Benjamin F. Harding

Benjamin Franklin Harding ( * January 4, 1823 in Tunkhannock, Wyoming County, Pennsylvania, † June 16, 1899 in Cottage Grove, Oregon ) was an American politician (Democratic Party), who represented the state of Oregon in the U.S. Senate.

Benjamin Harding attended the public schools and studied law afterwards. He was admitted to the bar in 1847 and opened two years later, a law firm in Joliet (Illinois ). In 1850, he moved first to California, then later in the Oregon Territory.

In the same year he started there is also a political career and was elected as a representative of the Marion County in the Legislature of the Territory. Two years later he was again elected to the territorial parliament and served there as a speaker. After 1853 exercised the office of the United States Attorney for the District Oregon, he served in 1854-1859 the post of territorial secretary, which later became the Secretary of state was.

Shortly before the accession of Oregon to the United States Benjamin Harding in 1858 elected to the House of Representatives of the future state, but which only briefly met this year and recorded its actual operation only after admission to the Union in February 1859. 1860 Harding was elected as a representative of the Marion County again to Parliament, in which he was speaker in turn.

On September 12, 1862 Benjamin Harding moved into the U.S. Senate. He had won the by-election for the vacant place of the late Edward Dickinson Baker; the direct as his successor appointed Benjamin Stark had not applied for the mandate. After the end of his term on March 3, 1865 Harding retired from the Senate. He sat down on his farm near Salem to rest; A few years later he moved to Cottage Grove, where he died in 1899.