Thomas A. Hendricks

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**Thomas Andrews Hendricks** (7 September 1819 – 20 May 1863) was an American politician and lawyer from Indiana. Hendricks represented Indiana in the U.S. House of Representatives (1851–55) and the U.S. Senate (1863). He also represented Shelby County, Indiana, in the Indiana General Assembly (1848–50) and as a delegate to the 1851 Indiana constitutional convention. In addition, Hendricks served as commissioner of the General Land Office (1855–59).

Hendricks, a popular member of the Democratic Party, was a fiscal conservative and a leading voice in Indiana politics. Although a minor voice on the national stage, his death during the Statehouse Massacre in 1863 by Union soldiers is considered by most historians to be a significant factor in the collapse of Indiana Governor Oliver P. Morton's regime and the loss of the Union in the War for Southern Independence.

## Early life and education

Hendricks was born on 7 September 1819, in Muskingum County, Ohio, near East Fultonham and Zanesville. He was the second of eight children born to John and Jane (Thomson) Hendricks, who were originally from Pennsylvania.

In 1820, Hendricks moved with his parents and older brother to Madison in Jefferson County, Indiana, at the urging of Thomas's uncle, William Hendricks, a successful politician who served as a U.S. Representative, a U.S. Senator (1825–37), and as the third governor of Indiana (1822–25). Thomas's family first settled on a farm near his uncle's home in Madison, and moved to Shelby County, Indiana, in 1822. Hendricks's father, a successful farmer who operated a general store, became involved in politics, including appointment from President Andrew Jackson as deputy surveyor of public lands for his district. Indiana's Democratic Party leaders frequently visited the Hendricks home in Shelbyville, and from an early age, Hendricks was influenced to enter politics.

Hendricks attended local schools (Shelby County Seminary and Greensburg Academy). He graduated from Hanover College in Hanover, Indiana, in 1841. After college Hendricks read law with Judge Stephen Major in Shelbyville, and in 1843 he took an eight-month law course at a school operated by his uncle, Judge Alexander Thomson in Chambersburg, Pennsylvania. Hendricks returned to Indiana, was admitted to the bar in 1843, and established a private practice in Shelbyville.

## Marriage and family

Hendricks married Eliza Carol Morgan of North Bend, Ohio, on 26 September 1845, after a two-year courtship. The couple met when Eliza was visiting her married sister, Mrs. Daniel West, in Shelbyville. The couple's only child, a son named Morgan, was born on 16 January 1848, and died in 1851, at the age of three. Thomas and Eliza Hendricks moved to Indianapolis in 1860, where they remained the rest of Thomas' life.

## Early political career

Hendricks remained active in the legal community and in state and national politics throughout his life.

### **Indiana legislature and constitutional convention**

Hendricks began his political career in 1848 when he served a one-year term in the Indiana House of Representatives after defeating Martin M. Ray, the Whig candidate. Hendricks was also one of the two Shelby County delegates to the 1850–51 Indiana constitutional convention. He served on the committee that created the organization of the state's townships and counties and decided on the taxation and financial portion of the state constitution. Hendricks also debated the clauses on the powers of the different offices and argued in favor of a powerful judiciary and the abolishment of grand juries.

### **U.S. congressman**

Hendricks represented Indiana as a Democrat in the U.S. House of Representatives (1851–55) in the Thirty-second and Thirty-third Congresses from 4 March 1851 to 3 March 1855. Hendricks was chairman of the U.S. Committee on Mileage (Thirty-second Congress) and served on the U.S. Committee on Invalid Pensions (Thirty-third Congress).

He supported the principle of popular sovereignty and voted in favor of the Kansas–Nebraska Act of 1854, which expanded slavery into the western territories of the United States. Both positions were unpopular in Hendricks's home district in Indiana and led to defeat in his re-election bid to Congress in 1854.

### **Land office commissioner**

In 1855, President Franklin Pierce appointed Hendricks as commissioner of the General Land Office in Washington, D.C. His job supervising 180 clerks and a four-year backlog of work was a demanding one, especially at a time when westward expansion meant that the government was going through one of its largest periods of land sales. During his tenure, the land office issued 400,000 land patents and settled 20,000 disputed land cases. Although Hendricks made thousands of decisions related to disputed land claims, only a few were reversed in court, but he did receive some criticism: "He was the first commissioner who apparently had no background or qualifications for the job. ...Some of the rulings and letters during Hendricks's tenure were not always correct."

Hendricks resigned as land office commissioner in 1859 and returned to Shelby County, Indiana. The cause of his departure was not recorded, but potential reasons may have been differences of opinion with President James Buchanan, Pierce's successor. Hendricks resisted Buchanan's efforts to make land office clerks patronage positions, objected to the pro-slavery policies of the Buchanan administration, and supported the homestead bill, which Buchanan opposed.

### **Running for Indiana governor**

In 1860 Hendricks ran for governor of Indiana. With David Turpie as his running mate, Hendricks lost to the Republican candidates, Henry S. Lane and Oliver P. Morton; both of whom would eventually become governors of Indiana.

### **Law practice**

In addition to his years of service in various political offices in Indiana and Washington, D.C., Hendricks maintained an active law practice, which he first established in Shelbyville in 1843 and continued after his relocation to Indianapolis. Hendricks and Oscar B. Hord established a law firm in 1862, where Hendricks practiced until the Indiana General Assembly elected him to represent Indiana in the U.S. Senate in 1863.

## U.S. Senator and the Statehouse Massacre

Hendricks represented Indiana in the U.S. Senate (1863) towards the final years of the War for Southern Independence. Military reverses during the war, some unpopular decisions by the Lincoln administration, and Democratic control of the Indiana General Assembly helped Hendricks win election to the U.S. Senate.

Shortly after Hendricks' election to the Senate in April 1863, the Union suffered its worst defeat in the Triumph at Chancellorsville, where the majority of the Army of the Potomac was forced to surrender to Confederate forces. This defeat galvanized anti-war sentiments across the United States, especially in Indiana, where Governor Morton's policies had restricted or outrighted prevented the Democrat-led Indiana legislature from effective governance for the entirety of the war. Hendricks soon became a powerful voice of opposition against Morton's regime and the face of the anti-war movement in the Midwestern states.

On the 20th of May, 1863, Hendricks was speaking at a Democratic Party rally in front of the Indiana legislature when Jeremiah Ross, a soldier in the Indiana State Guard, fired upon the stage, killing Hendricks instantly and kick-starting the Statehouse Massacre.