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Tackling the US prison system The US prison system has long been an issue of concern for many Americans. Despite the US having only 5% of the world’s population, it is home to 25% of the world’s prisoners. The US prison population has grown exponentially in recent years and this has been largely attributed to the ‘War on Drugs’, which has seen the introduction of mandatory minimum sentencing guidelines. This has resulted in a large number of non-violent offenders being incarcerated for lengthy periods of time. There have been a number of initiatives to address this issue, such as the bipartisan First Step Act which was signed into law in 2018. The Act seeks to reduce the number of federal prisoners, reform sentencing guidelines and expand rehabilitation programs. There is also growing support for the decriminalization of certain drugs such as marijuana. These measures are a step in the right direction, however much more needs to be done to reform the US prison system.
The Daring 19th-Century Reformers Who Sought to End Prostitution by Offering Financial and Emotional Support to Urban Sex Workers | Smithsonian
Led entirely by women, the American Female Moral Reform Society gave material aid to those in need and pushed for men to be held accountable for frequenting brothels
Edition for Educators—Edith Nourse Rogers of Massachusetts | US House of Representatives: History, Art & Archives
Since the First Congress opened in 1789, more than 11,000 people have served in the U.S. House of Representatives. Most served capably for a few terms and returned to their communities. But some lawmakers have left towering legacies and are remembered for their legislative prowess, path-breaking careers, and bold personalities. These Members of Congress, including powerful Speakers of the House, strong-willed legislators, trailblazing Representatives, and policy specialists, qualify as “Giants of the House.”As a volunteer nurse and advocate for veterans across the country during and after World War I, Edith Nourse Rogers of Massachusetts won election to the House following the death of her husband, Representative John Jacob Rogers, in 1925 and went on to serve for 35 years in Congress. During her record-setting tenure, Rogers helped shape America’s role in World War II, provided a path for women in military service, and expanded the responsibilities of the federal government to care for veterans and their families.This month’s Edition for Educators highlights the pathbreaking career of Representative Edith Nourse Rogers, one of the longest-tenured women in Congress.The “Widow’s Mandate”HIGHLIGHT—Representative Edith Nourse Rogers of MassachusettsRepresentative Edith Nourse Rogers of Massachusetts, a renowned advocate for veterans and one of the longest-serving women in House history, was born in Saco, Maine, on March 19, 1881. Following an early career advising and assisting Congressmen and Presidents, she won a special election to succeed her husband, John Jacob Rogers of Massachusetts, following his death in 1925.HISTORICAL DATA—Women Members with Military ServiceThe experience Edith Nourse Rogers gained serving as a nurse during World War I shaped her congressional career and her deep respect for American veterans. Although she was not an official member of America’s armed services as a volunteer nurse, Rogers helped set the stage for women to join and serve in the nation’s armed forces.ESSAY—Widows and Familial ConnectionsMore often than not, the first generation of women in Congress gained experience in public affairs as political confidantes and campaign surrogates for the Congressmen to whom they were married or otherwise related. Ironically, it was personal tragedy rather than a shared interest in reform that provided political entrée for most early women in Congress. Beginning with Representative Mae Nolan of California in 1923, eight of the women who served in Congress between 1917 and 1934 were widows who succeeded their late husbands. None had held previous political office. But in these cases—in which special elections were called quickly to fill the vacancies, leaving little time for campaigning—party leaders believed in the value of having the same familiar last name on the ballot. Several of these women, however, shared much more than a last name with their predecessors: they were among their husbands’ most trusted political advisers, particularly Edith Nourse Rogers and Florence Kahn of California.This essay from the first chapter of Women in Congress discusses the “widow’s mandate,” as it was popularly coined, as well as the expectations political party structures had for women lawmakers and the ways in which women Members like Rogers set their own course as both leaders and legislators.Representative Rogers of MassachusettsPEOPLE PROFILE—Edith Nourse Rogers of MassachusettsDuring her 35-year House career, one of the longest tenures of any woman in American history, Rogers authored legislation that had far-reaching effects on American servicemen and women. Initially relegated to middling committee assignments, Rogers gradually rose within the ranks of the Republican Party. In 1933, she earned a seat on the Foreign Affairs Committee and began to address the rise of fascism in Italy and Nazi Germany. As isolationism gripped her party, Rogers voted against the Neutrality Act of 1937 and cosponsored legislation to assist Jewish refugees fleeing Nazi persecution. Congresswoman Rogers’s crowning legislative achievements came during World War II and in the immediate postwar years, including the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps Act and the GI Bill of Rights.ESSAY—Onto the National Stage: Congresswomen in an Age of Crisis, 1935–1954 This second chapter from Women in Congress covers the tumultuous two decades that encompassed the Great Depression, World War II, and the start of the Cold War. Women participated in America’s survival, recovery, and ascent to world power in important and unprecedented ways; they became shapers of the welfare state, workers during wartime, and members of the military. Like their male counterparts, women in Congress legislated to provide economic relief to their constituents, debated the merits of government intervention to help the economy, argued about America’s role in world affairs, and grappled with challenges and opportunities during wartime. As a ranking member and later chair of committees that worked on veterans’ legislation, Rogers held a central role in the nation’s response to World War II and its aftermath.RECORD—Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps BillBefore serving in Congress, Representative Edith Nourse Rogers worked overseas during World War I inspecting field hospitals. In Europe, she saw women who served on a contractual or voluntary basis who received no legal protection or medical care for their essential contributions. When she served in Congress many years later, her experience as a field nurse influenced the legislation Rogers sponsored, including the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps bill. When the bill became law in 1942, it formalized the indispensable role women played in the military during wartime and compensated them for their service and in the event of injury or illness.PathbreakerBLOG—“The Most Gallant Lady from Massachusetts”The portrait of Edith Nourse Rogers as chair of the Committee on Veterans’ Affairs was unveiled on July 27, 1950. The artwork had been commissioned by the Massachusetts American Legion, and it still hangs in the Veterans’ Affairs Committee rooms in the Cannon House Office Building. The portrait shows Rogers as she appeared in the later part of her 35-year career—white-haired and dignified, set in a vague, dark, impressionistic space. It closely resembles artist Howard Chandler Christy’s other portraits of House Members, which include two Speakers of the House and two other committee chairs. Contrary to the business-as-usual depiction in her portrait, Rogers was exceptional in many ways. She was only the second woman—after her colleague Mary Norton of New Jersey—to have a portrait commemorating her time leading a committee hung in the House. By the time the portrait was painted, Rogers had served in Congress for a quarter of a century, chalking up major victories on behalf of veterans and military personnel.HISTORICAL DATA—Women with 25 Years or More House Service For more than half a century, Edith Nourse Rogers held the record as the longest-serving woman in Congress. Though her record has since been eclipsed, Rogers’s career remains among the lengthiest tenures for any woman in the U.S. House of Representatives. This chart provides a list of all women who have served in the U.S. House of Representatives for at least 25 years.BLOG—“You Start It and You Like the Work, and You Just Keep On”“The first 30 years are the hardest,” Edith Nourse Rogers of Massachusetts said of her more than three decades in the U.S. House of Representatives. The former Red Cross volunteer nurse compared her tenure in Congress to “taking care of the sick. You start it and you like the work, and you just keep on.” In an institution where long service often yields greater power, many long-tenured Members became some of the House’s most famous and influential people. With her 35 years in office, Rogers is among a select few—less than three percent of all lawmakers—to have served so long in the House.Additional ResourcesThe primary research collection for Edith Nourse Rogers’s congressional career can be found at Harvard University’s Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, in the Schlesinger Library. Additional material, including letters to constituents, is available through the Massachusetts Historical Society.This is part of a series of blog posts for educators highlighting the resources available on History, Art & Archives of the U.S. House of Representatives. For lesson plans, fact sheets, glossaries, and other materials for the classroom, see the website's Education section.
Objection Day | US House of Representatives: History, Art & Archives
During the 33rd Congress (1853–1855), a Texas man named Joseph Clymer launched what would become a quarter-century effort to petition Congress for financial redress after the U.S. Army broke the terms of a multiyear shipping contract he had signed with the government. A few years earlier in 1851, Clymer had won a bid to transport military supplies from Fort Leavenworth on the Kansas-Missouri border to locations in Texas and New Mexico. Clymer subcontracted part of the job with another shipping outfit, and the Army agreed to pay Clymer and his associates at least $112,908 over two years to move goods and supplies by wagon train during the spring and summer of 1851 and 1852. After successfully making the deliveries in 1851, Clymer received notice from the Army in March 1852 that he would not be required to ship any goods at all that year. By then, Clymer had already prepared 30 wagons and hired three dozen teamsters and hundreds of work animals to transport the goods and materials that the Army had stipulated in his contract. Clymer protested the decision and noted that without the freight “he would lose much, and be put to great stress.”In 1854, Clymer’s case went before an auditor at the U.S. Treasury Department who determined that Clymer had been “greatly damaged, and a heavy loser” after the Army reneged on its contract. Another Treasury official agreed with the auditor’s conclusion and outlined the next steps: “Mr. Clymer, sustained damage and injury by the non-fulfilment of contract on the part of the government, and that in such a case Congress alone can afford redress.”On Friday, February 23, 1855, the House Committee on Military Affairs reported Clymer’s petition seeking that redress as House Joint Resolution 59, “for the relief of Joseph Clymer,” a private bill that dealt solely with his claim; private bills are different from public bills, which concern the country’s general citizenry. The committee, which supported Clymer’s claim, reported the bill with a requirement “authorizing the accounting officers of the treasury to settle the claim upon the principles of equity and justice.” The House placed it on the calendar for the next day’s debate, but the chamber adjourned for lack of a quorum and lawmakers never considered it.Clymer’s petition had been the victim of unlucky timing in 1855. But as a private bill, it faced long odds from the start because it was also subject to a requirement in the legislative calendar called “objection day,” during which opposition from just one lawmaker would kill a bill. From the time the House created objection day in 1839 until Members ended it four decades later, the House had effectively created a legislative veto over private bills. In an institution where the majority would eventually be able to exercise almost unchecked power, House Rules for a time governed the private calendar under the tyranny of the smallest possible minority: one. Clymer’s bill lingered in Congress, off and on, for more than a quarter century. Objection day had not killed his petition in 1855, but it nearly did 26 years later, when, in 1881, timing was finally on Clymer’s side.Private BillsBy the time the House considered Clymer’s petition in 1855, much of the legislation Congress passed came in the form of private bills. In the 33rd Congress, when Clymer first requested help from Congress, lawmakers approved almost twice as many private bills (352) as public bills (188). Before the creation of America’s social safety net in the twentieth century, private bills were the primary way everyday Americans sought help from their government. Private bills often came in the form of relief bills—money that Congress appropriated on a case-by-case basis for widows, wounded veterans, people experiencing hardship, or those like Clymer who had claims against the government. While many Members saw petitions and private bills as an extension of their constituent services, others saw them, in the words of one nineteenth century Georgia congressman, as “mediated robberies” of the federal purse.In 1810, lawmakers began blocking out time in the legislative calendar for the consideration of private bills when the House met in the Committee of the Whole. That year, on the motion of Representative Richard Mentor Johnson of Kentucky, the House reserved Fridays for debate on “reports and bills originating from petition,” giving private bills priority over all other matters in the House’s schedule that day. Sixteen years later, in 1826, as the demands on lawmakers grew, the House approved a new rule submitted by William Leigh Brent of Louisiana, that reserved both Fridays and Saturdays “for the consideration of private bills and private business, in preference to any other.”In early 1839, the House changed its rules again, creating what became known as “objection day.” The House reserved the first and fourth Fridays each month for the private calendar and stipulated that on those days “the calendar of private bills shall be called over, and the bills to the passage of which no objection shall then be made, shall be first considered and disposed of.” Bills that were objected to, however, were sent to the back of the private calendar, buried under a mountain of other legislation.“Vigilance” and “Long Delayed Justice”It’s not clear when the term objection day gained traction, but it is first mentioned in the Congressional Globe on Friday, June 2, 1848—“‘objection day,’ on which bills could be passed that were unobjectionable,” noted the editors of the Globe. Thirty years later, in 1877, the Boston Daily Globe newspaper highlighted perhaps the truer nature of the term. On December 7, the House went into the Committee of the Whole. “As this was what is known as ‘objection day,’ nearly all of the bills on the calendar were objected to.”For at least one reporter, objection day had both costs and benefits. On occasions when the Committee of the Whole cleared a large number of bills on objection day, consideration was “necessarily loose and imperfect,” wrote a New York Tribune correspondent in January 1849 after witnessing the proceedings in the House. “Great reliance must be placed on the vigilance and rectitude of the Committee reporting the bills.” But the author was confident that “seven eights” of the bills on the private calendar “were right, and that much long delayed justice was secured, much undeserved suffering relieved” during objection day proceedings.Reporting on a subsequent objection day, the Tribune was surprised that more private bills “were objected to than allowed to pass, there being a number of particularly hard cases on the Calendar.” The author suspected that some bills that deserved to pass ended up failing but ultimately concluded that objection day was “remarkably well done.” Most of the measures that succeeded “were grants of small pensions to men who lost their health or limbs in the public service, to widows of deceased Revolutionary soldiers, &c. &c.”Deserving though these cases may have been, the Tribune observed that there was always “some Member . . . with a sour stomach” who would object on Fridays and Saturdays, dashing the hopes of a downtrodden petitioner in the process. There were always Members “who grudge the days devoted to” the private calendar and vote to adjourn as soon as possible; always Members “who seem to detest most heartily the lobby influences with which these bills surround Congress and distract the attention of its Members.” The cumulative effect meant that “very dubious claims go through with a rush” one day, while “fair and just” claims get smothered the next day.“I am inclined to think there are a great many unjust claims presented before the Government,” Representative Alexander Stephens of Georgia said during consideration of a House Rules change in December 1852, “but I think there are a great many just ones which have been sleeping here for a half century, perhaps longer.” For Stephens—who would go on to serve as Confederate vice president during the Civil War—the problem wasn’t the type of private legislation the House considered, it was objection day itself. “That is a useless day,” he said. “No discussion is allowed. A claim is taken up, the Clerk reads a long report to the House until he is horse, to which perhaps not more than fifteen Members of the House are listening. Then someone says ‘I object!’ and thus ends the matter for that day.”For many years, Cave Johnson of Tennessee reportedly made it regular practice to oppose legislation on the private calendar, protecting “Uncle Sam’s strong box with the fidelity of a dog and the snarling combativeness of a genuine Cerberus,” the Louisville Daily Courier remembered in 1855, a decade after Johnson left the House. With the Tennessean gone, the role of chief objector fell to John Letcher of Virginia. Letcher “honestly” believed, the Daily Courier said, that “every man who seeks redress at the hands of Congress, or asks to be paid what he (the claimant) considers a just demand upon the government, is a dishonest man; not to say a rascal, and has a deliberate design to defraud the treasury.”Because objection day allowed just one Member to determine the fate of a bill, some observers found the practice, well, objectionable. In 1854, an editorial published under the penname “Jefferson,” critiqued the legislative mechanism as it existed in the House Rules, highlighting objection day as the most egregious example of the how “the rules work most onerously.” Under objection day, “Jefferson” observed, the good faith recommendation of a House committee to approve a private claim could be struck down by one lawmaker without a good faith debate on the floor. “The veto power is conferred by the constitution upon the President of the United States alone, but by the Rules of the House of Representatives each member can exercise this power as effectually as the President.” Some of the claims came from “widows and children imploring justice for years,” the author observed, and deserved to be considered. “An objection on the part of a single member should not be sufficient to defeat a just claim. The character of the country is involved in this matter.”In 1860, the House made a final adjustment to the objection day rule, giving bills that had already been objected to another chance at passage. On March 16 that year, the House approved an amendment that raised the number of objections required to effectively kill a private bill from one to five.The House ended objection day with a major overhaul of the rules in 1880 that, among other reforms, sought to better standardize the House Calendar. In a last-minute attempt to salvage objection day, Harry White of Pennsylvania offered an amendment to keep it on the books. Joseph Blackburn of Kentucky quickly snuffed out his effort. “What reason is there for continuing a practice which allows any bill on the Private Calendar to be passed over because of a single objection, when if by chance or luck it comes upon the next Friday it is not amenable to that objection at all?” he asked. “I would rather have the judgement of one of the standing committees of this House as to the merit or equity of a matter specially committed to it than to have the single unsupported opinion of any member on this floor.” White’s amendment to keep objection day was voted down overwhelmingly.Clymer’s PaydayA year later, in 1881, the House once again resurrected Joseph Clymer’s $18,325 claim against the government for lost revenue after the Army broke its shipping contract with him in 1852. Clymer’s bill had come up so often and been around for so long that in 1878 the House Claims Committee wrote that it was “most remarkable that a claim with so many recognitions of its justice should have been so long delayed of payment.” But some Members remained unwilling to approve Clymer’s claim, and Philip Hayes of Illinois rose to object when it was put to a vote. “It seems to me that bill ought not to be passed,” Hayes said. “If this claim has been running for twenty-five years, I think if there was any justice in it it would have been settled long ago. I wish to ask the Chair whether, under our new rules, there is an objection day, and if this be objection day?”“Under the present rules there is no objection day,” the presiding officer replied.Two other Members rose to defend Clymer’s claim, pointing out that it had already passed the Senate on two separate occasions but always failed in the House “for want of time.” Unable to wield veto power without the authority of objection day, Hayes lost the argument. The private bill compensating Clymer for $18,325 finally became law on March 2, 1881.Sources: House Journal, 11th Cong., 2nd sess. (22 January 1810): 189; House Journal, 19th Cong., 1st sess. (26 January 1826): 197; House Journal, 25th Cong., 3rd sess. (25 January 1839): 374; House Journal, Appendix, Standing Rules and Orders, 37th Cong., 3rd sess. (1863): 639; Annals of Congress, House, 11th Cong., 2nd sess. (19 January 1810): 1247; Annals of Congress, House, 11th Cong., 2nd sess. (22 January 1810): 1253; Congressional Globe, House, 25th Cong., 3rd sess. (25 January 1839): 446; Congressional Globe, House, 46th Cong., 2nd sess. (2 June 1848): 810; Congressional Record, House, 32nd Cong., 2nd sess. (20 December 1852): 98; Congressional Record, House, 46th Cong., 2nd sess. (24 February 1880): 1089; Congressional Record, House, 46th Cong., 3rd sess. (14 January 1881): 635; House Committee on Military Affairs, Joseph Clymer, To Accompany Joint Resolution No. 59, 33rd. Cong., 2nd sess., H. Rept. 110 (1855); House Committee on Claims, Joseph Clymer, 45th Cong., 2nd sess., H. Rept. 425 (1878); An Act for the Relief of Joseph Clymer, of Texas, 21 Stat. 637 (1881); Boston Daily Globe, 8 December 1877; Louisville Daily Courier, 12 January 1855; National Intelligencer, 11 January 1854; New York Tribune, 29 January 1848, 5 February 1849, 12 February 1849, 28 December 1858; Memoirs of John Quincy Adams, vol. 10, ed. Charles Francis Adams (Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott & Co., 1876); Richard S. Beth, “Private Bills: Procedure in the House,” 21 October 2004, Report 98-628, Congressional Research Service; Joseph Cooper and Cheryl D. Young, “Bill Introduction in the Nineteenth Century: A Study of Institutional Change,” Legislative Studies Quarterly, 14, no. 1 (Feb., 1989): 67–105; George B. Galloway, History of the House of Representatives, ed. Sindey Wise (1962; rev. Thomas Y. Crowell Company: New York, 1976).
Edition for Educators: Norman Mineta of California | US House of Representatives: History, Art & Archives
Since the First Congress opened in 1789, more than 11,000 people have served in the U.S. House of Representatives. Most served capably for a few terms and returned to their communities. But some lawmakers have left towering legacies and are remembered for their legislative prowess, path-breaking careers, and bold personalities. These Members of Congress, including powerful Speakers of the House, strong-willed legislators, trailblazing Representatives, and policy specialists, qualify as “Giants of the House.”Around the time of his 11th birthday in 1942, future U.S. Representative Norman Mineta of California and his family were imprisoned by the federal government in an internment camp at Heart Mountain, Wyoming, created to house Japanese Americans during World War II. Released in 1945, the family returned to San Jose, California, to rebuild their lives. Mineta would later graduate from college, serve in the U.S. Army and lead the city of San Jose as mayor, before embarking on a 22-year career in the U.S. House of Representatives, where he served one term as chairman of the Public Works and Transportation Committee.In the House, Mineta sought to work with other Members on issues that impacted Asian Pacific Islander Americans, helping to create the Asian Pacific American Caucus.Well, as a member of Congress I would look at the success of the Congressional Black Caucus or the Hispanic Caucus and think, ‘Gee, we don’t have . . . a caucus that looks out after the interest of Asian Pacific Islanders.’ And so I started enquiring about [how] the Congressional Black Caucus and the Hispanic Caucus operated. And then called on not only Asian Pacific American Members of Congress, but more importantly those Congressional districts across the country where you would have a relatively large Asian Pacific American population, and enlist those members to join the caucus. And so we had a bipartisan caucus that dealt with . . . Asian Pacific American issues.Throughout his career, Mineta worked to address challenging issues including reparations for victims of internment. Mineta’s generation of lawmakers valued accountability and accessibility, but perhaps none more so than him. “It goes back to my own experience in terms of the evacuation and the internment of those of Japanese ancestry,” he said years later. “We didn’t have access to our political leaders at the time.”This month’s Edition for Educators highlights the historic career of Representative Norman Y. Mineta of California, a victim of internment who became a Congressman and later a Cabinet member under two different presidential administrations.From the California to the House ChamberPEOPLE PROFILE—Norman Y. Mineta of California Thirty years after being imprisoned by the United States government because of the happenstance of his ancestry, Norman Y. Mineta helped change forever the inner workings of the United States House of Representatives. Over a 20-year career in the House, the San Jose Congressman worked to make the federal lawmaking process more accountable. From the federal budget to the nation’s highway system, Mineta and his generation of reform-minded legislators redefined expectations on Capitol Hill. With the moral authority derived from having been unjustly incarcerated as a child, Mineta convinced Congress to address wartime internment and helped the country understand the sins of its past.BLOG—Edition for Educators—Asian Pacific Heritage Month California Representative Norman Mineta spent nearly four years of his childhood in an internment camp for Japanese Americans during World War II. First elected in 1974, Mineta served 11 terms in the House of Representatives and worked to hold the legislative process accountable and address the mistakes of the past. Learn more about the efforts and accomplishments of Mineta and other Asian and Pacific Islander Americans in Congress for Asian Pacific Heritage Month. BLOG—Edition for Educators— Transportation and Infrastructure Since the First Continental Congress, America’s national legislature has taken responsibility in different ways for America’s transportation, communication, and trade. To bolster the nation’s defenses and develop the country’s commerce, early federal lawmakers used public resources to fund the construction of military installations, postal routes, lighthouses, and ports and harbors. This Edition for Educators highlights the role the House has in setting transportation and infrastructure policy, including the work of notable committee chairman Norman Mineta of California.RECORD—Internment records The United States entered World War II in December 1941 after the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor. President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066 on February 19, 1942, authorizing the government to evacuate persons of Japanese descent. On March 17, 1942, the Committee on Military Affairs issued House Report No. 1906, recommending the passage of H.R. 6758, which gave teeth to the executive order by creating a “penalty for violation of restrictions or orders.” Learn more about House Committee interment records.Leadership and OrganizationESSAY—From Exclusion to Inclusion, 1941–1992 In the aftermath of Pearl Harbor, the federal government, afraid that immigrants or their family members with Japanese ancestry had helped orchestrate the attacks from U.S. soil, uprooted more than 120,000 Japanese Americans living along the West Coast and placed them in internment camps out of “military necessity.” For these people, the war was a period of remarkable emotional and psychological trauma. Beginning in the nineteenth century, Congress and the courts prevented Japanese immigrants from becoming citizens and from participating in the political process. After 1924, Congress made them ineligible for admission into the United States entirely, and the federal government considered them a direct threat to the nation. The native-born children of Japanese immigrants were U.S. citizens, yet they were imprisoned by their own government, including four who years later would serve in the U.S. House of Representatives. Because their community lacked a voice at almost every level of government, mainland Japanese Americans’ political exclusion was quickly compounded by their physical exclusion with internment.HISTORICAL DATA—Asian Pacific American Caucus Chairman and Chairwomen In 1994, Members of Asian and Pacific Islander descent created the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus (CAPAC). Inspired by the Congressional Black and Hispanic Caucuses, CAPAC was created for Members to formally coordinate efforts to advance legislation pertaining to the interests of Asian Pacific American communities. Since its formation, the bipartisan and bicameral caucus has educated congressional colleagues on the history of the growing Asian Pacific American community in the United States and continues to build recognition in Congress. Representative Norman Mineta became the first caucus chair. This chart provides a list of individuals in caucus and conference positions. HOUSE COLLECTION—Featured Objects and ImagesNorman Y. Mineta Lapel PinCalifornian Norman Mineta represented a Silicon Valley district for 20 years. This relatively simple campaign button contained key pieces of information for his constituents, namely, the fact that he was an incumbent running for re-election and the district he represented. Mineta cofounded and chaired the Asian Pacific American Caucus, and chaired the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure in the 103rd Congress.Norman Yoshio Mineta PortraitThe portrait of Transportation and Infrastructure Chairman Norm Mineta tracks his life and career from an internment camp for Japanese-Americans during World War II to the halls of Congress. Artists George and Jim Pollard used their signature blue-and-white background and layered it with a dream-like image of Mineta and his parents in Heart Mountain internment camp, and the Capitol appears at lower right.Additional ResourcesLearn more about Representative Norman Mineta, his life, and his achievements in these oral histories available through these institutions:Densho Digital Archive:Japanese American National Museum CollectionLibrary of Congress Veterans History ProjectLibrary of Congress, John W. Kluge Center:Protecting National Security & Civil LibertiesUnited States Capitol Historical SocietyThis is part of a series of blog posts for educators highlighting the resources available on History, Art & Archives of the U.S. House of Representatives. For lesson plans, fact sheets, glossaries, and other materials for the classroom, see the website's Education section.
From Bunker Hill to Capitol Hill: Representative Henry Dearborn and the New Nation | US House of Representatives: History, Art & Archives
On April 19, 1775, future U.S. Representative Henry Dearborn, then a 24-year-old country doctor from Nottingham, New Hampshire, heeded an urgent call to arms and marched roughly 60 miles through the night to northeastern Massachusetts to confront British forces at the battles of Lexington and Concord. When Dearborn, one of nearly five dozen New Hampshire recruits who made the long march, arrived at the battle site on April 20, the fighting was over. The British regiments had hastily retreated to Boston after being turned back by colonial militiamen.Two months later, Dearborn, who was in just his third year practicing medicine, had been promoted to captain in the First New Hampshire regiment as American revolutionaries fortified and defended Bunker Hill, the largest of three hills surrounding the city of Boston.The British Army had largely been confined to a peninsula jutting into Boston Harbor, but on June 17 British red coats moved to capture surrounding land—including the hills guarded by Dearborn and his troops. Few had anticipated that this confrontation would lead to the first significant conflict between the rebel army and British troops in the American Revolution.On June 17, Dearborn’s New Hampshire regiment defended Bunker Hill in intense fighting. The Americans inflicted heavy casualties on the British, killing officers and infantrymen with ease from the high ground of Breed's Hill and Bunker Hill in Charlestown, just across the Charles River from Boston. With a larger fighting force, the British ultimately captured control of Bunker Hill but the Americans had won a symbolic victory, showed their mettle on the battlefield, and set the tone for a lengthy war of rebellion that ended with independence in 1783.Henry Dearborn remained in the Continental Army for the duration of the war, attaining the rank of colonel by the end of the conflict in 1783. Nearly 20 years after Bunker Hill, he was elected from the state of Massachusetts to two terms in the U.S. House of Representatives in the 3rd and 4th Congresses (1793–1797). He went on to serve as the longest tenured U.S. Secretary of War in the nation’s history and returned to military service to lead the American invasion of Canada during the War of 1812.Of the many colonists who fought for America’s freedom, Dearborn was one of the few who had been there from the start. He was one of even fewer still who went on to shape the future of his young nation in the halls of Congress. As America commemorates the 250th anniversary of the Battle of Bunker Hill, Dearborn’s unique life helps us understand how veterans of the American Revolution influenced the creation of the federal government in the decades after the war.Eight Years of RevolutionBorn on February 23, 1751, in North Hampton, New Hampshire, Dearborn trained as a physician in the coastal city of Portsmouth. By 1772, he was living in Nottingham, New Hampshire, with his family. Three years later, the Battle of Bunker Hill became the starting point for Dearborn’s long, improbable journey from doctor to soldier to Congressman.Dearborn’s experience in the Continental Army sent him to points along the eastern seaboard where he participated in a series of significant battles during the ensuing eight years of war. A few months after Bunker Hill, in the fall of 1775, he accompanied American General Benedict Arnold in a failed campaign to capture Quebec. Taken prisoner in May 1776, Dearborn was paroled and returned to service the following year, just in time to play a key role in the American victory in Saratoga, New York. In his wartime journal, Dearborn recorded his satisfaction at defeating the “British Butchers,” many of whom he described as mercenaries fighting for wages rather than freedoms. The challenging conditions on the battlefield, Dearborn wrote, did not phase the American soldier, as “we who had Something more at Stake than fighting for six Pence Pr [sic] Day kept our ground til Night.”At the Battle of Monmouth in New Jersey in 1778, Dearborn led a pivotal maneuver to ward off a British attack, and in western New York in 1779, he joined an expedition to attack British loyalists and Native American tribes. Dearborn was also part of George Washington’s forces when they initiated the siege of Yorktown, Virginia, in 1781.Dearborn mustered out of service with the conclusion of the war in 1783, and moved to Maine, which was then a district of Massachusetts and would not become an independent state until 1820. He settled in the town of Gardiner in 1785, invested in land, owned a ferry, and pursued business ventures in timber and construction. He also became enmeshed in local politics, serving as a local selectman. Dearborn was named brigadier general of the district of Maine’s division within the Massachusetts state militia. He rose to major general of the state militia and was named U.S. Marshal for the district of Maine by President George Washington in 1789.A “Full Blooded Yankee” in the HouseIn 1792, Dearborn ran for and won a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives representing the Maine district, what was then the Massachusetts Fourth Congressional District. Dearborn was one of three At-Large Members who represented the district; George Thacher and Peleg Wadsworth, the grandfather of the American poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, joined him in the House.Although Congress had approved the construction of a permanent national capital along the banks of the Potomac River, the new seat of government would not be ready until 1800. When the 3rd Congress (1793-1795) began in December 1793, Dearborn instead made his way to the temporary capital at Congress Hall in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.During the early Congresses, partisan affiliations were loosely defined—more blocs than organized parties—and very different than they are today. President George Washington had pledged to remain nonpartisan, but conflicting ambitions in the new federal government had given rise to competing factions. On one side stood the Federalists who, like U.S. Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton, aimed to centralize economic and political power in the federal government. On the other side, stood Dearborn and the Democratic Republicans who, led by Representative James Madison of Virginia, remained wary of concentrated power, opposed Hamilton’s agenda, and backed Thomas Jefferson for President in 1800. Dearborn, described by one observer as “a full blooded Yankee,” believed in a different set of politics than most in the Massachusetts delegation where 12 of the state’s 16 Representatives in the 4th Congress (1795–1797) won election as Federalists.In his two terms in the House, Dearborn’s legislative agenda focused largely on military affairs and international relations. Representative William Barry Grove of North Carolina described him as having a “strong natural sense, and in all a pretty clever man—better fitted for the Military than a Legislator.” But Dearborn competently navigated the amendment process on the House Floor and spoke clearly in defense of his legislative priorities.Appointed to several select committees on military affairs, Dearborn took the lead in assessing the nation’s frontier defense and evaluating the needs of the military. On several occasions he sought to limit military appropriations and proposed reducing the number of soldiers in America’s standing Army. In 1797, he opposed a series of bills designed to bolster the Navy, including measures to fund the construction of three ships, build a Navy yard, and secure access to adequate timber for shipbuilding. Dearborn twice introduced amendments to specify that only the hulls of the ships should be completed to prevent cost overruns. The amendments were rejected and the bills passed despite Dearborn’s vote against them.On international affairs, Dearborn backed several resolutions designed to stop trade with Great Britain and force the British government to comply with the terms of the 1783 treaty ending the Revolutionary War. In 1794, President Washington’s emissary, John Jay, secured a new treaty to improve maritime relations between the nations, remove British troops from frontier lands, and ultimately prevent war. In April 1796, Dearborn and Democratic Republicans tried in vain to kill a bill to fund the implementation of Jay’s Treaty. Dearborn suggested amending the funding measure to add a preamble stating that the House found the treaty “highly objectionable.” The House, however, defeated his amendment. Dearborn voted against the treaty, but the House approved it by a 51 to 48 vote.In 1796, Dearborn lost re-election to Federalist Isaac Parker in his bid for a third term in the House. He returned to the district of Maine, where he was elected to the Massachusetts house of representatives in 1798.U.S. Secretary of WarWhen Thomas Jefferson was elected President in 1800, he appointed Dearborn U.S. Secretary of War. This time, Dearborn’s role in the federal government necessitated a move to the District of Columbia, the nation’s new capital. Dearborn resided on Capitol Hill for several years and retained this appointment throughout Jefferson’s two terms in office.As the civilian head of the military, Dearborn set out to transform America’s defense forces. In collaboration with President Jefferson, Dearborn framed his changes as a way to cut spending and reduce the size of the standing military during peacetime. Democratic Republicans had also grown concerned that Federalists had appointed a class of officers who would perpetuate their control of the military. Dearborn helped devise a plan to enable a new generation of military leaders to gain access to officer commissions—and to appoint those who were sympathetic to Jefferson’s party.As Secretary of War, Dearborn lobbied Congress to implement these changes. He played an integral role in developing the Military Peace Establishment Act of 1802, a complete overhaul of the American military that enabled the Secretary to remove officers, make new officer appointments, and reorganize domestic garrisons and fortifications. The law also created a military academy at West Point, New York, to train officers and develop the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Jefferson and Dearborn hoped these reforms would create a new class of officers more representative of the American people—and more sympathetic to Democratic Republican principles.When Jefferson’s second term ended in 1809, Dearborn was appointed collector of customs at the port of Boston. As the nation engaged in another conflict with Great Britain during the War of 1812, President James Madison asked Dearborn to take control of the military in the northeast, leading troops from the Niagara River east into New England. He led the Army into Canada, seizing the city of York—now known as Toronto—as well as Fort George in Canada just north of Niagara Falls. After struggling to hold these positions, Dearborn was removed from his post in July 1813. During the final year and a half of the War of 1812, Dearborn led American forces in New York City and Boston.After he retired from the military, Dearborn lived in Boston. He was an unsuccessful candidate for governor of Massachusetts in 1817. In 1822, he entered the final chapter in his long record of service to the U.S. government. Appointed minister to Portugal, he spent almost two years in Lisbon before retiring to Roxbury, Massachusetts, where he died on June 6, 1829, at the age of 78.Bunker Hill Veterans in the HouseHenry Dearborn was not the only future U.S. Representative to participate in the Battle of Bunker Hill. Colonel John Paterson, who had been born in New Britain, Connecticut, but later represented New York in the House in the 8th Congress (1803–1805), was there. As was Artemas Ward, one of the first Major Generals of the U.S. Army, who issued the orders to defend Bunker Hill. Ward represented a Massachusetts district in the House for two terms between 1791 to 1795. Finally, William Eustis of Massachusetts had served as a physician at the battle and later held a seat in the House for parts of four nonconsecutive terms. Eustis died in February 1825, only four months before the fiftieth anniversary of the Battle of Bunker Hill.At least one additional future House Member had been present near the Battle of Bunker Hill in 1775. About 10 miles away from the fighting, from a hill at his home in Braintree, Massachusetts, a seven-year-old John Quincy Adams saw smoke and fire in the distance, heard the cannon volleys, and feared his family—especially his father John Adams, a leading revolutionary—was in danger of reprisals from British soldiers. After serving as President from 1825 to 1829, Adams held a seat in the House for 17 years, from 1831 until his death in 1848, capping a distinguished career in public service.50 Years after Bunker HillOn June 17, 1825, 74-year-old Henry Dearborn traveled to Charlestown to attend the ceremony commemorating the fiftieth anniversary of the Battle of Bunker Hill. That day, a large crowd watched as assembled dignitaries symbolically initiated construction of a planned 221-foot-tall granite obelisk to memorialize the battle. The French hero of the American revolution, the Marquis de Lafayette, who was in the final months of his yearlong tour of the United States, helped lay the cornerstone of the monument, which was later completed in 1843.Representative Daniel Webster of Massachusetts addressed the crowd. A rising star in the House, Webster was chair of the House Judiciary Committee and would later serve in the U.S. Senate and twice as U.S. Secretary of State. His speech praised the heroism, initiative, and achievements of the defenders of Bunker Hill and underscored the legacy of the battle, which he said set the stage for the founding of the nation and its great democratic experiment in self-government. Several lines from Webster’s 1825 address are enshrined in the House Chamber today:Let us develop the resources of our land, call forth its powers, build up its institutions, promote all its great interests, and see whether we also, in our day and generation, may not perform something worthy to be remembered.In 1775, Dearborn and others had helped plant the seeds of American democracy on the battlefield at Bunker Hill overlooking the Charles River in Massachusetts. Two hundred and fifty years later, in Washington, DC, the U.S. Capitol sits perched on a different hill within sight of a different river, the Potomac. But inside the grand domed building, the House of Representatives remains a place for Americans to strive to “perform something worthy to be remembered,” as Webster said, while enjoying the civil and political rights that Henry Dearborn had fought to guarantee.Sources: Annals of Congress, House, 3rd Cong., 1st sess. (21 January 1794): 1122–25; Annals of Congress, House, 3rd Cong., 1st sess. (13 February 1794): 1222; Annals of Congress, House, 4th Cong., 1st sess. (11 April 1796): 905–907; Annals of Congress, House, 4th Cong., 1st sess. (30 April 1796): 1282, 1291–1292; Annals of Congress, House, 4th Cong., 2nd sess. (23 January 1797): 1945–1971, 2332; Annals of Congress, House, 4th Cong., 2nd sess. (10 February 1797): 2113–2122; Annals of Congress, House, 4th Cong., 2nd sess. (2 March 1797): 2349–2352; Military Peace Establishment Act, 2 Stat. 132 (1802); Office of the Historian, U.S. House of Representatives, The People’s House: A Guide to Its History, Spaces, and Traditions (Washington, DC: Government Publishing Office, 2025); Boston Patriot and Daily Chronicle, 8 June 1829; Connecticut Courant (Hartford), 28 June 1825; Henry Dearborn, An Account of the Battle of Bunker Hill (Philadelphia: Harrison Hall, 1818); Lloyd A. Brown and Howard H. Peckham, eds., Revolutionary War Journals of Henry Dearborn, 1775–1783 (New York, Da Capo Press: 1971); Theodore J. Crackel, Mr. Jefferson’s Army: Political and Social Reform of the Military Establishment, 1801–1809 (New York: New York University Press, 1987); Harry L. Coles, “Dearborn, Henry,” American National Biography, vol. 6 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999): 299–301; Thomas Egleston, The Life of John Paterson, Major-General in the Revolutionary Army (New York, G.P. Putnam’s Sons: 1894); Richard Alton Erney, The Public Life of Henry Dearborn (New York: Arno Press, 1979); Daniel Goodwin Jr., The Dearborns; A Discourse Commemorative of the Eightieth Anniversary of the Occupation of Fort Dearborn, and the First Settlement at Chicago (Chicago: Fergus Printing Company, 1884); Nathaniel Philbrick, Bunker Hill: A City, a Siege, a Revolution (New York: Penguin Press, 2013); Alexander S. Twombly, ed., Daniel Webster’s First Oration at Bunker Hill (New York: Silver Burdett and Company, 1897); Henry Wagstaff, ed., The Papers of John Steele, vol. 1 (Raleigh, NC: Edwards & Broughton Printing Company,1924).