Joseph C. Sibley

Joseph Crocker "Joe" Sibley, Jr. (February 18, 1850 – May 19, 1926) was an American livestock breeder, farmer, and politician who represented northwestern Pennsylvania in the United States House of Representatives for five terms.

Biography Early years Joseph Crocker Sibley, Jr., known to his family and friends as "Joe," was born in Friendship, Allegany County, New York on February 18, 1850. His father, Joseph Crocker Sibley, Sr., was a medical doctor; his mother, the former Lucy Elvira Babcock, was a school teacher in the years before marriage. His parents instilled a love of reading in him at a young age and he read precociously from the age of 6, quickly tackling books intended for a more advanced readership. Although not a total abstainer from alcohol, the newcomer Sibley won the respect of the Democratic establishment for his political courage by pointedly refusing to drink at a private banquet hosted by local brewers in the district, declaring that "I have been trusted by the Prohibitionists with their nomination, and I will not be false to the confidence which they have placed in me, not even in secret and not even as the price of a seat in the House of Representatives." Sibley was also an advocate of depoliticizing the tariff question and an early advocate of a constitutional change which would have limited the President of the United States to a single 6-year term of office. Sibley died instantly from this cardiac event; he was 76 years old at the time of his death.

Sibley's body was interred in Franklin Cemetery.

Footnotes

Works

Speech of Hon. Joseph C. Sibley, of Pennsylvania, in the House of Representatives, August 18, 1893. Washington, DC: George R. Gray, 1893. Observations and Experiments with the Mammoth French White Jerusalem Artichoke to Date of April 1, 1924: River RIdge Farm, Joseph C. Sibley, proprietor. Oil City, PA: Derrick Publishing Co., 1924.