Isham Green Harris (February 10, 1818 – July 8, 1897) was an American and Confederate politician who served as the 16th governor of Tennessee from 1857 to 1862, and as a U.S. senator from 1877 until his death.

A pivotal figure in the state's history, Harris was considered by his contemporaries the person most responsible for leading Tennessee out of the Union and aligning it with the Confederacy during the Civil War.

After the Union Army gained control of Middle and West Tennessee in 1862, Harris spent the remainder of the war on the staffs of various Confederate generals.

In 1838, with funds provided by his brother, Harris established his own business in Ripley, Mississippi, an area that had only been recently opened to settlers after a treaty with the Chickasaw Indians.

[8] In 1847, Henry County Democrats convinced Harris to run for the district's Tennessee Senate seat in hopes of countering a strong campaign by local Whig politician William Hubbard.

Anti-war comments made in August by the district's Whig congressional candidate, William T. Haskell, damaged Hubbard's campaign, and he quit the race.

With sectional strife in Congress fueling both campaigns, these debates were often heated, and fights frequently broke out among spectators (and in one instance, between Harris and Hatton).

The nationwide debate over the Kansas–Nebraska Act and the Dred Scott case pushed the issue of slavery to the forefront in the mid-1850s, and the balance in West Tennessee was tipped in favor of the Democrats.

[12] In 1859, Harris ran for reelection against John Netherland, who had been nominated by a hodge-podge group of ex-Whigs, ex-Know Nothings, and disgruntled Democrats, known as the Opposition Party.

Harris again campaigned on fears of northern domination, while Netherland argued that the U.S. Constitution provided the best protection for Southern rights, and thus it was in the state's interest to remain in the Union.

[13] Harris endorsed John C. Breckinridge for president in 1860, and warned that the state must consider secession if the "reckless fanatics of the north" should gain control of the federal government.

[13] Following Lincoln's election in November, Harris convened a special session of the legislature on January 7, 1861, which ordered a statewide referendum on whether or not Tennessee should consider secession.

Reading his response to Lincoln before a raucous crowd in Nashville on April 17, Harris said, "Not a single man will be furnished from Tennessee," and stated he would rather cut off his right arm than sign the order.

A group of pro-Union leaders in East Tennessee, which had rejected the Ordinance, petitioned Harris to allow the region to break away from the state and remain with the Union.

Harris and other staff officers moved the general to a small ravine and attempted to render aid, but Johnston died within a few minutes.

Harris spent the remainder of the war as an aide-de-camp on the staffs of various Confederate generals, among them Joseph E. Johnston, Braxton Bragg, John B.

[2] After the war, the United States Congress passed a joint resolution allowing the governor of Tennessee to offer a reward for the apprehension of Harris because he was "guilty of treason, perjury and theft".

[3] Brownlow taunted Harris in the warrant, stating, "His eyes are deep and penetrating—a perfect index to a heart of a traitor—with the scowl and frown of a demon resting upon his brow.

As such, Harris spent his early Senate career advocating strict constructionism and limited government, states' rights, and low tariffs.

When the vote came up in the Senate in October, Harris, as president pro tempore, launched a filibuster in hopes of preventing the act's repeal, but was unsuccessful.

[1] Disgruntled over the repeal of the Sherman Act, Harris campaigned for unsuccessful presidential candidate and gold standard opponent William Jennings Bryan in 1896.