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History of the Treasury
Secretaries of the Treasury
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Thomas Corwin
(1850 - 1853)
President Taylor's death brought Millard Filmore to the
presidency and Thomas Corwin (1794-1865) to the office of Secretary of the
Treasury. Corwin had established himself as "the most captivating and effective
political orator the country had  ever produced" during his years as a Whig
senator from Ohio (1845-1850). Like his immediate predecessor, William M.
Meredith, Corwin believed in a protective tariff, but he did not want to
make sudden or drastic changes in the free-trade tariff law of 1846.
He objected to that law's provisions, which taxed
some imported raw materials at a higher rate than the imported manufactured
goods made from those materials, stating in a report to Congress that,
"such provisions certainly take from the manufacturer and artisan that
encouragement which the present law was intended to afford." As a longtime
Whig, however, Corwin was unsuccessful in passing any tariff legislation
in a Congress controlled by Democrats. He retired as Secretary at the
end of Filmore's administration.
About the Artist
Born in 1840, John Harrison Witt began his career
in Dublin, Indiana as a wagon painter in a small agricultural-implement
factory owned by his uncle. At the age of eighteen, Witt went to Cincinnati
to study art with Joseph 0. Eaton, a renowned portrait and figure painter.
By 1860, Witt had embarked on portrait painting as a profession and had
opened a studio in Columbus, Ohio where he painted a number of early Ohio
governors for the State House as well as many other prominent citizens.
Moving to Washington, D.C. in 1873 in search of portrait commissions,
Witt painted several notable figures, including General William T. Sherman.
His portrait of Thomas Corwin, painted in 1880, was most likely copied
from a photograph.
Office of the Curator
All rights reserved. 2001
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