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HEODORE ELIJAH BURTON, lawyer, legislator, member of the United States house of representatives, was born in Jefferson, Ashtabula count}^ Ohio, December 20, 1851, a son of Reverend William and Elizabeth Grant Burton. His early education was obtained in the public schools and by a period of study at Grand River institute, Austinsburg, Ohio, after which he removed to Iowa and spent some time on a farm. He resumed his studies in Iowa college in 1868, and in 1870 returned to Ohio to enter Oberlin college, from which he was graduated two years later. He was appointed tutor in Oberlin college, and during his spare time he studied law, and was admitted to the bar in 1875. He was offered a professorship at Oberlin, but declined it, and at once entered actively upon the practice of his profession, at Cleveland, Ohio, where he has successfully practised ever since.

In 1888, Mr. Burton was elected to the fifty-first Congress, as a Republican, from the twenty-first Ohio district, then a part of Cuyahoga county. He failed of a reelection in 1890, and was not a candidate in 1892. In 1894, he again presented himself as a candidate and was elected to the fifty-fourth Congress; and he has been reelected to each succeeding congress since that time, including the fifty-ninth, which ends March 4, 1907.

In his legislative capacity, he has been a useful member, both in committee work and on the floor of Congress. He has given especial attention to the financial and economic aspects of national legislation, and his speeches on these and kindred subjects have not only commanded the confidence of the house of representatives, but have had positive results to the country at large.

In 1902, he published a book upon "Financial Crises and Periods of Commercial Depression." Among his most notable contributions to the current discussions of congress are: Speeches on the Civil Service System in 1898; on the Financial Bill in 1900; and on the bill to establish the Nicarauguan Canal in the same year; also in opposition to the enlargement of the Navy, and on the Growth of