BUTLER, Roderick Randum, (grandfather of Robert Reyburn Butler), a Representative from Tennessee; born in Wytheville, Va., April 9, 1827; bound as an apprentice and learned the tailor’s trade; moved to Taylorsville (now Mountain City), Tenn.; attended night school; studied law; was admitted to the bar in 1853 and commenced practice in Taylorsville; appointed postmaster of Taylorsville by President Fillmore; major of the First Battalion of Tennessee Militia; member of the State senate 1859-1863; during the Civil War served in the Union Army as lieutenant colonel of the Thirteenth Regiment, Tennessee Volunteer Cavalry, from November 5, 1863, until April 25, 1864, when he was honorably discharged; delegate to the Republican National Conventions in 1864, 1872 and 1876; delegate to the State constitutional convention in 1865; county judge and judge of the first judicial circuit of Tennessee in 1865; chairman of the first State Republican executive committee of Tennessee; delegate to the Baltimore Border State Convention; elected as a Republican to the Fortieth and to the three succeeding Congresses (March 4, 1867-March 3, 1875); chairman, Committee on the Militia (Forty-third Congress); censured by the House of Representatives on March 16, 1870, for corruption in regard to an appointment to West Point; unsuccessful candidate for reelection in 1874 to the Forty-fourth Congress; president of the Republican State conventions in 1869 and 1882; member of the State house of representatives 1879-1885; elected to the Fiftieth Congress (March 4, 1887-March 3, 1889); was not a candidate for renomination in 1888; resumed the practice of law; again a member of the State senate 1893-1901; died in Mountain City, Johnson County, Tenn., August 18, 1902; interment in Mountain View Cemetery.