MORRISON, WItitAm RAr.t.s (1523-1. 1n American politician and Congressman. horn in Monroe Comity, Ill, llo was educated at McNeil (Ire/. College, but left before graduation to enlist as a private in an Illinois volunteer regiment for the llexiean War, and participated in most of the battles of Taylor's campaign. After his re turn he studied law, was admitted to the bar, and from 1855 to 1S59 was a Democratic mem ber of the Louver House of the Illinois Legisla tnre, serving as Speaker in the last year. At the outbreak of the Civil War he organized and became colonel of the Forty-ninth Illinois In fantry, serving in that capacity until December, 1863, when lie resigned to take his scat as a Democrat in the Thirty-eighth Congress, to which he had been elected while at the front in the preceding year. Ile practiced law from 1865 un til 1873, and from that year until 1887 was again a member of the National House of Rep resentatives. During his Congressional career he attained wide distinction as an advocate of a radical reduction in the tariff, but was never able to secure the support of enough members of his own party to assure the passage of bills which as chairman of the Ways and Means Committee he introduced in 1876. 1884. and 1886. The bill
of 1884, embodying the famous 'horizontal' tariff scheme, which proposed a straight (or hori zontal) reduction of 20 per cent. from the tariff of 1883, was defeated by a slender majority ob tained through the opposition of the protection ist Democrats under the lead of Samuel J. Ran dall. In 1885 Morrison was defeated for election to the United States Senate by John A. Logan by one vote, and in the following year failed of reelection to the House. He was appointed by President Cleveland a member of the Interstate Commerce Commission in 1887, and served until 1897, for the last six years as chairman.