In 1845, he moved to the territorial capital of Madison, where he was appointed district attorney for Dane County in January 1846.

After leaving office, his name was drawn into the scandal involving the fraudulent re-election of William A. Barstow in 1855.

The Democratic Party selected him as their candidate to run for his district's congressional seat in 1864 and 1872, but he failed to win both times.

[3] In 1876 he helped to supervise the canvass of electoral votes in Louisiana in the heavily-disputed 1876 presidential election.

Smith studied law with attorneys in Medina and Cleveland before moving with his father to Wisconsin in 1843.