John Willis Menard (April 3, 1838 – October 8, 1893) was a federal government employee, poet, newspaper publisher and politician born in Kaskaskia, Illinois to parents who were Louisiana Creoles from New Orleans.

After moving to New Orleans, on November 3, 1868, Menard was the first black man ever elected to the United States House of Representatives.

John Willis Menard was born in 1838 in Kaskaskia in Randolph County in southern Illinois, to parents who were free people of color.

Menard would later separate from his first wife when he traveled to Jamaica and the U.S. Virgin Islands, where he met and married Elizabeth Mary, a union that led to two children.

[citation needed] During the American Civil War, Menard worked as a clerk in the Department of the Interior under President Abraham Lincoln.

Menard moved to New Orleans in 1865, establishing the newspaper, The Free South, later named The Radical Standard.

Though the claim circulates that Congressman and future president James A. Garfield purportedly suggested it was too early for an African American to be admitted to Congress, he did not make such a statement to the House when Menard gave his presentation and the roll call shows that he voted to seat Menard.