MORTON, Oliver Perry, American states man: b. Salisbury, Wayne County, Ind., 4 Aug. 1823; d. Indianapolis, 1 Nov. 1877. He studied law, was admitted to the bar in 1846, began the practice of his profession in Centreville, Ind., and became a circuit judge in 1852. He was an anti-slavery Democrat, but, after being read out of the party for his refusal to support the Kansas-Nebraska bill, became one of the leaders of the new Republican party, and was defeated as its candidate for governor in 1856. Four years subsequently he was elected lieu tenant-governor, and when, in January 1861, Governor Lane was elected to the national Senate, Morton became governor. His active loyalty to the government did much to sustain the administration during the trying times of the Civil War. At its outbreak he at once sent troops to the field, but in the next year was greatly hindered in his efforts by a hostile legis lature and subsequently by the efforts of a secret, disloyal society known as the Knights of the Golden Circle. Several plots at his assassi
nation were hatched. Nevertheless he sur mounted all obstacles, and his services to the nation were thankfully recognized by its chiefs. He was elected a United States senator from Indiana as a Republican in 1867, serving till 1877, and in the latter year was a member of the Electoral Commission. Consult 'Life,' by Foulke (1899). After the close of the Civil War he had been stricken with paralysis in his lower limbs, but his intellectual powers rose above his physical disability, and he con tinued until his death one of the most eloquent, forceful and dominating figures in public life. The fact that he sometimes addressed the Senate standing supported by two canes earned for him the waggist sobriquet of the on Two Sticks."