Salmon Portland Chase (1808-1873) was an American politician and jurist who served as U.S. Senator from Ohio and the 23rd Governor of Ohio; as U.S. Treasury Secretary under President Abraham Lincoln; and as the sixth Chief Justice of the United States.

“It is not the purpose of this volume to give a detailed account of Mr. Chase’s private life, nor even to describe fully his long, eventful, and varied public career, but rather to present him as the central figure in three episodes which are of great historic importance, – the Western political anti-slavery movement, the financial measures of the Civil War, and the process of judicial reconstruction.”
-author’s Preface