Richard Achilles Ballinger
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Richard Achilles Ballinger, mayor of Seattle, Washington, from 1904–1906 and U.S. Secretary of the Interior from 1909–1911, was born on July 9, 1858 in Boonesboro, Iowa. He graduated from Williams College in 1884 and passed the bar exam in 1886.
After serving as mayor of Seattle, Ballinger was commissioner of the General Land Office from 1907–1909. In 1909, President William Howard Taft appointed him Secretary of the Interior. While Secretary, he was accused of having interfered with investigation into the legality of certain private coal-land claims in Alaska. After a series of articles in Collier's Weekly that roused the conservationists an investigation was demanded. A congressional committee exonerated Ballinger, but the questioning of committee counsel Louis D. Brandeis made Ballinger's anti-conservationism clear. He resigned in March, 1911. The incident split the Republican Party and helped turn the election of 1912 against Taft.
Ballinger died on June 6, 1922, in Seattle, Washington.
| Preceded by: James Rudolph Garfield |
United States Secretary of the Interior 1909–1911 |
Succeeded by: Walter Lowrie Fisher |
| Preceded by: Thomas J. Humes |
Mayor of Seattle 1904–1906 |
Succeeded by: William H. Moore |
| United States Secretaries of the Interior |  |
|---|---|
| Ewing • McKennan • Stuart • McClelland • Thompson • C Smith • Usher • Harlan • Browning • Cox • Delano • Chandler • Schurz • Kirkwood • Teller • Lamar • Vilas • Noble • M Smith • Francis • Bliss • Hitchcock • Garfield • Ballinger • Fisher • Lane • Payne • Fall • Work • West • Wilbur • Ickes • Krug • Chapman • McKay • Seaton • Udall • Hickel • Morton • Hathaway • Kleppe • Andrus • Watt • Clark • Hodel • Lujan • Babbitt • Norton • Kempthorne |
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