Willard Saulsbury Sr.

Saulsbury was born in Mispillion Hundred, Kent County, Delaware, son of William & Margaret Ann Smith Saulsbury. He was a younger brother of Governor Gove Saulsbury and U.S. Senator Eli Saulsbury. He married Annie Ponder, sister of Governor James Ponder, and they had three children, John Ponder, Margaret, and Willard Jr. They were members of the Episcopal Church. Saulsbury was educated at Dickinson College and Delaware College, which is now the University of Delaware, studied law, was admitted to the Delaware Bar, and began his practice in Georgetown, Delaware. He was a slaveholder.{{Cite news |last1=Weil |first1=Julie Zauzmer |last2=Blanco |first2=Adrian |last3=Dominguez |first3=Leo |title=More than 1,800 congressmen once enslaved Black people. This is who they were, and how they shaped the nation. |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/interactive/2022/congress-slaveowners-names-list/ |access-date=2023-04-26 |newspaper=Washington Post |language=en}}

Saulsbury was the Delaware Attorney General from 1850 until 1855, and was elected to the United States Senate in 1858, defeating incumbent U.S. Senator Martin W. Bates. Saulsbury was reelected in 1864, but was defeated for a third term in 1870 by his older brother, Eli Saulsbury. He served two full terms from March 4, 1859, to March 4, 1871. He then continued his law practice and served as Chancellor of Delaware from 1873 until his death in 1892.

In 1863, Saulsbury was a vehement critic of President Abraham Lincoln's administration. Opposing the war in general and the suspension of habeas corpus specifically, Saulsbury attempted to prevent a vote sustaining that controversial executive order. Apparently intoxicated, Saulsbury verbally attacked the President on the Senate floor in what John Hay described as "language fit only for a drunken fishwife". Senator Saulsbury called Lincoln "an imbecile" and stated that the President was "the weakest man ever placed in a high office". When Vice President Hannibal Hamlin called Saulsbury to order, the Senator refused to take his seat. Finally, the Senate's sergeant-at-arms approached to remove Saulsbury from the Senate floor when the Senator suddenly brandished a revolver, placed it against the sergeant's head and said, "Damn you, if you touch me I'll shoot you dead!" Eventually, Saulsbury was calmed and removed from the Senate floor.{{cite web |publisher=Senate Historical Office |date=January 17, 1871 |title=The Battle of Three Brothers |url=https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/minute/The_battle_of_three_brothers.htm |access-date=November 10, 2012}})

Saulsbury died at Dover and is buried there in the Christ Episcopal Church Cemetery. His son Willard Saulsbury Jr. was also a U.S. Senator.

The General Assembly chose the U.S. Senators, who took office March 4 for a six-year term.

{{Reflist}}

• {{cite book |author=Hoffecker, Carol E. |title=Democracy in Delaware |publisher=Cedar Tree Books, Wilmington |year=2004 |isbn=1-892142-23-6 }}
• {{cite book |author=Munroe, John A. |title=History of Delaware |publisher=University of Delaware Press |year=1993 |isbn=0-87413-493-5 }}
• {{cite book |title=History of Delaware 1609-1888. 2 vols. |last=Scharf |first=John Thomas |publisher=L. J. Richards & Co. |location=Philadelphia |year=1888 |isbn=0-87413-493-5}}
• {{cite book |title=History of the State of Delaware, 3 vols. |last=Conrad |first=Henry C. |publisher=Wickersham Company |location=Lancaster, Pennsylvania |year=1908 }}

• [http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=S000074 Biographical Directory of the United States Congress]

• [http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=S000074 Biographical Directory of the United States Congress]
• [http://www.russpickett.com/history/sentbio.htm#sauls1 Delaware’s Members of Congress]
• {{Find a Grave|4362}}
• [http://politicalgraveyard.com/bio/sarig-saunder.html#R9M0JBUYL The Political Graveyard]

• Delaware Historical Society; [http://www.hsd.org/ website] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/19961231010053/http://hsd.org/ |date=1996-12-31 }}; 505 Market St, Wilmington, Delaware; (302) 655-7161.
• University of Delaware; [http://www.lib.udel.edu/ Library website]; 181 South College Ave, Newark, Delaware; (302) 831-2965.

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{{succession box | title=Attorney General of Delaware | before=Edward W. Gilpin | after=George P. Fisher

| years= 1850–1855 }}

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{{US Senator succession box

|state=Delaware|class=2

|before=Martin W. Bates

|years=March 4, 1859 – March 3, 1871

|alongside=James A. Bayard Jr., George R. Riddle, James A. Bayard Jr., Thomas F. Bayard

|after=Eli Saulsbury}}

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{{United States senators from Delaware|state=autocollapse}}

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Category:1820 births

Category:1893 deaths

Category:19th-century American Episcopalians

Category:People from Georgetown, Delaware

Category:People of Delaware in the American Civil War

Category:University of Delaware alumni

Category:Dickinson College alumni

Category:Delaware lawyers

Category:Delaware Democrats

Category:Delaware attorneys general

Category:Democratic Party United States senators from Delaware

Category:Chancellors of Delaware

Category:Burials in Dover, Delaware

Category:Saulsbury family

Category:19th-century American judges

Category:19th-century American lawyers

Category:United States senators who owned slaves

Category:19th-century United States senators