Page:Men of Mark in America vol 1.djvu/451



OWLER, CHARLES NEWELL, banker and Republican member of congress from the fifth congressional district of New Jersey, was born November 2, 1852, on his father's farm at Lena, Illinois, where his early years were passed in the work and the amusements and studies of a typical American country boy. After taking a course at Beloit college, Wisconsin, he entered Yale in 1872; and four years later he was graduated in the class of which President Hadley, of Yale, was valedictorian. He took an active part in college athletics and was a member of the Yale crew.

After graduation he moved to Chicago, where he taught school while he attended the Chicago law school. In 1878 he was graduated from this school, standing second in his class; and the same year he went to Beloit, Kansas, to practise his profession. He remained there for five years, during which time he had established a profitable legal business. In 1883 he moved East and settled in Union county. New Jersey, first in Cranford, and later at Elizabeth, his present home. Within a short time he became an active factor in local politics, and for many years he served as chairman of the Republican city committee of Elizabeth. From his college days he has been a close student of political economy and of the laws of finance.

In 1894 he was elected a member of the fifty-fourth Congress of the United States, and up to 1905 he has been reelected to each successive congress. When he entered congress. Speaker Reed recognized his knowledge of the science of finance by assigning him to the important committee on Banking and Currency, the membership of which in that period of financial stress and panic was a matter of national concern. The following year Mr. Fowler introduced a general financial and currency bill by which he hoped to strengthen the financial system of the country. Some of the provisions of this bill were later enacted into law. In 1901 Speaker Henderson appointed him chairman of the committee on Banking and Currency, a position which he still retains. In 1902 he drafted the Fowler bill, which has been discussed by the press of the entire country. At his