Originally a lawyer, he had for many years devoted his attention to farming.

He had acquired prominence in his party by carefully preparing and accurately committing to memory a political oration each year, which he delivered at the Democratic State Convention.

He was an upright, good-natured man, with extreme Democratic views always amiably expressed .-- John P.
Stockton, who was deprived of his seat three years before under circumstances which seemed to impose a hardship upon him, now entered with undisputed credentials from New Jersey.
The senators first admitted from the reconstructed States were about equally divided between native Southerners and those who had gone from the North at the close of the war; but all were Republicans except one in Virginia and one in Georgia.

John F.Lewis and John W.Johnston were natives of the state, belonging to old and influential families.
The former was a Republican; the latter a Democrat .-- In North Carolina, John Pool was an old Whig, prominent in the politics of his State before the war.

Joseph C.Abbot was from New Hampshire, a Brigadier-General in the Union Army .-- Thomas J.Robertson of South Carolina was a native of the State, and Frederick A.Sawyer was from Massachusetts, but had lived in the State since 1859 .-- Joshua Hill and Thomas M.Norwood of Georgia were both Southern men by birth.