Lewis Davis Campbell was born in Franklin, Ohio, in Warren County on August 9, 1811. His father, Samuel Campbell, was a wheelwright and then a farmer. As a boy, he loved reading, collected newspapers containing speeches, and attended the local public schools. He was later apprenticed to a printer and worked at the Cincinnati Gazette until 1831. Politically, he was a strong supporter of Henry Clay, and from 1831 to 1835 he published his own Whig newspaper in Hamilton, Ohio. He also studied law whenever he could. He gained admission to the bar in 1835 and practiced law in Hamilton until 1850.

Campbell also pursued various agricultural interests and became more involved in politics. He persistently and unsuccessfully ran for Congress as a Whig in 1840, 1842, and 1844. Each time he lost the election, but his determination finally paid off in the 1848 election, when he became the Representative of the 2nd District of Ohio. Campbell won re-election in 1850 to the 32nd Congress as well.

A fair amount of redistricting in Ohio took place by the next election in 1852. Campbell successfully ran for office again that year, but this time as the representative of the 3rd District of Ohio. In 1854, Campbell was elected to the 34th Congress, again from the 3rd District, but this time as an Opposition party candidate. During that Congress, he served as chairman of the Ways and Means Committee.

In 1856, Campbell ran as a Republican to the 35th Congress, and served until May 25, 1858. Clement Vallandigham, his Democratic opponent in 1856, had successfully contested the 1856 election, and took over in place of Campbell for the remainder of that term. Campbell ran against Vallandigham again in the next election but lost.

Campbell then focused his career on the military. In 1861 and 1862, he served in the Union Army as colonel of the 69th Regiment of the Ohio Volunteer Infantry. After the war ended, Campbell served briefly in the Foreign Service. President Andrew Johnson appointed Campbell as an envoy extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to Mexico on May 4, 1866. While on his mission to Mexico, Campbell was accompanied by General William T. Sherman. They were instructed to offer Mexican President Benito Juarez American military support to help restore his government against Maximilian's French forces which were occupying Mexico at the time. Campbell worked in his diplomatic position until he resigned on June 16, 1867.

Campbell then turned to local politics for a short time. He won election to the Ohio Senate in 1869, but resigned in 1870 to run yet again for a Congressional seat representing the 3rd District of Ohio. He won the election to the Forty-second Congress, but this time as a Democrat. He was not a candidate for reelection in 1872, though.

He served as a delegate to the third State Constitutional Convention in 1873 as its Vice President. Campbell eventually returned to his agricultural pursuits for the remainder of his life. He died in Hamilton, Ohio, on November 26, 1882, and was buried in Greenwood Cemetery.

Sources:
Biographical Directory of the United States Congress
History of Warren County, Part IV, Township Histories, Franklin Township by W.C. Reeder

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