John Reagan
John Henninger Reagan (October 8, 1818 – March 6, 1905) was an American politician from Texas. A Democrat, Reagan resigned from the U.S. House of Representatives when Texas declared secession from the United States and joined the Confederate States of America. He served in the cabinet of Jefferson Davis as Postmaster General.
After the Confederate defeat and his release from prison after the war, Reagan called for cooperation by the southern states with the U.S. government, an unpopular position among most conservative whites. He was elected to Congress in 1874 and was elected in 1886 by the state legislature as a Democrat from Texas to the U.S. Senate, where he served one term from 1887 to 1891. He resigned from the seat when appointed by the governor as chairman of the Texas Railroad Commission. He was among the founders of the Texas State Historical Association.
He was the only former Confederate cabinet member to be sit in the US Senate after the civil war. Alexander H. Stephens, the only Confederate Vice President, was also elected in 1866 to represent Georgia, but was refused to be seated to the Senate due to his war history. Elected as the representative of the Democrat Party for the state of Texas, he sat in the Senate for just one term; he was one of just three former Confederate cabinet members to take major political offices after the war.
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