Amos Tappan Akerman (February 23, 1821 – December 21, 1880) was an American politician who served as United States Attorney General under President Ulysses S. Grant from 1870 to 1871.
A native of New Hampshire, Akerman graduated from Dartmouth College in 1842 and moved South, where he spent most of his career. He first worked as headmaster of a school in North Carolina and as a tutor in Georgia. Having become interested in law, Akerman studied and passed the bar in Georgia in 1850; where he and an associate set up a law practice. He also owned a farm and enslaved eleven people. When the American Civil War broke out in 1861, Akerman joined the Confederate Army, where he achieved the rank of colonel.
After the end of the war in 1865, Akerman joined the Republican Party during Reconstruction. He became an outspoken attorney advocate for freedmen's civil rights in Georgia. Akerman was appointed by President Ulysses S. Grant as his U.S. Attorney General; with Grant's support, he vigorously prosecuted the Ku Klux Klan under the Enforcement Acts. Akerman was assisted by Solicitor General Benjamin Bristow in the newly established Department of Justice. Attorney General Akerman also prosecuted important land grant cases that concerned railroads in a rapidly expanding West. Akerman advised on the United States first federal Civil Service Reform law implemented by President Grant and the U.S. Congress. Possibly due to Akerman's rulings against the Union Pacific Railroad, Grant asked for Akerman's resignation from the cabinet. Although Akerman left office at Grant's request, he continued to support Grant. He returned to Georgia, practiced law, and remained highly popular in the state.
Early years
Akerman was born on February 23, 1821, in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, as the ninth of twelve children of Benjamin Akerman and his wife. He attended Phillips Exeter Academy and Dartmouth College, located in Hanover, where he graduated in the class of 1842 with Phi Beta Kappa honors. Akerman took advantage of Berrien's extensive law library and became fascinated with the field. Akerman first served in General Robert Toombs' brigade and later in the quartermaster's department where it was his job to procure and dispense uniforms, weapons and other supplies to the soldiers. Akerman was put into active service against the Union during Sherman's 1864 march through Georgia.
Reconstruction
Akerman joined the Republican Party in the campaign for freedmen's citizenship and suffrage. He was an outspoken proponent of Reconstruction as a member of Georgia's 1868 state constitutional convention and when appointed as U.S. district attorney for Georgia (1869). His appointment was blocked for some time by Congress, since he had served in the Confederate army. Akerman served for a total period of six months in this position. To stop the rumor, in a letter from Elberton, Akerman published his full endorsement for Ulysses S. Grant. He served as the Republican presidential state elector from Georgia. White's opponent, William James Clement, represented by Solicitor General Alfred B. Smith of the Eastern Georgia Circuit court, said that White was ineligible to hold office since he was a black man. The case went to the Georgia's Supreme Court where Akerman defended White's election and said his color did not deny him the right to hold office. Akerman argued that since blacks had been granted the franchise throughout the United States, they had the right to hold public office. Akerman was the "only person from the Confederacy to reach cabinet rank during Reconstruction". Having become attorney general shortly after the creation of the new Justice Department, Akerman dealt with legal issues from the Department of the Interior, such as the question of whether competing railroad companies deserved more land in the West in return for expanding the country's transportation system. He also dealt with the Crédit Mobilier of America scandal. He led enforcement efforts to suppress the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) in the South through litigation. He had experienced its violence first-hand. He oversaw prosecution of more than 1100 cases against KKK members, gaining convictions.
Akerman did not create the Department of Justice, but he helped play a pivotal role in its development. He helped to appoint members and set standards, but due to the geographical constraints, past laws, and financial restrictions he struggled to properly build a strong Department of Justice.
Akerman resigned on December 13, 1871. One of these subsidiaries was financially unable to complete the railroad through Kansas, as a result, the Union Pacific applied for federal assistance in the form of land grants and bonds.
Ruled on Civil Service Law
On September 7, 1871, Att. Gen. Akerman ruled on the newly formed Civil Service Commission passed by Congress on March 3, 1871, and signed into law by President Grant on March 4. In the United States first ever Civil Service Reform legislation a commission was set up to establish rules, testing, and regulations, authorized by the President, for the best possible candidates to be appointed civil service positions. The Freedman's Bureau in the Deep South were sent hundreds of complaints by blacks who had been persecuted and attacked by whites. One United States attorney of later years characterized this Klan activity as "the worst outbreak of domestic violence in American history to date." Upon his assumption to office, Akerman's primary duty was to stop the violence against blacks in the South and prosecute the perpetrators. Akerman, expanding the powers of the Department of Justice, started an investigating division that looked into the organization of the Klan in the South. Rumor was that Grant was pressured by Secretary of Interior Columbus Delano, who sympathized with railroad tycoons Collis P. Huntington and Jay Gould, and had demanded Akerman's resignation. According to McFeely, with Akerman's resignation "went any hope that the Republican party would develop as a national party of true racial equality".
Return to Georgia and death
Although he was offered another government job, he returned to Georgia, where he continued to practice law until his death in Cartersville, on December 21, 1880. He was interred at Oak Hill Cemetery in the city.
Family
Days before he entered active Confederate Army service in 1864 during the American Civil War, Akerman married Martha Rebecca Galloway. The couple had eight children; one child died before adulthood.
Akerman monument text
in Cartersville at the site of his former home. The marker commemorated his career as both teacher and attorney, including his prosecution of the Ku Klux Klan during Reconstruction. The marker states: