Joseph B. Foraker
Joseph Benson Foraker was an American politician of the Republican Party who served as the 37th governor of Ohio from 1886 to 1890 and as a United States senator from Ohio from 1897 until 1909.
Foraker was born in rural Ohio; he enlisted at age 16 in the Union Army during the American Civil War. He fought for almost three years, attaining the rank of captain. After the war, he was a member of Cornell University's first graduating class, and became a lawyer. He was elected a judge in 1879 and became known as a political speaker. He was defeated in his first run for the governorship in 1883, but was elected two years later. As Ohio governor, he built an alliance with the Republican Party "boss" Mark Hanna, but fell out with him in 1888. Foraker was defeated for reelection in 1889, but was elected U.S. senator by the Ohio General Assembly in 1896, after an unsuccessful bid for that office in 1892.
In the Senate, he supported the Spanish–American War and the annexation of the Philippines and Puerto Rico; the Foraker Act gave Puerto Rico its first civil government under American rule. He came to differ with President Theodore Roosevelt over railroad regulation and political patronage. Their largest disagreement was over the Brownsville Affair, in which black soldiers were accused of terrorizing a Texas town, and Roosevelt dismissed the entire battalion. Foraker zealously opposed Roosevelt's actions as unfair, and fought for the soldiers' reinstatement. The two men's disagreement broke out into an angry confrontation at the 1907 Gridiron Dinner, after which Roosevelt worked to defeat Foraker's re-election bid. Foraker died in 1917; in 1972, the Army reversed the dismissals and cleared the soldiers. Mount Foraker, the second highest peak in the Alaska Range, and the third highest peak in the United States, was named for him in 1899.
Early life and career
Boyhood and Civil War
Joseph Benson Foraker was born on July 5, 1846, on a farm about north of Rainsboro, Ohio, in Highland County. He was the son of Henry and Margaret Foraker, and one of 11 children, of whom nine reached adulthood. The house in which Joseph Foraker was born was a comfortable two-story residence; his later campaign publications often depicted it as a log cabin. When Joseph was age 2, David Reece died, and the Foraker family purchased the mill and adjacent farm. There, Joseph grew up as a typical farm boy. He received little formal education, attending the local school for three or four months each winter. Nevertheless, he acquired a taste for military history, and a gift for speaking. At age 10, he became an adherent of the newly formed Republican Party. Four years later, he supported the Republican candidate, former Illinois representative Abraham Lincoln, in the 1860 presidential race, marching in processions of the Wide Awakes and other pro-Lincoln groups, and attending as many rallies as he could. Impressed enough by one speaker to follow him to a neighboring town, he learned not to make the same speech twice in two days—at least, not in venues close to each other.In October 1861, Foraker left his parents' home to go to the county seat of Hillsboro where he was to live with his uncle, James Reece, auditor of Highland County, and work as a clerk in his office. He was sent to replace his older brother, Burch, by then enlisted in the Union Army as the American Civil War was raging. Foraker noted in his memoirs that while his time as auditor's clerk greatly improved his penmanship, it also brought him into contact with many county officials, teaching him how government worked. The young clerk was impressed by his brother's letters home, and was anxious to join the army despite his young age. Soon after his 16th birthday, Joseph Foraker learned that a family friend was organizing a volunteer company, and sought to enlist. His uncle gave reluctant consent, and on July 14, 1862, Foraker was mustered in Company "A", 89th Ohio Volunteer Infantry; in late August, after training, he became second sergeant. With Confederate forces moving through Kentucky and threatening Cincinnati, the 89th was hurried into defenses set up across the Ohio River in Newport, Kentucky. The Confederates did not reach the Ohio, having been forced back well to the south, and the 89th moved to Fort Shaler, near Newport. While Foraker was at Fort Shaler, President Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation; Foraker recounted in his memoirs that he and his comrades felt that the proclamation meant that they were fighting for the end of slavery, not just to preserve the Union.
Later in September 1862, the 89th was sent to Western Virginia to reinforce Union forces there, and joined in their advance for a month. The regiment settled into winter quarters, but was called out for transport to Tennessee, where it helped relieve Fort Donelson in February 1863. Before this action, Foraker had seen little fighting, and the bloody scenes there were a shock to him; he wrote his parents, "To know how dreadful war is you must see it yourself." The 89th remained at Donelson only a few days before being sent to join the Army of the Cumberland under the command of Major General William Rosecrans near Carthage; there, Foraker was promoted to second lieutenant. In June, Foraker led an advance guard that clashed with the Confederate rear in what developed into the Battle of Hoover's Gap, and the Union forces slowly advanced across Tennessee, reaching Chattanooga in September. From Chattanooga, Foraker and two other officers were sent home to collect new soldiers who were expected to be drafted, but the plan to draft recruits was abandoned due to political opposition. In November he returned to Chattanooga, where the 89th was now part of the Army of the Tennessee under Brigadier General William Tecumseh Sherman, in time to fight in the Battle of Missionary Ridge.
In May 1864, Sherman began his Atlanta campaign. Foraker fought in several fierce battles in that campaign, including Resaca, New Hope Church, and Kennesaw Mountain. Atlanta, or at least what was left of it after devastating fires, fell on September 2. Foraker was detailed to the Signal Corps school that had been set up by the army at Atlanta, and spent a month there. He was then assigned to Major General Henry W. Slocum's division, and remained with that division as it participated in Sherman's March to the Sea, leaving a swath of destruction behind. In late December 1864, the army reached Savannah, and Foraker, despite a storm, was able to communicate with US Navy ships offshore to alert them to the presence of Sherman's army. After a month, the army marched north into South Carolina, determined to bring even more devastation to the state that had first seceded. Foraker was in charge of maintaining signals between the wings of the army, and was stationed on a gunboat as it moved up the Savannah River. He saw more active duty as a courier between Sherman's main army and Slocum's forces in March 1865 as they met Confederate forces in North Carolina in the Battle of Bentonville. On the day of the battle, March 19, 1865, Foraker was promoted to brevet captain, and was soon thereafter made aide-de-camp to General Slocum. In April, as Sherman's army moved slowly northward, word came of the surrender of Confederate general Robert E. Lee and his forces at Appomattox, Virginia, effectively ending the war. In early May, Sherman's Army of Georgia journeyed north towards Washington, passing in review on May 23 before President Andrew Johnson, sworn in after Lincoln's assassination the previous month. Foraker soon returned to Ohio, and was mustered out.
Education and early career
Foraker had been anxious to become a lawyer while a clerk for his uncle; with peace restored he enrolled for a year at Salem Academy and then in 1866 Ohio Wesleyan University in Delaware, Ohio. He found the students who had not served in the army to be immature. He took the usual course, mostly of classics, with a few classes in the sciences, and registered as a clerk for a local attorney. Foraker courted Julia Bundy, daughter of Congressman Hezekiah S. Bundy and a student at nearby Ohio Wesleyan Female College; the two married in 1870. In 1868, he learned that newly founded Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, was offering entrance by examination to students willing to transfer. Along with fellow Ohio Wesleyan students Morris Lyon Buchwalter and John Andrew Rea, Foraker enrolled at Cornell; the three founded the first New York State chapter of Phi Kappa Psi fraternity, and in 1869 graduated as part of Cornell's inaugural class of eight students. Foraker, in later years, served as a trustee of Cornell, elected by his fellow alumni.After graduating from Cornell, Foraker moved to Cincinnati, where he resumed his study of law with a local firm; he was admitted to the bar in October 1869. Foraker's first job in the legal profession was as a notary public; he wrote in his memoirs how time-consuming depositions were in the days before typewriters. Foraker wrote that he earned $600 in his first year as a lawyer, but by the fourth year was earning $2,700; "after that it was easy".
The Forakers lived in a boarding house on Elm Street in Cincinnati for two years after their wedding in 1870. They then moved to a house in the suburb of Norwood and in 1879 built a home in upscale Mount Auburn. Joseph Foraker had initially intended to concentrate on his law practice, but in the early 1870s became a well-regarded speaker for the Republicans. In 1872, Foraker campaigned for President Ulysses S. Grant's successful re-election bid. In 1875, he was for the first time a delegate to the Republican state convention, supporting fellow Cincinnatian Alphonso Taft for governor. However, Taft was defeated for the nomination by the incumbent, Rutherford B. Hayes, who that fall broke Ohio precedent by winning a third two-year term. The following year, Foraker attended the 1876 Republican National Convention as a spectator, and listened spellbound as Robert Ingersoll dramatically nominated Maine Senator James G. Blaine for president, calling him a "plumed knight". While Ingersoll's speech gained Blaine a lasting nickname, it did not procure him the nomination, which fell to Governor Hayes. Foraker supported Hayes, who was elected that fall in a close and controversial election.
In 1876, Foraker ran for judge of the Court of Common Pleas. Election fraud by Democratic political boss Eph Howard defeated Foraker and the rest of the Republican ticket. In 1878, he ran for state's attorney for Hamilton County but was defeated in another Democratic sweep. In 1879, Foraker won his first elective office, as judge of the Superior Court of Cincinnati. He served three years of a five-year term, resigning in 1882 due to an illness, though he recovered after several months' rest.
In 1881 Foraker became a charter member of the Ohio Commandery of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States - a military society of veteran officers of the Union armed forces and their descendants. He was assigned national insignia number 2179 and Ohio Commandery number 21.