American statesman, born in Campbell County, KY, on the 5th of September 1835; taught school in the county, and afterward at Covington; was admitted to the bar in 1858, and was a member of the House of Representatives from 1859 to 1861. He was elected to the state senate in 1866, and re-elected in 1869; he was also a delegate-at-large from Kentucky to the national Democratic convention in 1868. He resigned his seat in the Senate in June 1871, and was the same year elected lieutenant-governor, serving until September 1875. The year following he was alternate Presidential elector for the state at large. He was a member of consecutive Congresses from the Forty-fifth to the Fifty-first, both inclusive, and was speaker in the Forty-eighth, Forty-ninth and Fiftieth Congresses. In 1890 he was elected to the United States Senate as a Democrat, to fill the unexpired term of James B. Beck, and in March 1893, was appointed Secretary of the Treasury by Mr. Cleveland. In 1895–96 he took a firm stand in favor of the gold standard, making numerous speeches in various parts on the country, and was looked upon as one of the leaders of the “sound money” wing of his party.
