Biographical Sketches:  Robert Marion La Follette


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File Contributed by Tina S. Vickery, tsvickery@gmail.com
19:11 4/29/01
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The Blue Book of the State of Wisconsin Compiled and Published under
the direction of Wm. H. Froehlich, Secretary of State 1901.

page 725.

STATE OFFICERS. Terms end first Monday in January, 1903.

GOVERNOR.

ROBERT MARION LA FOLLETTE (Rep.), was born in a log cabin at Prim-
rose, Dane Co., Wis., June 14th, 1855, son of Josiah and Mary
(Ferguson) La Fol-lette. He comes from an old French Huguenot family
which settled ill this country more than a century ago. After
attending the district school and a preparatory academy at Madison,
he entered the preparatory department of the State University in 1874,
graduated from the General Science course with the class of 1879 and
entered the Law department the same year. In February, 1880, He
passed the state bar examinations, was admitted to practice, and
immediately opened an office in the city of Madison. At the ensuing
election he, was elected district attorney of Dane county, and was re-
elected to that office in 1882, carry-ing Dane county by 495 votes,
although all other Republican nominees in Dane, county suffered defeat
by about 1,000 votes. In 1884 he was elected a member of Congress from
the then Third Congressional district, comprising Dane, Grant, Green,
Iowa, and La Fayette counties, defeating Burr W. Jones, democrat. He
was three times elected to Congress and again renominated in 1890, but
was defeated in common with most Republican nominees in the state
that year. During his last term in Congress he served on the Ways and
Means Committee and framed several schedules of the McKinley Tariff
Law.

Upon his retirement from Congress Air. La Follette entered upon the
practice of his profession at Madison as the senior member of the firm
of La Follette, Harper, Roe & Zimmerman. This partnership was
dissolved In 1894, since which time he has practiced alone. He was
elected governor in 1900, receiving a net plurality of 103,745 over
Louis G. Bohmrich, democrat, or 59 75-100 per cent. of all votes east
for governor, with five candidates in the field.