Zachariah Chandler
Zachariah Chandler was an American businessman, politician, and one of the founders of the Republican Party, whose radical wing he dominated as a lifelong abolitionist. He was mayor of Detroit, a four-term senator from the state of Michigan, and Secretary of the Interior under President Ulysses S. Grant.
As a successful young businessman in Detroit, Chandler supported the Underground Railroad. During the Civil War, he advocated for the Union war effort, the abolition of slavery, and civil rights for freed African Americans. As Secretary of the Interior, Chandler eradicated serious corruption in the Bureau of Indian Affairs, fully endorsing President Grant's Peace Policy initiative to civilize American Indian tribes. In 1879, he was re-elected U.S. Senator and was a potential presidential candidate, but he died the following morning after giving a speech in Chicago.
Chandler’s great great grandnephew is Rod Chandler, who was a U.S. representative from Washington state from 1983 to 1993.
Early life and career
Zachariah Chandler was born in Bedford, New Hampshire, on December 10, 1813. His father was Samuel Chandler and his mother was Margaret Orr. Through an entirely paternal line, Samuel Chandler was a descendant of William Chandler who had migrated to Roxbury, Massachusetts, from England in 1637. Through this line he was the seventh generation of his family born in North America. Margaret Orr was the oldest daughter of military officer Col. John Orr. Chandler was educated in the common schools. Upon graduation, deciding not to attend college, Chandler moved west in 1833 to Detroit, at that time the capital of Michigan Territory. In Detroit, Chandler opened a general store and through trade, banking, and land speculation became one of the wealthiest men in the state of Michigan.Marriage and family
On December 10, 1844, Chandler married Letitia Grace Douglas, a native of Baltimore, who moved to New York. A social entertainer, Letitia lived in Washington during the Winter throughout Chandler's career. Chandler and Letitia had one daughter, Mary Douglas Chandler, who married Senator Eugene Hale of Maine. Chandler's and Letitia's grandchildren included Frederick Hale, who was a long-serving U.S. Senator from Maine, and Chandler Hale, who served as a U.S. diplomat in Rome. Letitia, known to have a "gentle and kindly disposition" and to be "much beloved," died on February 19, 1899.Political career
From his youth, Chandler had been strongly opposed to slavery and hoped that the Northern Whig party would be able to stop Southern slave power from spreading slavery into the Western Territories. Chandler financially supported the Detroit Underground Railroad, which helped fugitive or runaway slaves find safe haven.In 1848 Chandler began his political career by making campaign speeches for the Whig Party presidential candidate Zachary Taylor. In 1851, Chandler was elected Mayor of Detroit and served one year in office. In 1852, Chandler ran as a Whig candidate for the Governor of Michigan, but he was defeated. Having supported Kansas as a free state without slavery, Chandler signed a petition that formed the Republican Party on July 6, 1854. In 1856, Chandler was a delegate at the first Republican Party National convention in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and was a member of the Republican National Committee. The Republican Convention that year nominated John C. Frémont for president, known as The Pathfinder, who wanted to rid Kansas of African American slavery and opposed the repeal of the Missouri Compromise.
U.S. Senator (1857–1875)
In January 1857, Chandler ran as a Republican and was elected as a U.S. Senator for Michigan, succeeding Lewis Cass. Chandler was reelected in 1863 and again in 1869, serving from March 4, 1857, to March 3, 1875, in the 35th through the 43rd U.S. Congresses. In the Senate Chandler allied himself with the anti-slavery Radicals, although he opposed Massachusetts Senator Charles Sumner. Chandler was the most outspoken Senator against secession. From March 1861 to 1875 Chandler was chairman of the Committee on Commerce that controlled powerful "pork barrel" appropriations for rivers and harbors. At the outbreak of the Civil War Chandler used his Senatorial influence to raise and equip the Michigan volunteers. Chandler was a member of the Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War.On July 6, 1862, Chandler castigated General George McClellan's prosecution of the war in a speech at Jackson, Michigan. Chandler regarded his speech against McClellan as one of his most important public services. Chandler's attack on McClellan came five days after McClellan failed to capture Richmond and the withdrawal of Union troops by McClellan to the James River during the Seven Days Battle that resulted in Confederate victory. On March 3, 1863, Chandler authored legislation for the collection and administration of abandoned property in the South. On July 2, 1864, Chandler authored legislation for the regulation of intercourse with the insurrectionist Confederate states.
Chandler supported higher tariff rates, the creation of a national bank, and voted for greenbacks as an emergency war measure, but strongly condemned any inflation of the currency. Chandler supported Reconstruction Acts that gave civil rights to African Americans but criticized reconstruction for being too lax. On January 5, 1866, Chandler authored a resolution for non-intercourse with Great Britain for refusing to negotiate the Alabama Claims, but this was rejected by the Senate. During the Civil War, Great Britain secretly allowed Confederate warships to be armed in British ports. These ships, including the CSS Alabama, did much to destroy Union commerce causing great monetary damage to the Union war effort. On November 29, 1867, in retaliation to Britain, Chandler submitted a resolution that Abyssinia be recognized as a belligerent nation at war against Great Britain, demanding that Abyssinia be given the "same rights which the British had recognized to the Confederacy" during the Civil War. During the election of 1868, Chandler was chairman of the Republican Congressional Committee.
Chandler was known as one of the Radical Republicans who pushed for harsher punishment for the former rebels, and greater liberties for African-Americans. After the war, he angrily stated that "Every man who murdered and stole and poisoned was a Democrat".
During his entire Senate career, Chandler used his Senatorial federal patronage to increase his own political power. Chandler's methods of obtaining power were considered "openly partisan and despotic if not actually corrupt" in obtaining control of the Republican machine in Michigan. Chandler was for many years Michigan's undisputed Republican boss. The Democratic landslide during the election of 1874 broke his Senatorial power and he was defeated by Isaac P. Christiancy while seeking election for a fourth term when the Michigan legislature deadlocked.