Henry Fountain ASHURST, Congress, AZ (1874-1962)

ASHURST, Henry Fountain, a Senator from Arizona; born in Winnemucca, Humboldt County, Nev., September 13, 1874; moved with his parents to Arizona in 1875 and settled near the present town of Flagstaff, Coconino County; attended the public schools of Flagstaff and graduated from the Stockton (Calif.) Business College in 1896; studied law and political economy at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor; admitted to the bar in 1897 and commenced practice in Williams, Ariz.; member of the Territorial house of representatives in 1897 and 1899, serving as speaker in 1899; served in the Territorial senate in 1903; district attorney of Coconino County 1905-1908; moved to Prescott, Ariz. in 1909 and continued the practice of law; upon the admission of Arizona as a State was elected as a Democrat to the United States Senate on March 27, 1912; reelected in 1916, 1922, 1928, and again in 1934, and served from March 27, 1912, to January 3, 1941; unsuccessful candidate for renomination in 1940; chairman, Committee on Indian Affairs (Sixty-third through Sixty-fifth Congresses), Committee on Industrial Expositions (Sixty-third Congress), Committee to Investigate Trespassers on Indian Land (Sixty-sixth Congress), Committee on the Judiciary (Seventy-third through Seventy-sixth Congresses); appointed a member of the Board of Immigration Appeals in the Department of Justice on April 8, 1941, and served until February 28, 1943, when he retired; died in Washington, D.C., May 31, 1962; interment in Sacred Heart Cemetery, Prescott, Ariz.

Bibliography

American National Biography; Dictionary of American Biography; Ashurst, Henry F. A Many-Colored Toga: The Diary of Henry Fountain Ashurst. Edited by George F. Sparks. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1962.

Source: Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, 1771-Present