cause, and, although lie took no pait in politics, the course of public alfairs induced him to remove in 1850 from Kentucky to Iowa, where he became s. leader of the Republican party. He was offered and declined numerous offices, and devoted himself to his profession, in which he took high rank. In 1863 he was appointed by President Lincoln asso- ciate justice of the U. S. supreme court, which office he continued to hold. He was the orator at the con- stitutional centennial celebration at Philadelphia.
MILLER, Stephen, soldier, b. in Perry countv,
Pa., 7 Jan., 181G ; d. in Worthington, Minn., 18
Aug., 1881. His grandfather, Melchior Miller,
came from Germany about 1785. Stephen received
a, common-school education, became a forwarding
and commission merchant in Harrisburg in 1837,
was elected prothonotary of Dauphin county in
1849 and 1853, and in 1853-5 edited the '• tele-
graph," a Whig journal at Harrisburg. In 1855-'8
he was flour-inspector of Philadelphia, and in the
latter year he removed to Minnesota for his health,
and engaged in business in St. Cloud. He was a
delegate to the Republican national convention of
1860, and a presidential elector on the Lincoln
ticket in that year. He enlisted as a private sol-
dier in 1861, was made lieutenant-colonel of the
1st Minnesota infantry, and served with the Army
of the Potomac till September, 1863, when he became colonel of the 7th Minnesota, and assisted,
with his regiment, in quelling the Indian outbreak
of that year in his adopted state. He was commis-
sioned brigadier-general of volunteers, 36 Oct.,
1863, and shortly afterward elected governor of
Minnesota, so that he resigned from the army on
18 Jan., 1864. He served as governor in 1864-'5,
and from 1871 till his death was field-agent of the
St. Paul and Sioux City railroad.
MILLER, Stephen Decatur, senator, b. in
Waxhaw settlement, Lancaster district, S. C, in
May, 1787; d. in Raymond, Miss., 8 March, 1838.
He was graduated at the College of South Carolina
in 180S, admitted to the bar in Columbia in 1811,
and elected to congress in 1816 as an anti-Calhoun
Democrat, serving in 1817-'19, and declining a re-
election. He was state senator in 1833-'8, and in
1888-'30 governor of South Carolina. While oc-
cupying the former office, he was chairman of the
judiciary committee, and originated important
changes, especially in the criminal law of the state.
As governor he threw all his influence on the side
of nullification. He was a member of the state
convention in 1830, again in 1833, and in 1830-'3
was in the U. S. senate, but resigned at the latter
date on account of the failure of his health. He
removed to Mississippi in 1835, settled on a planta-
tion, and engaged in cotton-planting till his death.
MILLER, Stephen Franks, lawyer, b. in North
Carolina about 1810; d. in Oglethorpe, G-a., in 1867.
He removed to Georgia in his early youth, was ad-
mitted to the bar when twenty-one years of age,
.and was soon afterward elected solicitor-general
of the southern district. On the expiration of his
term of office he removed to Alabama, where he
practised his profession until a bronchial affection
compelled him to engage in other pursuits. From
1840 till 1847 he edited •' The Monitor," a Whig
journal published in Tuscaloosa, Ala. In 1848-"y
he resided in New Orleans, where he was associated
in the editorial management of " De Bow's Re-
view " and the " Daily Commercial Times." His
health again failing, he removed to Oglethorpe. Ga.,
where he resided until his death. He published
" Bench and Bar of Georgia " (3 vols., Philadelphia,
1858) ; " Wilkins Wilder, or the Successful Man "
(1860) ; and " Memoir of Gen. David Blackshear."
MILLER, Theodore, jurist, b. in Hudson, N. Y.,
in IMay. 1816 ; d. there, 18 Aug., 1895. He was edu-
cated in the public schools, admitted to the bar, was
district attorney for Columbia county, and con-
ducted successfully the prosecutions against the
leaders of the anti-rent faction, his energy in main-
taining the law resulting in the suppression of that
movement. He was elected a judge of the supreme
court of New York state in 1861, and during the
last four years of his service was presiding justice
of the 3d department. He was made associate jus-
tice of the court of appeals in 1874 and held office
till 1886, when he was retired on account of age.
MILLER, Warner, senator, b. in Oswego county,
N. Y., 13 Aug., 1838. His parents were of German
extraction, and his grandfather served as a colonel
in the Revolutionary army. Warner was graduated
at Union in 1860. He enlisted a few months later
as a private in a New York cavalry regiment, served
under Gen. Philip H. Sheridan in the Shenandoah
valley, and was promoted lieutenant. At the battle
of Winchester he was taken prisoner, and paroled
on the field. Soon afterward he was honorably dis-
charged and went abroad, where he became inter-
ested in paper-manufacturing, and on his return
he established himself in this business in Herkimer,
N. Y., where he still (1888) resides. His first active
participation in politics was in 1873, when he was
a delegate to the National Republican convention
at Philadelphia. He was in the Legislature in
1874-"8. was elected to congress as a Republican in
1878, and re-elected in 1880, bat in 1881 was chosen
U. S. senator from New York to fill the unexpired
term of Thomas C. Piatt, who had resigned. His
term expired in 1887, when he was succeeded by
Frank Hiscock.
MILLER, William, founder of the sect of Adventists. or " Millerites," b. in Pittsfield, Mass., 5 Feb., 1783 ; d. in Low Hampton, N. Y., 30 Dec, 1849. His father,
Capt. William Mil-
ler, was a soldier of
the Revolution and
of the war of 1813.
His mother was the
daughterof Elnathan
Phelps, of Pittsfield,
Mass., a popular Bap-
tist clergyman. Re-
ligious meetings were
often held in his fa-
ther's house, and the
zeal of the exhorters
and revivalists had.
much to do with shap-
ing the boy's career,
who had little else to
break the monotony
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of his farm life, the few books he could borrow were mainly religious, stimulating the morbid tendency of his mind ; but he earned copies of " Robinson Crusoe " and " The Adventures of Robert Boyle " by chopping wood. He became a prosperous Green mountain farmer, was a recruiting-officer at the beginning of the war of 1813, and a captain at Plattsburg. He was a ready and smooth versifier, and was called the "poet of Low Hampton." In his early manhood he read Hume. Voltaire, and Thomas Paine, and advocated their teachings. He afterward professed faith in Christianity, uniting with the Baptist church at Low Hampton, when his absorbing study of the Bible began. " I lost all taste for other reading," he wrote of this period. He began with Genesis, and left not a sentence unstudied, accept-