William Pitt Fessenden was an American politician. He was born in 1806 at New Hampshire and died in 1869. He was admitted to the bar in 1827, and soon began practice in Portland, Maine. He served in the Maine House of Representatives from 1832 until 1840, 1845 until 1846, and 1853 until 1854. He was a member of the Whig National Conventions of 1840, 1848 and 1852, and became one of the founders of the Republican party. He was elected to the US Congress from 1841 to 1843, and served in the US Senate from 1854 until 1864, when he was appointed Secretary of the Treasury by President Abraham Lincoln, and served until 1865. He was again a US Senator from 1865 until 1869. While in the Senate he made a famous speech against the Kansas-Nebraska bill, and in 1861 was appointed chairman of the Finance Committee, where he very ably sustained the national credit. He was one of the seven Republican Senators who voted for the acquittal of President Johnson in the impeachment trial of 1867. Research William Fessenden
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