Elihu Benjamin Washburne (23 September 1816 – 22 October 1887) was a member of the US House of Representatives (W-IL 1) from 4 March 1853 to 3 March 1863 (succeeding William Bissell and preceding Isaac N. Arnold) and from IL-3 from 4 March 1863 to 6 March 1869 (succeeding Owen Lovejoy and preceding Horatio C. Burchard) and US Secretary of State from 5 to 16 March 1869 (succeeding William H. Seward and preceding Hamilton Fish).
Biography[]
Elihu Benjamin Washburne was born in Livermore, Maine in 1816, and he left Maine at the age of 14 to support himself and further his education. Washburne worked for newspapers and studied law before moving to Galena, Illinois and becoming a successful lawyer. He served in the US House of Representatives from 1853 to 1869, advocating Abraham Lincoln's war policy and sponsoring the rise of his neighbor Ulysses S. Grant in Republican politics. He became a leader of the Radical Republicans during Reconstruction, supporting African-American suffrage and civil rights. He went on to briefly serve as Secretary of State before serving as ambassador to France from 1869 to 1877, and, in 1880, he launched a failed presidential bid. He died in 1887.