William Morris Stewart

William M. Stewart
United States Senator
from Nevada
In office
February 1, 1865 – March 3, 1875
Preceded by (none)
Succeeded by William Sharon
In office
March 4, 1887 – March 3, 1905
Preceded by James G. Fair
Succeeded by George S. Nixon
5th California Attorney General
In office
1854–1854
Preceded by John R. McConnell
Succeeded by William T. Wallace
Personal details
Born (1827-08-09)August 9, 1827
Galen, New York
Died April 23, 1909(1909-04-23) (aged 81)
Washington, D.C.
Political party Republican, Silver Republican (1893-1901)
Residence Virginia City
Profession Attorney

William Morris Stewart (August 9, 1827 – April 23, 1909) was an American lawyer and politician.

Biography

Stewart was born in Wayne County, New York. As a child he moved with his parents to Trumbull County, Ohio. As a young man he was a mathematics teacher in Ohio. In 1849 he began attending Yale University but left in 1850 to move to California. Like many young men during that time, he came to California because of the Gold Rush. He arrived in San Francisco, California and soon left to begin mining near Nevada City, California. In 1852 he stopped mining and decided to become a lawyer in Nevada City. He almost immediately became a district attorney, and served as attorney general of California briefly during 1854, at the age of 27.

In 1860 Stewart moved to Virginia City, Nevada where he participated in mining litigation and helped the development of the Comstock Lode. As Nevada was becoming a state in 1864, he helped the state develop its constitution. Stewart’s role as a lawyer and politician in Nevada has always been controversial. He was the territory’s leading lawyer in mining litigation, but his opponents accused him of bribing judges and juries.[1] Stewart accused the three Nevada territorial judges of being corrupt, and he barely escaped disbarment.[2]

Political career

In 1864, Stewart was elected to the United States Senate as a Republican. He served in the Senate from 1865 until 1875 when he retired and practiced law again in Nevada and California.[3] In 1873, Stewart's palatial residence, nicknamed Stewart's Castle, was built in Washington, D.C. and became a center of the city's social scene.[4][5] He was elected to the Senate again in 1887 and reelected in 1893 and 1899. During the 1890s he left the Republican Party to join the Silver Party, which supported the Free Silver movement.[3] He caucused with the Silver Republicans

During his many years in the Senate, Stewart drafted or co-authored important legislation, including several mining acts and laws urging land reclamation by irrigation. Most famously, Stewart is given credit for authoring in 1868 the Fifteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution protecting voting rights regardless of race, color, or previous condition of servitude. During his time as senator, Stewart received 50,000 acres of land for his service on the Committee on Pacific Railroads.[6] In 1871, President Ulysses S. Grant offered Stewart a seat on the United States Supreme Court. Stewart declined. Stewart was also involved in an international scandal where he promoted the sale of a worthless worked out Emma Silver Mine at Alta, Utah for millions of pounds to unsuspecting English citizens.[7]

Post political career

Stewart retired from the Senate in 1905. He was a co-founder of the city of Chevy Chase, Maryland, along with Francis G. Newlands, a fellow Senator from Nevada.[8] Stewart remained in Washington, D.C. and died there four years later. He was cremated and the ashes were originally kept in Laurel Hill Cemetery in San Francisco before being moved to Holy Cross Cemetery in Colma, California.[9] Note: According to the book Reminiscences of William M. Stewart (1908) in May 1905 he moved to the Bullfrog Mining District (Nevada) with his new wife and her daughter where he started a law firm and law library.

References

  1. ↑ Grant H. Smith, 1943, The History of the Comstock Lode, Univ. of Nevada Bulletin, v.37, n.3, p.69.
  2. ↑ Dan Plazak, 2006, A Hole in the Ground with a Liar at the Top, Salt Lake City: Univ. of Utah Press, ISBN 0-87480-840-5, p.26-27.
  3. 1 2 "Senators Who Changed Parties During Senate Service (Since 1890)". United States Senate. Retrieved February 6, 2017.
  4. ↑ Hansen, Stephen A. (2014). A History of Dupont Circle: Center of High Society in the Capital. Charleston, South Carolina: Arcadia Publishing. pp. 31–44. ISBN 9781625850843.
  5. ↑ Goode, James M. (2003). Capital Losses: A Cultural History of Washington's Destroyed Buildings (Second Edition). Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press. pp. 96–97. ISBN 1-58834-105-4.
  6. ↑ Faragher, John Mack (2006). Out of Many: A History of the American People, 5th Edition. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Prentice Hall. p. 505.
  7. ↑ E.G.D. (October 9, 1893). "New York Times". The New York Times.
  8. ↑ http://www.chevychasehistory.org/content/view/3/144/
  9. ↑ William Morris Stewart (1827 - 1909) - Find A Grave Memorial

His story was dramatized in an early episode of the TV western series, "Death Valley Days."

U.S. Senate
Preceded by
(none)		 U.S. Senator (Class 1) from Nevada
1865–1875
Served alongside: James W. Nye, John P. Jones		 Succeeded by
William Sharon
Preceded by
James G. Fair		 U.S. Senator (Class 1) from Nevada
1887–1905
Served alongside: John P. Jones, Francis G. Newlands		 Succeeded by
George S. Nixon
Legal offices
Preceded by
John R. McConnell		 California Attorney General
1854 		Succeeded by
William T. Wallace
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