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History and Government—Congressional Biographies—Kentucky / USRichard Mentor JOHNSON
(1780-1850)
Senate Years of Service:
1819-1829Party: Democratic Republican;
Jackson Republican; JacksonianJOHNSON, Richard Mentor,
(brother of James Johnson [1774-1826] and John Telemachus Johnson,
and uncle of Robert Ward Johnson), a Representative and a Senator
from Kentucky and a Vice President of the United States; born at
“Beargrass,” Jefferson County, Ky., near the present
site of Louisville, October 17, 1780; attended the common schools
and Transylvania University, Lexington, Ky.; studied law; admitted
to the bar in 1802 and commenced practice in Great Crossings, Ky.;
member, State house of representatives 1804-1806 and again in 1819;
elected as a Democratic Republican to the Tenth and to the five
succeeding Congresses (March 4, 1807-March 3, 1819); chairman,
Committee on Claims (Eleventh Congress), Committee on Expenditures
in the Department of War (Fifteenth Congress); commissioned colonel
of Kentucky Volunteers and commanded a regiment in engagements
against the British in lower Canada in 1813; elected as a
Democratic Republican to the United States Senate to fill the
vacancy caused by the resignation of John J. Crittenden; reelected
as a Jackson Republican (and later Jacksonian) and served from
December 10, 1819, to March 3, 1829; unsuccessful candidate for
reelection in 1829; chairman, Committee on Post Office and Post
Roads (Nineteenth and Twentieth Congresses); elected to the
Twenty-first and to the three succeeding Congresses (March 4,
1829-March 3, 1837); chairman, Committee on Post Office and Post
Roads (Twenty-first and Twenty-second Congresses), Committee on
Military Affairs (Twenty-second through Twenty-fourth Congresses);
was chosen Vice President of the United States by the Senate on
February 8, 1837, no candidate having received a majority of the
electoral vote, and served under President Martin Van Buren from
March 4, 1837, to March 3, 1841; member, State house of
representatives 1850; died in Frankfort, Ky., November 19, 1850;
interment in the Frankfort Cemetery.
Bibliography
American National Biography; Dictionary of American
Biography; Meyer, Leland. The Life and Times of Colonel
Richard M. Johnson of Kentucky. 1932. Reprint. New York: AMS
Press, 1967; Jones, Jonathan Milnor. “The Making of a Vice
President: The National Political Career of Richard M. Johnson of
Kentucky.” Ph.D. dissertation, University of Memphis,
1998.
Source: Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, 1771-Present
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