John H. Reagan
Palestine, Anderson County, Texas
Marker Inscription
John Henninger Reagan, son of Timothy and Elizabeth Lusk Reagan, was born on October 8, 1818, in Sevierville, Tennessee. He joined the Republic of Texas Army in 1839 and served in the Cherokee War. In the early 1840s he held several public offices in Nacogdoches County, and in 1847 obtained a law license and was elected to the Texas House of Representatives. He moved to Palestine in 1851 and opened a law office in his home. He was elected Texas 9th Judicial District Judge in 1852. Reagan, elected U.S. Congressman in 1857, resigned in 1861 over what he believed was a Federal takeover of states' rights. He served as postmaster general of the Confederacy during the Civil War. He was captured by Federal troops in 1865 and imprisoned for 18 months. He returned to Texas in 1866 and established a family farm near Palestine at the former site of Ft. Houston. During his tenure as a U.S. Congressman (1876-87) and U.S. Senator (1887-1891) Reagan led the fight that brought railroad monopolies under federal control with the passage of the Interstate Commerce Act in 1887. In 1891 he became the first chairman of the Texas Railroad Commission, a position he held until 1901. Reagan died of pneumonia on March 6, 1905. The entire Texas legislative assembly attended his funeral. (1994)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Born in Tennessee in 1818, John Henninger Reagan came to Texas, fought in the Cherokee War, and built a career in law and politics that carried him to the U.S. Congress by 1857. When war came he resigned over states' rights and served as postmaster general of the Confederacy, was captured and imprisoned, then returned to Texas and rebuilt his life. His greatest legacy came afterward: as congressman and senator he led the fight that produced the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887, then became the first chairman of the Texas Railroad Commission, pioneering government regulation of the railroads.
Why it matters
Reagan's career bridges the Confederacy and the Progressive impulse to rein in corporate power, making him a father of federal railroad regulation in America.
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Related people
- · John Henninger Reagan
Related events
- · Interstate Commerce Act
- · Cherokee War
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
John H. Reagan
Palestine, TX
Born in Tennessee in 1818, John Henninger Reagan rose through Texas public life as a judge and congressman before resigning his seat in 1861 to serve as postmaster general of the Confederacy. Captured and imprisoned after the war, he returned to farm near Palestine and re-entered national politics, where he led the fight for the 1887 Interstate Commerce Act that first brought railroad monopolies under federal regulation. He capped his career as the first chairman of the Texas Railroad Commission.
Anderson County in the Civil War
Palestine, TX
Settled largely by families from the Deep South, Anderson County voted overwhelmingly—870 to 15—for secession in 1861, even as Governor Sam Houston pleaded against it on the steps of Palestine's Osceola Hotel. More than 1,100 local men filled a dozen Confederate companies, over 300 dying on battlefields from New Mexico to Pennsylvania. On the home front, factories and salt works supplied the war effort while a hotel served as a makeshift hospital; among the county's leaders was John H. Reagan, the Confederacy's postmaster general.
Sacred Heart Church
Palestine, TX
Sacred Heart Church succeeded the 1874 Church of St. Joseph, which stood on land given by the International & Great Northern Railway—a reminder of how railroads seeded new towns and congregations across Gilded Age Texas. After fire destroyed the earlier church in 1890, this handmade-brick building rose that same year, designed by the noted Galveston architect Nicholas J. Clayton. Clayton was among the most celebrated architects in nineteenth-century Texas, and his involvement marks the ambition of a growing railroad town.
The I&GN Railroad in Palestine
Palestine, TX
Named the Anderson County seat in 1846, Palestine first grew on Trinity River steamboat trade that stalled whenever low water forced residents back onto ox-drawn wagons. Local leaders courted the railroad, and when the line that became the International and Great Northern arrived in 1872 — soon relocating its headquarters, shops, and roundhouse here — it became the town's largest employer for decades. Recruited workers arrived from across the nation and abroad, and to spare the old courthouse square the noise of trains the line was routed west, spawning a separate 'New Town' that took years to blend with the old.