Benjamin Helm Bristow (June 20, 1832 – June 22, 1896) was an American lawyer and politician who served as the 30th U.S. Treasury Secretary and the first Solicitor General.
A Union military officer, Bristow was a Republican Party reformer and civil rights advocate. During his tenure as Secretary of the Treasury, he is primarily known for breaking up and prosecuting the Whiskey Ring at the behest of President Grant, a corrupt tax evasion profiteering ring that depleted the national treasury. Additionally, Bristow promoted gold standard currency rather than paper money. Bristow was one of Grant's most popular Cabinet members among reformers. Bristow supported Grant's Resumption of Specie Act of 1875, that helped stabilize the economy during the Panic of 1873. As the United States' first solicitor general, Bristow aided President Ulysses S. Grant and Attorney General Amos T. Akerman's vigorous and thorough prosecution and destruction of the Ku Klux Klan in the Reconstructed South.Department of Justice, Benjamin Bristow Solicitor General Bristow advocated for African American citizens in Kentucky to be allowed to testify in a white man's court case. He also advocated education for all races to be paid for by public funding.
A native of Kentucky, Bristow was the son of a prominent Whig Unionist and attorney. Having graduated from Jefferson College in Pennsylvania in 1851, Bristow studied law and passed the bar in 1853, working as an attorney until the outbreak of the American Civil War in 1861. Fighting for the Union, Bristow served in the army during the American Civil War and was promoted to colonel. Wounded at the Battle of Shiloh, Bristow recuperated and was promoted to lieutenant colonel. In 1863, Bristow was elected Kentucky state Senator, serving only one term. At the end of the Civil War, Bristow was appointed assistant to the U.S. District Attorney serving in the Louisville area. In 1866, Bristow was appointed U.S. District attorney, serving in the Louisville area.
In 1870, Bristow was appointed the United States' first U.S. Solicitor General, who aided the U.S. Attorney General by arguing cases before the U.S. Supreme Court. In 1874, Bristow was appointed U.S. Secretary of the Treasury by President Ulysses S. Grant. Initially Grant gave Bristow his full support during Bristow's popular prosecution of the Whiskey Ring. However, when Bristow and Grant's Attorney General Edwards Pierrepont, another reforming Cabinet member, uncovered that Orville Babcock, Grant's personal secretary, was involved in the ring, Grant's relationship with Bristow cooled. In June 1876, due to friction over Bristow's zealous prosecution of the Whiskey Ring and rumor that Bristow was interested in running for the U.S. presidency, Bristow resigned from President Grant's Cabinet on his 44th birthday. During the 1876 United States presidential election, Bristow made an unsuccessful attempt at gaining the Republican presidential ticket, running as a Republican reformer. The Republicans, however, chose Rutherford B. Hayes. After the 1876 presidential election, Bristow returned to private practice in New York. He formed a successful law practice in 1878, often arguing cases before the U.S. Supreme Court until his death in 1896.
Bristow was credited, by historian Jean Edward Smith, as one of Grant's best cabinet choices. Reformers were generally pleased by Secretary Bristow's overall prosecution of the Whiskey Ring, and looked to him for cleaning up government corruption. Historians have also given credit for Bristow, America's first Solicitor General, for prosecuting the Ku Klux Klan. Bristow, however, had an ambitious, contentious nature, and at times this led to various feuds with Grant cabinet members. Bristow, a native of Kentucky, represented the Southern United States on Grant's cabinet, during Grant's second term.
Early life
Benjamin Helm Bristow was born in Edwards Hall on June 20, 1832, in Elkton, Kentucky, United States.Boone, George Street. . National Park Service, 1973-07-10, 3. Bristow was the son of Francis M. Bristow and his wife Emily Helm. This work in turn cites:
Whiskey Frauds, 44th Congress, 1st Session, Mis. Doc. No. 186. McDonald, John, Secrets of the Great Whiskey Ring, Chicago, 1880. A book by one concerned and to be considered in that light: John McDonald was supervisor of internal revenue at St Louis for nearly six years. Francis was a prominent lawyer and Whig member of Congress in 1854–1855 and 1859–1861. Edwards Hall was the home of his late grandfather, Benjamin Edwards. Bristow graduated at Jefferson College, Washington, Pennsylvania, in 1851, studied law under his father, and was admitted to the Kentucky bar in 1853. For a while Bristow worked as a law partner for his father. His father later became a strong anti-slavery Unionist. His father's political anti-slavery and Whig views strongly influenced Bristow's own political outlook.
Marriage and family On November 21, 1854, aged 22, Bristow married Abbie S. Briscoe. Benjamin and Abbie had two children one son, William A. Bristow, and one daughter Nannie Bristow. William was an attorney who worked in Bristow's New York law firm Bristow, Opdyke, & Willcox. In June 1896 William was in London recovering from typhoid fever. Nannie married Eben S. Sumner a Massachusetts textile businessman and politician.
Kentucky law practice (1858–1861) In 1858, Bristow and his wife Abbie moved to Hopkinsville, Kentucky. Bristow practiced law until the outbreak of the Civil War.
American Civil War (1861–1863)
In December 1860, after Abraham Lincoln was elected, the South seceded from the Union and formed the Confederacy (1861), primarily to protect the institution of slavery, profitable cotton plantations, and resistance to black integration and citizenship.Chadwick, French Esnor. Causes of the civil war, 1859–1861 (1906) p. 8 President James Buchanan, sympathetic to the South, did virtually nothing to contain Southern secession, prior to Lincoln's March 4, 1861, Inauguration. At the beginning of the Civil War in 1861, Bristow, an ardent Unionist, joined the Union Army, and mustered the 25th Kentucky Infantry . On September 21, 1861, Bristow was appointed lieutenant colonel of the 25th Kentucky Infantry. Bristow fought under General Ulysses S. Grant and served bravely at three battles, Fort Henry, Fort Donelson, and Shiloh, at the latter he was injured.
In April 1862, General Grant and most of his Union Army were encamped at Pittsburg Landing, and had planned to attack Corinth, a Confederate stronghold. The Confederates, however attacked in full force, that surprised Grant's unentrenched Union Army. Grant and his men were able to hold off the Confederate Army, although one Union division was captured. The next day, after Grant received reinforcements, the Union Army attacked the Confederates in full force and pushed the Southern Army back to Corinth. At this two day Battle of Shiloh in Tennessee, Bristow was severely wounded by an exploding shell over his head and temporarily forced to retire from field duty in order to recover from his injury. The force and noise of the explosion left Bristow deaf and unconscious, unable to command. Bristow was replaced by Major William B. Wall. After his recuperation, Bristow returned to field service during the summer of 1862 and helped recruit the 8th Kentucky Cavalry.
On September 8, 1862, Bristow was commissioned lieutenant colonel over the 8th Kentucky Cavalry. Bristow assumed command of the 8th Kentucky Cavalry in January 1863 after Col. James M. Shackleford, the previous commander, was promoted brigadier general. On April 1, 1863, Bristow was promoted to colonel and continued his command over the 8th Kentucky Cavalry. In July 1863 Col. Bristow and the Kentucky 8th Cavalry assisted in the capture of John Hunt Morgan during his July 1863 raid through Indiana and Ohio.
Kentucky state senator (1863–1865) Bristow was honorably discharged from service in the Union Army on September 23, 1863, having been elected to the sixth district of the Kentucky Senate, which comprised Christian and Todd Counties. Bristow had not known he had been elected to the senate; he later resigned from the body in 1865 before the expiration of his four-year term. Bristow supported all Union war effort legislation, the presidential election of Abraham Lincoln in 1864, and the passage of the Thirteenth Amendment that outlawed slavery.
U.S. District Attorney (1866–1870)
In 1865, Bristow was appointed assistant to the United States Attorney. In 1866, Bristow was appointed district attorney for the Louisville, Kentucky district. As district attorney, he was renowned for his vigor in enforcing the 1866 U.S. Civil Rights Act. Bristow served as district attorney until 1870 and spent a few months practicing law in partnership with future United States Supreme Court Justice John Harlan.
First U.S. Solicitor General (1870–1872)
Prosecuted Ku Klux Klan
In 1870, Congress created the U.S. Department of Justice, in part, to aid in the enforcement of U.S. Congressional Reconstruction laws and U.S. Constitutional amendments. On October 4, 1870, Bristow was appointed the first incumbent U.S. Solicitor General by President Ulysses S. Grant and served until November 12, 1872, having resigned the office. Bristow and U.S. Attorney General Amos Akerman prosecuted thousands of Klansmen that resulted in a brief two-year quiet period during the turbulent Reconstruction Era in the South. In 1873 President Grant nominated him Attorney General of the United States in case then Attorney General George H. Williams was confirmed as Chief Justice of the United States, a contingency which did not arise.
Feud with Akerman On the verge of prosecuting the Ku Klux Klan in mid-September 1871, Bristow in Washington launched a treacherous attack on his boss Akerman's reputation, while Akerman was fighting lawlessness in the South. After Grant returned from a trip to Dayton, Ohio, Bristow, wanting Akerman's cabinet post, told Grant that Akerman was "too small" for the job of Attorney General and he was not respected "by the Court & the profession generally". Bristow went so far as to call Akerman a "dead weight on the administration". Grant was shocked at Bristow's view of Akerman and surprised that Bristow had prodded Grant to get him fired by Grant. Grant refused to consider firing Akerman, telling Bristow that Akerman was thoroughly honest and an earnest man. Grant kept Akerman on the cabinet while Bristow retained his job of Solicitor General.
Civil rights speech In 1871, Bristow traveled to his native Kentucky state and in a speech advocated African American civil rights. Bristow advocated that blacks be given the right to testify in juries. At this time Kentucky law forbade the 225,000 black U.S. citizens from testifying in any civil or criminal case involving a white man. He stated the Kentucky law that denied African Americans the right to testify in a white man's case had roots in slavery and was a "monstrous and grievous wrong to both races." Bristow stated that the Ku Klux Klan Act and the previous Civil Rights acts passed by the U.S. Congress were designed to protect the "humblest citizens" from lawbreakers. Bristow stated he would "tax the rich man's property to educate his poor neighbor's child", and he would "tax the white man's property to educate the black man's child." Bristow advocated free universal education and all property in Kentucky be taxed to pay for schools.New York Times (June 16, 1876), Nomination of Benjamin H. Bristow
Secretary of the Treasury (1874–1876)