Benjamin Wade
Ohio Radical who co-authored the Wade-Davis Bill and stood one vote from the presidency in 1868.
Overview
Wade served Ohio in the Senate from 1851 to 1869, rising from antislavery lawyer to leader of the Radical Republicans. With Henry Davis he wrote the Wade-Davis Bill of 1864, setting strict terms for readmission of the South, which Lincoln pocket-vetoed. As president pro tempore after 1867 he stood next in line to the presidency during Johnson's impeachment trial in 1868, when one vote in the Senate would have made him president. He also championed women's suffrage and labor interests, remarkable positions for his era.
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