| Warren County
Local History by Dallas Bogan |
| Contributor: |
Dallas Bogan on 27 September 2004 |
Source: |
The following is taken from Dallas Bogan's book, "The Pioneer Writings of Josiah Morrow." |
| Return to Index to see a list of other articles by Dallas Bogan |
In our sketches of the distinguished men of Warren county we have thus far
considered only those who were most distinguished as judges. We found that our
county in its early history was notable for the number of its citizens honored
with high positions on the bench. Three were successfully president judges of
a large circuit, two were judges of the supreme court of Ohio, and John
McLean was the first Ohioan to reach the supreme bench of the United
States.
We will now consider the two men of the county who were most highly honored
with civil offices--Jeremiah
Morrow and Thomas
Corwin. Both these men were elected to the office of governor by
the people and to the office of U.S. senator by the legislature; both, before
holding these high offices, had been elected for five successive terms to the
House of representatives and both were honored with other high official positions.
Both were singularly fortunate in their public careers and were looked upon
as among the most distinguished men of their time in the Buckeye state.
The fact is noteworthy in the early history of Ohio that under the first constitution
of the state, the life of which was nearly fifty years, the governor was the
only officer of state elected by the people and from only two counties did the
people elect more than one governor. These were Ross and Warren--the former
much more populous than the latter. While Edward Tiffin and
Thomas Worthington of Ross, were both senators as well as governors
and were among the most distinguished men of early Ohio, both Morrow
and Corwin were more frequently honored with high offices than
the two Ross county men.
Morrow was much older than Corwin and was
governor of the state when the younger man first served in the legislature.
The two men were warm personal friends. Both were Jeffersonian Democrats before
the division of that party and both became whigs in the contests between Jackson
and Clay.
This pioneer came to the Miami country in the spring of 1795 and stopped for
a year or two at the mouth of the Little Miami. He was twenty-three years of
age and had received in his native state of Pennsylvania a good English education,
largely by reading and studying. He had settled on the land he had purchased
on the Little Miami near where Foster now is; he engaged chiefly in surveying
land for the settlers. Cincinnati at this time was a little village. He became
favorably known for his wide intelligence and the year after his settling in
his log cabin on the Little Miami he was first elected to office by being chosen
a representative to the territorial legislature. From this time for more than
forty years he was almost constantly in public office. In 1843, being over 70
years of age, he declined further public service.
He was a member of the convention which framed the first constitution of Ohio
and no man in the state held so many high offices under that constitution as
he. Of no other governor of Ohio can it be said that he served in both houses
of the legislature and in both houses of congress. He was the first representative
to congress from Ohio and for ten years he was the sole representative. He was
then chosen senator and a full term and afterward twice elected governor. He
was never defeated when a candidate.
He served sixteen consecutive years in congress and during most of this time
he was chairman of the committee on Public Lands, both in the house and the
senate. Henry Clay said: "No man, in the sphere within
which he acted ever commanded or deserved the implicit confidence of congress
more than Jeremiah Morrow."
Gov. Charles Anderson, who knew him intimately wrote: "If
I were compelled to choose and name the one ablest and best of all the governors,
it would be this Jeremiah Morrow of Warren county. He had so
many exact yet varied and extensive knowledges, with such accuracy and aptness
of memory and citation that I am compelled to adjudge him a high place, as well
in scholarship as statesman."
The second governor of Ohio furnished by Warren county was Thomas
Corwin. Born in Kentucky his boyhood from the age of four years was
passed on a farm one mile northeast of Lebanon. Denied the privilege of attending
a high school or academy, he acquired a good English education chiefly by home
reading. He was admitted to the bar before he was twenty-three and soon became
the leading lawyer at Lebanon.
In politics he was remarkably successful and soon became the most brilliant
and popular of the leaders of the Whig party in Ohio. He was three times elected
to the legislature, five times to congress and then was elected governor by
the largest majority any candidate had received for any office in Ohio. He was
afterwards U.S. senator and secretary of the treasury in Fillmore's cabinet.
His last office was minister to Mexico to which he was appointed by Lincoln.
His most famous speech was delivered in the senate against the Mexican war.
It was one of the bravest ever spoken in congress. A fact in his political life
is early remembered. He was a candidate for office more than a dozen times and
was never defeated but once. His sole defeat was in 1842 when a candidate for
re-election as governor. This was five years before his denunciation of our
war with Mexico.
Successful as was Corwin in reaching high offices, in his state
and in the nation, he was most eminent as an orator. His oratorical powers were
the gift of nature and more than one writer has pronounced him a natural orator.
He was undoubtedly the most famous orator Ohio had produced. John Sherman
pronounced him "certainly the greatest popular orator of his time,"
and Andrew D. White said he was "the most famous stump
speaker of his time, perhaps of all time."
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This page created 27 September 2004 and last updated
28 September, 2008
© 2004 Arne H Trelvik
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