Frank Billings Kellogg was born in Potsdam, New York on December 22, 1856. In 1865, his parents took him to Minnesota. He studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1877. After serving for three years as the city attorney of Rochester and the county attorney of Olmstead County for another five, he left for St. Paul, where as a member of the law firm of Davis, Kellogg and Severance he represented mining and railroad concerns. Later he was a special counsel for the United States government in its cases against the Standard Oil Company, the paper trust, and several railroads. His stature was such that in 1912 he was elected president of the American Bar Association. Kellogg entered public service in 1916 when he was elected to the United States Senate, where he served one full term. He was one of the few Republicans who supported ratification of the Treaty of Versailles. After being defeated for re-election in 1922, he was a delegate in 1923 to the Fifth International Conference of American States, held in Santiago, Chile. In 1924, President Coolidge appointed him ambassador to Great Britain, and then to the cabinet in 1925 as secretary of state. Kellogg achieved some success in Latin American relations, improving relations with Mexico and helping settle the long-running Tacna-Arica dispute between Peru and Chile. However, he is best remembered for the part he played in the Kellogg-Briand Pact, which outlawed war as an instrument of national policy by its signatories. For this achievement, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1929. Between 1930 and 1935, he served on the Permanent Court of International Justice at the Hague. He died in St. Paul, Minnesota, on December 21, 1937.