Ambassador Miles Poindexter (1868 - 1946)
Miles Poindexter (April 22, 1868 – September 21, 1946) was an American politician. As a Republican and later a Progressive, he served as a United States Representative and United States Senator.
Legal career
After he graduated, he settled in Walla Walla, Washington, where he was admitted to the bar and began the practice of law. In 1892 he became the prosecuting attorney of Walla Walla County. He moved to Spokane, Washington in 1897 where he continued the practice of law. He served as the assistant prosecuting attorney for Spokane County from 1898 to 1904, and as a judge of the superior court from 1904 to 1908.
He was elected as a Republican to the Sixty-first Congress, and served from March 4, 1909 to March 4, 1911 representing the then Washington's newly created 3rd congressional district. He was then elected to the United States Senate in 1910 and was reelected in 1916, serving from March 4, 1911 to March 4, 1923. Poindexter left the Republican Party in 1913 to join the Progressive Party, rejoining the Republicans in 1915.[1] He was unsuccessful in his candidacy for reelection in 1922. He was one of only three Republican Senators to vote, on June 1, 1916, to confirm Louis Brandeis as a Supreme Court Justice—the other two Republicans being Robert M. La Follette and George W. Norris.
To date, Poindexter is the last Senator from Washington who lived east of the Cascades at the time of his election.
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