[1] Bliss pursued a career in real estate and lived at 238 Armington Street in the Edgewood neighborhood of Cranston, Rhode Island.
[citation needed] Bliss was elected as a Republican to the Rhode Island House of Representatives in 1902 and served from 1903 to 1909.
He then served as chairman of the Rhode Island State Tax Commission from 1912 to 1935.
He was also a hereditary companion of the Loyal Legion by right of his father's service as an officer in the Union Army during the American Civil War.
A widower, he was survived by his son, Brown University professor and provost Zenas Randall Bliss II (1898-1993).