William Boyd Allison was born at Perry, Ohio, March 2, 1829. His
father, John Allison, was a farmer, and young William spent his boyhood
in work on the farm and in attending the district school. At the age
of sixteen he studied at the Academy at Wooster and subsequently spent
a year at Allegheny college in Meadville, Pennsylvania. After that he
made enough money by teaching school to pay for his admission in the
Western Reserve college in Hudson, Ohio. He studied law in Wooster, and
in 1851 was admitted to the bar. Soon after he became deputy county
clerk. His political tastes were made evident early in life. In 1856 he
was a delegate to the Republican state convention and supported Fremont
for president. In the following year he moved to Ohio, and settled in
Dubuque, where he has since resided. He was a delegate at the Chicago
Republican Convention which nominated Abraham Lincoln for President.
At the beginning of the Civil war he was appointed on the staff of the
Governor of Ohio. In 1862 he was elected to the Thirty-eighth congress
and was re-elected three times in succession. He was the leading member
of the ways and means committee during the Civil war and was of great
use to the President and the Secretary of the Treasury in devising
plans for raising money. He was elected to the United States senate in
1872. His previous record in the house caused his selection as chairman
of the senate committee on appropriations. Mr. Allison has always taken
a prominent part in tariff questions and was chiefly instrumental in
framing the senate tariff bill of the Fiftieth congress. In 1881 he
was offered the position of secretary of the Treasury by President
Garfield, but declined, and, in 1888, he was a leading candidate for
nomination for the presidency. After the election of Mr. Harrison he
was again offered the treasury portfolio, which he again declined.
Senator Allison has always held the respect of public men, and has
never used his position to enrich himself. His tastes are refined, he
is an agreeable host, and popular in both public and private life.