JOSEPH McKENNA
JOSEPH McKENNA, lawyer, cabinet officer, jurist, and associate justice of the United States Supreme court, is a native of Pennsylvania, though his chief distinctions have been won as a citizen of California. Of mixed Irish and English ancestry he was born in Philadelphia, August 10, 1843, a son of John and Mary McKenna. He was educated in the local schools, and at St. Joseph's college, Philadelphia, until he reached his eleventh year, when his parents removed to California, and located at Benicia, Solano county. Here his education was continued in the public schools and at Benicia collegiate institute, from which latter he was graduated in law, mainly under the instructorship of Professor Abbott, in 1865, and was at once admitted to the bar.
Early in his professional career Mr. McKenna was twice elected district attorney of Solano county, being inducted into office in March, 1866. Upon being elected he moved to Fairfield, the county seat, and subsequently to Suisun, in the same county, where he continued his practice, and was elected to the lower house of the California legislature, serving throughout the sessions of 1875 and 1876. While a member of this body he delivered a speech that attracted much attention on the proposal to create a State Board of Railroad Commissioners. This effort gave him more than local prominence, and in the next year he received the Republican nomination for congress, from the third congressional district, but was defeated. His nomination in 1878 met with another defeat, and it was not until his third attempt, in 1884, that his congressional aspirations were successful. He served with eminent success in the forty-ninth, fiftieth, fifty-first and fifty-second Congresses, and was the only member during that period, west of the Rocky Mountains, to receive a place on the committee of Ways and Means. Here began his association with the late President McKinley, then chairman of that important committee, and the mutual friendship thus begun continued unabated until the untimely death of President McKinley.
