Elihu Root

Biography

Elihu Root was born in Clinton, New York, in 1845, the son of a mathematics professor at Hamilton College, where he studied. He took a law degree at New York University in 1867 and became a leading corporate lawyer in New York City; early on he was part of the defence in the trials of William M. Tweed. From 1883 to 1885 he was U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York.

As Secretary of War under McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt from 1899 to 1904, he governed the territories taken from Spain, helped draft the Foraker Act and the Platt Amendment, and reorganised the Army with a general staff and a reformed National Guard. As Secretary of State from 1905 to 1909 he put the consular service under civil service rules, improved relations with Latin America, eased tensions with Japan through the Root-Takahira Agreement and negotiated many arbitration treaties, work recognised with the 1912 Nobel Peace Prize.

He was a senator from New York from 1909 to 1915 and chaired the 1912 Republican National Convention that renominated Taft. In 1917 he led a mission to Russia's Provisional Government. He later helped design the Permanent Court of International Justice, was a delegate to the Washington Naval Conference and was the first president of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. He died in 1937.