William Henry Stanton (July 28, 1843 – March 28, 1900) was an attorney, editor, politician and judge. He served as a Democratic member of the U.S. House of Representatives from

Pennsylvania's 12th congressional district Pennsylvania's 12th congressional district is located in southwestern Pennsylvania, which includes Pittsburgh and much of Allegheny County. It has been represented since January 3, 2023 by Summer Lee. Prior to 2018, the 12th district was located ...

, elected to fill the vacancy when

Winthrop Welles Ketcham Winthrop Welles Ketcham (sometimes spelled Ketchum, June 29, 1820 – December 6, 1879) was a United States representative from Pennsylvania and a United States district judge of the United States District Court for the Western District of Pennsy ...

resigned and serving for three months from December 1876 to early March 1877. He was previously editor of the ''Scranton Daily Times'' (now the ''Times-Tribune'') until 1872.Frederick Lyman Hitchcock
History of Scranton and Its People
Volume 1, 1914, page 529 In 1877 Stanton was elected as a state judge for the County Court of Common Pleas in

Wilkes-Barre Wilkes-Barre ( or ) is a city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the county seat of Luzerne County. Located at the center of the Wyoming Valley in Northeastern Pennsylvania, it had a population of 44,328 in the 2020 census. It is the s ...

Luzerne County Luzerne County is a county in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of , of which is land and is water. It is Northeastern Pennsylvania's second-largest county by total area. As of ...

(which then included much of present-day Lackawanna County). After Lackawanna County was organized by the state legislature in 1878, and designated as a separate judicial district, Stanton chose to be reassigned to its County Court in

Scranton Scranton is a city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Lackawanna County. With a population of 76,328 as of the 2020 U.S. census, Scranton is the largest city in Northeastern Pennsylvania, the Wyoming V ...

. He resigned from the judgeship in February 1879. He was prosecuted and acquitted of libel in September 1879 following charges by

William Walker Scranton William Walker Scranton (April 4, 1844 – December 3, 1916) was an American businessman based in Scranton, Pennsylvania. He became president and manager of the Lackawanna Iron and Coal Company after his father's death in 1872. The company ...

, general manager of the Lackawanna Iron and Coal Company, who objected to newspaper articles published in August 1878. Stanton had been indicted in the scandal because of witness testimony.

Early life and education

William H. Stanton was born in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...

on July 28, 1843. He was raised in Carbondale and

Archbald, Pennsylvania Archbald is a borough in Lackawanna County, Pennsylvania. It is part of Northeastern Pennsylvania and is named for James Archbald, the first mayor of Carbondale, Pennsylvania. Before being renamed in Archbald's honor, the name of the settlement ...

. Stanton attended school in Archbald and at Saint John's College, near

Montrose, Pennsylvania Montrose is a borough in Susquehanna County, Pennsylvania, United States, south-southeast of Binghamton, New York and north by west of Scranton. The land is elevated approximately 1,400 feet (427 m) above sea level. It is the Susquehanna Cou ...

. Following graduation, he taught school while studying law with an established firm. He was

admitted to the bar An admission to practice law is acquired when a lawyer receives a license to practice law. In jurisdictions with two types of lawyer, as with barristers and solicitors, barristers must gain admission to the bar whereas for solicitors there are dist ...

in Scranton, Pennsylvania in 1868.

Career

He married Anna Marie Allen of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. They had a total of five children together: William H., Jr.; Mary A., Victoria A., Lenore, and Leroy Emmanuel Stanton. Stanton commenced practice in

, an industrial city in the anthracite region of northeastern Pennsylvania. He was editor of the ''Scranton Daily Times'' (now the ''Times-Tribune'') until 1872. He served as District Attorney and

Prosecuting Attorney A prosecutor is a legal representative of the prosecution in states with either the common law adversarial system or the civil law inquisitorial system. The prosecution is the legal party responsible for presenting the case in a criminal trial ...

of the Scranton Mayor's Court from 1872 to 1874. He served in the Pennsylvania State Senate for the 20th district in 1875 and 1876. Stanton was elected as a Democrat to the

44th United States Congress The 44th United States Congress was a meeting of the legislative branch of the United States federal government, consisting of the United States Senate and the United States House of Representatives. It met in Washington, D.C. from March 4, 1875, ...

, filling the vacancy caused by the resignation of Republican Winthrop W. Ketcham, appointed as a federal judge. He served from December 4, 1876 to March 3, 1877. He did not stand as a candidate in 1876 for election to a full two-year term. In August 1877, Scranton erupted into a general strike, as mine workers and others joined railroad workers. Thousands of workers protested wage cuts. After three men were killed by a mayor-appointed group known as the Citizens' Corps, Patrick Mahon, alderman of the Sixth Ward, acted as county coroner to investigate the deaths, assisted by Stanton. Based on his coroner's jury, Mahon issued warrants for more than a dozen arrests.Hitchcock, pp. 506-507 Stanton was later elected in late 1877 in a "wave of labor reform politics"''New York Times,'
"A Terrible Bereavement"
July 2, 1884 as the candidate of the

Greenback-Labor Party The Greenback Party (known successively as the Independent Party, the National Independent Party and the Greenback Labor Party) was an American political party with an anti-monopoly ideology which was active between 1874 and 1889. The party ran ...

for Judge of the

Court of Common Pleas, defeating incumbent Judge Dana, who was supported by Republicans and Democrats."Obituary: William Henry Stanton," ''Scranton Truth,'' 28 March 1900 (see scanned article to the right) In April 1878 the legislature passed an act authorizing the creation of new counties if population reached 150,000 in an existing county. This applied only to Luzerne County, and

Lackawanna County Lackawanna County (; unm, Lèkaohane) is a county in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. It is located in Northeastern Pennsylvania and had a population of 215,896 as of the 2020 census. Its county seat and largest city is Scranton. The county ...

was approved for organization in August 1878 as the last county in the state.Henry C. Bradsby
''History of Luzerne County, Pennsylvania''
Volume 1, 1893, Pages 232-233 The ''New York Times'' at the time described "excitement" in the lobbying around the formation of the new county, with a revisiting of issues related to the general strike in Scranton the previous year. As the new county had more than 40,000 inhabitants, it qualified to be designated as a new judicial district. After maneuvering by the governor, Stanton and other judges were ordered by the state supreme court to assist in the organization of county courts in the new Lackawanna County in October 1878.Hitchcock, p. 330 Stanton was reassigned as one of the judges for Lackawanna's County Court of Common Pleas, to be held at the county seat of Scranton. Stanton resigned his judgeship in February 1879. The ''New York Times'' reported later that fellow Democrats in the Assembly had begun impeachment proceedings against Stanton in retaliation for his snubbing Daniel Dougherty and other important Philadelphia counsel in an unfavorable ruling, and he resigned rather than being forced out.

, general manager of Lackawanna Iron and Coal, contended that articles published in August 1878 in the ''Scranton Times'' and ''Labor Advocate,'' during the lobbying for the new county, were libelous and encouraged violence against him. He filed a libel suit against Aaron Augustus Chase, editor of the ''Scranton Daily Times'' and a colleague of Stanton. Implicated by witnesses in the scandal (and thought by some to have written the article in ''Labor Advocate,'' Stanton was arrested and prosecuted for libel. Stanton was tried in September 1879 and acquitted. A separate libel trial of Chase resulted in his conviction and being sentenced to a fine and jail time. At the conclusion of the libel trial, the ''New York Times'' reported Scranton as saying that Stanton had offered to resign his judgeship if W.W. Scranton dropped his prosecution against him.

Later life

After leaving the bench, Stanton became an organizer of the reform Greenback and

Labor Labour or labor may refer to: * Childbirth, the delivery of a baby * Labour (human activity), or work ** Manual labour, physical work ** Wage labour, a socioeconomic relationship between a worker and an employer ** Organized labour and the la ...

movements,"Obituary Notes" W.H. Stanton"
''New York Times,'' 29 March 1900 which had a peak of influence in this area in the late 1870s and early 1880s, extending into the Southern Tier of New York.Milton M. Klein, ''The Empire State: A History of New York''
Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press, 2005, pp. 455-456''New York Times,'
"Pennsylvania Democrats: Disssensions in Their Ranks"
September 6, 1880 He left Scranton in 1883, living first in

Arkansas Arkansas ( ) is a landlocked state in the South Central United States. It is bordered by Missouri to the north, Tennessee and Mississippi to the east, Louisiana to the south, and Texas and Oklahoma to the west. Its name is from the O ...

, and in 1884 moving to Kansas City, Missouri. He made national headlines when travelling back to Scranton to run for judge, his wife back in Kansas took all his money and deserted the children. The family was reunited and Stanton returned to Scranton, where he practiced law until his death in 1900.''Scranton Truth,'' "Death of Ex-Judge Stanton," March 28, 1900

Death and burial

Stanton died in Scranton on March 28, 1900. He was buried in Scranton's West Side Catholic Cemetery. He was survived by his widow and five children: two sons and three daughters.

References

Sources

The Political Graveyard
, - {{DEFAULTSORT:Stanton, William Henry 1843 births 1900 deaths 19th-century American male writers 19th-century American newspaper editors 19th-century American legislators American lawyers admitted to the practice of law by reading law American male journalists Burials in Pennsylvania Democratic Party members of the United States House of Representatives from Pennsylvania District attorneys in Pennsylvania Judges of the Pennsylvania Courts of Common Pleas Pennsylvania lawyers Democratic Party Pennsylvania state senators People from Carbondale, Pennsylvania Politicians from New York City 19th-century American judges 19th-century American lawyers