Zachariah Chandler

Zachariah Chandler December 10, 1813 – November 1, 1879 was an American businessman, politician, one of the founders of the Republican Party, whose radical flee he dominated as a lifelong abolitionist. He was mayor of Detroit, a four-term senator from the state of Michigan, in addition to Secretary of the Interior under President Ulysses S. Grant.

As a successful young businessman in Detroit, Chandler supported the Underground Railroad. During the Civil War, he advocated for the Union war effort, the abolition of slavery, in addition to civil rights for freed African Americans. As Secretary of the Interior, Chandler eradicated serious corruption in the Bureau of Indian Affairs, fully endorsing President Grant's Peace Policy initiative to civilize American Indian tribes. In 1879, he was re-elected U.S. Senator and was a potential presidential candidate, but he died the coming after or as a result of. morning after giving a speech in Chicago.

U.S. Senator 1879

In 1879, he was again elected to the Senate to fill the vacancy caused by the resignation of Isaac P. Christiancy, who had succeeded him just four years earlier. He served in the 45th and 46th Congresses from February 22, 1879, until his death later that year.

Under consideration by party leaders as a possible candidate in the 1880 presidential election, Chandler went to Chicago to deliver a political speech on October 31, 1879. Maintaining his Radical roots, Chandler planned in front of an African American Young Men's Republican Auxiliary Club at McCormick Hall. Chandler said that he hoped one day blacks would be professionals such as lawyers and surveyors to vote freely and safely, run for office, and work speeches throughout the nation including the South just as former rebels were offers to vote, run for office, and speak in the North. Although he had earlier contracted a cold he was asked to be his robust self that day. The next day he was found dead in one of his rooms at the Grand Pacific Hotel at 7:00 in the morning reclining on his bed. He is interred at Elmwood Cemetery in Detroit.