William Pitt Kellogg (December 8, 1830 – August 10, 1918) was an American lawyer and Republican Party politician who served as a United States Senator from 1868 to 1872 and from 1877 to 1883 and as the Governor of Louisiana from 1873 to 1877 during the Reconstruction Era. He was one of the most important politicians in Louisiana during and immediately after Reconstruction and was notable for being elected after most other Republican officials had been defeated when white Democrats regained control of state politics. He is also notable as one of few incumbent senators to be elected to the House of Representatives, where he served from 1883 to 1885. He was the last elected Republican governor of Louisiana until Dave Treen in 1980 and the last Republican to serve as a senator from Louisiana until David Vitter was elected in 2004. Early life and education Kellogg was born in Orwell, Vermont, near the New York border, where he spent his childhood. After completing his education in the common schools, he moved to Peoria, Illinois, at the age of eighteen and was a school teacher for several years. His fifth cousin William Kellogg lived in the area and served as a member of the United States House of Representatives from 1857 to 1863. Career Kellogg became a lawyer, likely "reading law" and studying with practicing lawyers, as was typical for many then. He moved to Canton, Illinois, and started a law practice. There he joined the U.S. Republican Party and eventually came to know Abraham Lincoln, a fellow lawyer. When Lincoln became president in 1861, he appointed Kellogg as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the Nebraska Territory. Kellogg moved to Nebraska. With the outbreak of the American Civil War, Kellogg was granted a leave of absence and he returned to Illinois and joined the 7th Regiment Illinois Volunteer Cavalry. By 1862, he had risen to the rank of colonel and played an important role at a small battle near Sikeston, Missouri. Kellogg resigned because of ill health on June 1, 1862. He then returned to Nebraska and resumed his work as Chief Justice. After the Civil War, Kellogg was elected as a companion of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States. In 1865, at the end of the Civil War, days before his assassination, Lincoln appointed Kellogg as the federal collector of customs of