James Gillespie Blaine (January 31, 1830 – January 27, 1893) was a U.S. Representative, Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, U.S. Senator from Maine, two-time United States Secretary of State, and champion of the Half-Breeds. He was a dominant Republican leader of the post-Civil War period, obtaining the 1884 Republican nomination, but losing to Democrat Grover Cleveland.
Blaine was born in West Brownsville, Washington County, P...
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James Gillespie Blaine (January 31, 1830 – January 27, 1893) was a U.S. Representative, Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, U.S. Senator from Maine, two-time United States Secretary of State, and champion of the Half-Breeds. He was a dominant Republican leader of the post-Civil War period, obtaining the 1884 Republican nomination, but losing to Democrat Grover Cleveland.
Blaine was born in West Brownsville, Washington County, Pennsylvania, near Pittsburgh. His parents were Ephraim Lyon Blaine and his wife Maria Gillespie. The Blaines were Scots-Irish Americans. According to Blaine's entry in the "Representative Men of Maine" (1893), "Ephraim L. was an intellectual, an educated, and, in many respects, a brilliant man, but he was not regarded as a practical man. He was a graduate of Washington College. In 1820 he married Maria Gillespie, a granddaughter of Neal Gillespie, who came to America from the north of Ireland in 1771. The husband was a Presbyterian and the...
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