Emerson Etheridge

Emerson Etheridge ( born September 28, 1819 Currituck County, North Carolina; † 21 October 1902 in Dresden, Tennessee ) was an American politician. From 1853 to 1857, and again from 1859 to 1861, he represented the state of Tennessee in the U.S. House of Representatives.

Career

In 1831, Emerson Etheridge came with his parents to Tennessee, where he attended the public schools. After a subsequent study of law and its made ​​in 1840 admitted to the bar he began in Dresden to work in his new profession. At the same time he proposed as a member of the Whig Party launched a political career. From 1845 to 1847 he was a member of the House of Representatives from Tennessee.

In the congressional elections of 1852, Etheridge was the ninth constituency of Tennessee in the U.S. House of Representatives in Washington DC chosen, where he became the successor of Isham G. Harris on March 4, 1853. After a re-election he was able to complete in Congress until March 3, 1857 two legislative sessions. These were determined by the events and discussions that preceded the Civil War. Since 1855, Etheridge took the short-lived American Party in Congress. In 1856 he was defeated by Democrat John DeWitt Clinton Atkins.

In the 1858 elections Etheridge was elected as a candidate of the opposition party again in the ninth district of his state in Congress, where he replaced Atkins again on March 4, 1859. Until March 3, 1861, he could spend another term in the U.S. House of Representatives, which was marked by the impending civil war. During this time, Etheridge was chairman of the Indian Committee. He was an opponent of secession and a loyal supporter of the Union. Between 1861 and 1863 he served as Clerk of the House of Representatives in the Congress government. In 1867 he ran unsuccessfully for the post of governor of Tennessee: He defeated the Republican incumbent William Gannaway Brownlow significantly with 23:77 percent of the vote. Then he sat in the years 1869 and 1870 in the Senate of Tennessee. His last public office Etheridge 1891-1894 as head of the customs authority in Memphis. He died on 21 October 1902 in Dresden.