Josiah M. Anderson

Josiah McNair Anderson (* November 29, 1807 in Pikeville, Bledsoe County, Tennessee, † November 8, 1861 in Whitwell, Tennessee ) was an American politician. Between 1849 and 1851 he represented the state of Tennessee in the U.S. House of Representatives.

Career

Josiah Anderson attended the public schools of his home. After a subsequent study of law and qualifying as a lawyer, he began in Jasper to work in his new profession. At the same time he embarked on a political career. Mid-1830s he joined the newly formed Whig Party. From 1833 to 1837 he was a member and Chairman of the House of Representatives from Tennessee; 1843-1845 he was a member of the State Senate and was its president, he served also.

In the congressional elections of 1848 he was in the third electoral district of Tennessee in the U.S. House of Representatives in Washington DC chosen, where he became the successor of John Hervey Crozier on March 4, 1849. Since he Democrat William Montgomery Churchwell defeated in 1850, he was able to complete only one term in Congress until March 3, 1851.

In 1861, Anderson was a delegate to an unsuccessful conference in Washington, at the last minute of the outbreak of the civil war should be prevented. Anderson supported the cause of the South and became a colonel in the state militia of Tennessee. On 8 November 1861 he held a speech in which he justified the secession near the town of Whitwell. Shortly after the end of this speech, he was assassinated by political opponents.