Samuel B. Pettengill papers

Samuel Barrett Pettengill was born in Portland, Oregon, on January 19, 1886, the second son of Samuel Barrett and Susan Clagett Pettengill. At the time, his father was editor of the Portland Oregonian. After the death of his mother in 1890, he was brought to Grafton, Vermont and lived on the ancestral farm settled by his great-grandfather in 1787.

He was a graduate of Middlebury College and Yale Law School where he was a member of Chi Tau Kappa. He began the practice of law in South Bend, Indiana in 1912, and was a member of the Bar of the Supreme Court of Indiana and the United States Supreme Court. He was the recipient of honorary degrees from Harding, Franklin, Marietta and Middlebury Colleges and Norwich University.

He represented the Third Indiana District in Congress from 1931 to 1939, during which time he served on committees on military affairs, interstate and foreign commerce and helped formulate much influential legislation. His first book, Hot Oil, published in 1936, summarized the arguments pro and con in reference to the question of federal control or nationalization of the petroleum industry. Mr. Pettengill favored State rather than Federal regulation and the highest degree of industrial freedom consistent with the conservation of our national petroleum resources. He was influential in the enactment of the Connolly Hot Oil Act and the formulation of the Interstate Oil Compact. As a member of the House Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce, Mr. Pettengill helped formulate the Securities Act, the Motor Carriers Act, the Stock Exchange Act, the National Gas Act and other legislation dealing with railroads, commodity exchanges, public utilities, aviation and the Panama Canal. He became widely known because of his activities in the defeat of the Supreme Court Packing Bill and the Reorganization Bill during the presidency of Franklin D. Roosevelt.

Mr. Pettengill, a Jeffersonian Democrat, after being re-elected three times, terminated his Congressional career in 1939. Although his re-election was generally conceded, because of his disagreement with the policies of President Roosevelt, he re-turned to his law practice in South Bend.

A strong critic of numerous New Deal policies, he was Chair-man of the "No Third Term" campaign meeting at Carnegie Hall in 1940. Two years later, he was appointed Chairman of the Republican National Finance Committee. On January 1, 1943, he became Vice-President and General Counsel of the Transportation Association of America. He resigned early in 1944 to devote more of his time to his law practice, writing and speaking. Since leaving Congress, he had been writing a twice-a--week column as "The Gentleman From Indiana", which was syndicated to over 100 newspapers all over the country. During 1947 and 1948 he spoke on public affairs every Sunday afternoon over the American Broadcasting System. In addition to his first book, Hot Oil, written in 1936, he wrote Jefferson, The Forgotten Man in 1939 to show how far the principles of Jefferson had been discarded. In 1940 he wrote Smoke Screen to show that the increasing Federal controls over every facet of American business had its counterpart in developments in Germany and Italy. Smoke Screen was the best-selling non-fiction book of that year. For Americans Only, published in 1944, brought the same theme up to date.

By 1949 Mr. Pettengill decided that he had had enough of public life. He had resigned from his law firm in South Bend, of which he was a partner, a year or two before, as his columns, weekly broadcasts and the speeches he was making all over the country interfered with his practice of the law. He accepted the offer of Henry M. Dawes, brother of Charles G. Dawes, Vice-President under Calvin Coolidge, to come to Chicago as Assistant to the President of the Pure Oil Company, and consultant to the legal department. He wrote his last column on January 1, 1949. While there he was editor of the History of the Pure Oil Company, and also wrote many articles on politics and economics.

On July 1, 1956, he retired to his boyhood home at Grafton, Vermont, where he continued to engage in writing and speaking in defense of Constitutional Government and the competitive free enterprise system. He also conducted courses for teachers of American History in various colleges and was a trustee of the Vermont Historical Society. He was one of the founders of the Grafton Historical Society in 1962 and its President for the next ten years. His intense interest in the early history of Vermont and its settlers, led him to write his fifth book, The Yankee Pioneers -- A Saga of Courage, published in 1971.

A 33rd Degree Mason, Mr. Pettengill had been Master of Lodge # 294 and past deputy Grand Master of the Indiana Grand Lodge. In 1973, he received a citation and a medal of honor from the Masons in recognition of distinguished service to the craft.

On June 1, 1912, Mr. Pettengill married Josephine Campbell of Napoleon, Ohio, who died on June 26, 1948. They had one daughter, Susan, (Mrs. Thomas B. Douglas), who lives in Washington, D.C. On July 16, 1949, he married Helen M. Charles, of New York City. He was a Congregationalist and a member of the Grafton Church all his life.

Mr. Pettengill died on March 20, 1974, at the age of 88. His autobiography, My Story, edited by his wife Helen, was published posthumously in 1979.

Source: Biography supplied by Mrs. Samuel B. Pettengill, June, 1984.