Sherman Booth

Sherman Miller Booth (September 25, 1812 – August 10, 1904) was an American abolitionist activist, newspaper editor, and politician in Wisconsin. He was instrumental in forming the Liberty Party in 1840, the Free Soil Party in 1848, and finally the Republican Party in 1854. He became known nationally after instigating and leading a mob to break into the Milwaukee County jail to liberate Joshua Glover, who had been imprisoned under the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850. He was then arrested for his part in the affair and became the focal point of six years of legal struggle between the Wisconsin Supreme Court and the United States Supreme Court in the cases of Ableman v. Booth, culminating in his pardon by President James Buchanan in 1861.