Emile LA SÉRE, Congress, LA (1802-1882)

LA SÉRE Emile , a Representative from Louisiana; born on the island of Santo Domingo in 1802; moved with his parents to New Orleans, La., about 1805; completed preparatory studies; employed as a clerk in a mercantile establishment at Jackson, La., and later in Mexico for several years; elected sheriff of the parish of New Orleans in 1840 and served several years; elected as a Democrat to the Twenty-ninth Congress to fill the vacancy caused by the resignation of John Slidell; reelected to the Thirtieth and Thirty-first Congresses and served from January 29, 1846, to March 3, 1851; chairman, Committee on Expenditures in the Post Office Department (Twenty-ninth Congress); during the Civil War served in the Confederate Army as major in the Tenth Louisiana Regiment and afterward as chief quartermaster of the Trans-Mississippi Department; chairman of the Democratic State central committee for more than fifteen years; president of the Tehuantepec Railroad Co. in Mexico; died in New Orleans, La., August 14, 1882; interment in Metairie Cemetery.

Source: Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, 1771-Present