Levi Parsons MORTON, Congress, NY (1824-1920)

MORTON, Levi Parsons, a Representative from New York and a Vice President of the United States; born in Shoreham, Addison County, Vt., May 16, 1824; attended the public schools and Shoreham Academy; clerk in a general store in Enfield, Mass., 1838-1840; taught school in Boscawen, N.H., in 1840 and 1841; engaged in mercantile pursuits in Hanover, N.H., in 1845; moved to Boston in 1850; entered the dry-goods business in New York City in 1854; engaged in banking in New York City in 1863; unsuccessful candidate for election in 1876 to the Forty-fifth Congress; was appointed by President Rutherford Hayes honorary commissioner to the Paris Exhibition of 1878; elected as a Republican to the Forty-sixth and Forty-seventh Congresses and served from March 4, 1879, until his resignation, effective March 21, 1881; United States Minister to France 1881-1885; elected Vice President of the United States on the Republican ticket with Benjamin Harrison and served from March 4, 1889, to March 3, 1893; Governor of New York 1895-1897; was an investor in real estate; died in Rhinebeck, Dutchess County, N.Y., on May 16, 1920; interment in the Rhinebeck Cemetery.

Bibliography

McElroy, Robert. Levi Parsons Morton: Banker, Diplomat, and Statesman. 1930. Reprint, New York: Arno Press, 1975.

Source: Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, 1771-Present