The abolitionist atmosphere at Williams had enlightened him politically, after which he began to consider politics as a career.[26] He campaigned for Republican John C. Frémont in 1856.[27] In 1858, he married Lucretia and they had seven children, five of whom survived infancy.[28] Soon after the wedding, he registered to read law at the office of attorney Albert Gallatin Riddle in Cleveland, though he did his studying in Hiram.[29][30] He was admitted to the bar in 1861.[31]
Local Republican leaders invited Garfield to enter politics upon the death of Cyrus Prentiss, the presumptive nominee for the local state senate seat. He was nominated at the party convention on the sixth ballot and was elected, serving from 1860 to 1861.[32] Garfield's major effort in the state senate was an unsuccessful bill providing for Ohio's first geological survey to measure its mineral resources.[33]

Civil War[edit]
Garfield as a brigadier general during the Civil War
After Abraham Lincoln's election as president, several Southern states announced their secession from the Union to form a new government, the Confederate States of America. 