Joseph Henry Sweney

Joseph Henry Sweney ( born October 2, 1845 Warren County, Pennsylvania, † November 11, 1918 in Norfolk, Virginia ) was an American politician. Between 1889 and 1891 he represented the state of Iowa in the U.S. House of Representatives.

Career

Joseph Sweney attended the public schools in Pennsylvania and Iowa. During the Civil War he was, despite his youth, a soldier in the army of the Union. After the war he spent four years as a colonel in the National Guard of Iowa. After that, he was Chief of Staff of this unit. After studying law at the University of Iowa in Iowa City and its made ​​in 1880 admitted to the bar, he began practicing in Osage in his new profession. He was also engaged in farming. He also went into the banking business.

Sweney was a member of the Republican Party. Between 1883 and 1891 he sat in the Senate of Iowa; In 1886 he was its acting president. In the congressional elections of 1888 Sweney was in the fourth electoral district of Iowa in the U.S. House of Representatives in Washington DC chosen, where he became the successor of William E. Fuller on March 4, 1889. Since he Democrat Walter Butler Half defeated in the elections of 1890, he was able to complete only one term in Congress until March 3, 1891.

After the end of his time in the U.S. House of Representatives, Joseph Sweney withdrew from politics. In the following years he worked again as a lawyer. He died on 11 November 1918 during a visit to Norfolk ( Virginia) and was buried in Osage.