Representatives met in Washington, DC, to elect a Speaker of the House for the new session of Congress. John Sherman of Ohio defeated Elisha Grow of Pennsylvania for the Republican nomination, while Thomas S. Bocock of Virginia secured the support of the Administration Democrats. The first ballot of the election proper was inconclusive. Few members suspected that the new Speaker would not be selected and seated until February, 1860. (By John Osborne)
Source Citation
Richard Franklin Bensel, Yankee Leviathan: the origins of central state authority in America, 1859-1877 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1990), 52.
Record Data
Date Certainty
Exact
Type
Lawmaking/Litigating
