Bust view of Johnson. Image is clear with very good contrast. Mount is clean and in good condition. Photographer's backmark, M.B. Brady, Washington, DC & New York.

Reverdy Johnson (May 21, 1796 – February 10, 1876) was a statesman and jurist from Maryland. He gained fame as a defense attorney, defending notables such as Sandford of the Dred Scott case, Maj. Gen. Fitz John Porter at his court-martial, and Mary Surratt, alleged conspirator in the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. A former Whig, he was a strong supporter of the Union war effort. At first he opposed wartime efforts to abolish slavery until 1864, and in 1865 supported the 13th Amendment banning slavery.

From 1845 to 1849, Johnson represented Maryland in the United States Senate as a Whig. From his confirmation by the Senate in March 1849 until July 1850, Johnson was Attorney General of the United States under President Zachary Taylor.

A conservative Democrat, Johnson supported Stephen A. Douglas in the presidential election of 1860. He represented the slave-owning defendant in the controversial 1857 case Dred Scott v. Sandford. However, Johnson was personally opposed to slavery and became a key figure in the effort to keep Maryland from seceding from the Union during the American Civil War.

He served as a Maryland delegate to the Peace Convention of 1861 and from 1861 to 1862 served in the Maryland House of Delegates.

After the capture of New Orleans, President Abraham Lincoln commissioned Johnson to revise the decisions of the military commandant, General Benjamin F. Butler, in regard to foreign governments, and reversed all those decisions to the entire satisfaction of the administration. After the war, reflecting the diverse points of view held by his fellow statesmen, Johnson argued for a gentler Reconstruction effort than that advocated by the Radical Republicans.

On June 12, 1868, he was appointed minister to the United Kingdom.

This image was from the collection of the late William A. Turner.  [ad] [ph:L]

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