John P. C. Shanks

John Peter Cleaver Shanks ( born June 17, 1826 in Martinsburg, Virginia; † January 23, 1901 in Portland, Indiana ) was an American politician. Between 1861 and 1875 he represented two times the state of Indiana in the U.S. House of Representatives.

Career

John Shanks was born in 1826 in Martinsburg in what is now West Virginia. He enjoyed a good basic education. After a subsequent study of law and its made ​​in 1848 admitted to the bar he began in Portland (Indiana) to work in his new profession. In the years 1850 and 1851 he was a prosecutor in Jay County. Politically, he joined the Republican Party, founded in 1854. In 1855 he was elected to the House of Representatives from Indiana. In the congressional elections of 1860 Shanks was in the eleventh electoral district of Indiana in the U.S. House of Representatives in Washington DC chosen, where he became the successor of John U. Pettit on March 4, 1861. Since he has not been confirmed in 1862, he was initially able to do only one term in Congress until March 3, 1863. This was marked by the events of the Civil War.

During the Civil War Shanks served as a colonel in the army of the Union. In the 1866 elections, he was re-elected in the eleventh district of his state in Congress, where he replaced Thomas N. Stilwell on March 4, 1867. After three re- elections, he could spend up to March 3, 1875 four further terms in the U.S. House of Representatives. Since 1869 he represented there as a successor of the new Vice-President Schuyler Colfax, the ninth district of Indiana. Until 1869 Shanks experienced the violent quarrels between his party and President Andrew Johnson, which culminated in a nearly failed impeachment proceedings against this. In the years 1868 and 1870, the 14th and the 15th Amendment to the Constitution were ratified. Between 1869 and 1871 Shanks was chairman of the Militia Committee; 1871 to 1873 he headed the Indian Committee.

In 1874, Shanks has not been nominated by his party for re-election. After his retirement from the U.S. House of Representatives, he practiced as a lawyer again. In 1879 he was elected again to the House of Representatives from Indiana. John Shanks died on January 23, 1901 in Portland.