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Rh often being exceedingly bitter. No speaker was received with greater enthusiasm or addressed larger audiences. It was largely owing to his labors at the hustings that a change in the political sentiment of the state was brought about. In 1856 he was a member of the National Republican Convention, and in November of the same year was elected one of the presidential electors in New Hampshire, and voted for Fremont and Dayton for president and vice-president.

In 1855 the legislature was called upon to elect two United States senators. For the first time in a quarter of a century, with a single exception, the Democratic party was in a minority. The opposition was composed of the Whig party, then on the point of dissolving, the American party, commonly known as the "Know-Nothing" party, and the Free-Soil party. These elements, a year later, were fused in the Republican party. By common consent, Hon. John P. Hale was nominated for the short term, and the contest for the long term was between Mr. Clark and the Hon. James Bell. In the senatorial caucus the latter was nominated and subsequently elected by the legislature. The contest, although warm, was a friendly one, so that when, two years later, in 1857, the legislature was called to fill the vacancy in the office occasioned by the death of Senator Bell, in obedience to the common wishes of their constituents the Repulican members nominated and the legislature elected Mr. Clark. Upon the expiration of his term he was reelected in 1860 with little opposition. The ten years spent by Senator Clark in congress constituted the most eventful period in the history of the republic. He witnessed the rise, progress, and overthrow of the Rebellion. This is not the time or place to review his congressional life. One will get a glimpse of his position upon the slavery question on page 268, volume 1, of Mr. Blaine's "Twenty Years of Congress." He served upon some of the most important committees, and was chairman of the Committee on Claims, and, during portions of two sessions, president pro tempore of the senate in the absence of Vice-President Hamlin. He was a firm supporter of the various war measures adopted for the suppression of the Rebellion, and had the confidence of President Lincoln and Secretary Stanton. He failed of a reelection in 1866, as his colleague, Senator Hale, had done two years before, not from any lack of appreciation of the invaluable services they had rendered the country nor of the honor they had conferred upon the state by their course in congress, but because the rule of rotation in office had become so thoroughly ingrafted into the practice of the Republican party in the state that a departure from it was not deemed wise, even in the persons of these eminent statesmen.

In the summer of 1866 a vacancy occurred in the office of district judge of the United States district court for the district of New Hampshire, and Senator Clark was nominated for the position by President Johnson, and unanimously confirmed by the senate. He thereupon resigned his seat in the senate and entered upon the discharge of his judicial