Seward studied law at Union College, graduating in 1820. He was admitted to the New York State Bar in 1821. In that same year, he met Frances Adeline Miller, a classmate of his sister Cornelia at Emma Willard's Troy Female Seminary and the daughter of Judge Elijah Miller of Auburn, New York. In 1823, he moved to Auburn where he entered into law partnership with Judge Miller. In the 1820s Seward entered the New York Militia. When a regiment including Seward's battalion was organized in 1829, he was selected to command the regiment and promoted to colonel. In 1832 Seward was promoted to brigadier general, and he served until 1835, when he declined a promotion to major general and resigned his commission. Seward entered politics with the help of his friend Thurlow Weed, whom he had met by chance after a stagecoach accident.[14] Seward served as an Anti-Masonic member of the New York State Senate (7th D.) from 1831 to 1834, sitting in the 54th, 55th, 56th and 57th New York State Legislatures. In 1834, Seward was nominated as the Whig candidate for Governor of New York, but he lost the election to the incumbent Democrat William L. Marcy. From 1836 to 1838, Seward served as agent for a group of investors who had purchased the over 3-million-acre (12,000 km2) western New York holdings of the Holland Land Company. He moved the land office from Mayville, NY to Westfield, New York, where he was successful in easing tensions between the investors and local landowners.In 1838, Seward again challenged Marcy, and this time was elected Governor of New York. He was narrowly re-elected to a second two-year term in 1840. As a state senator and governor, Seward promoted progressive political policies including prison reform and increased spending on education. He supported state funding for schools for immigrants operated by their own clergy and taught in their native language. This support, which included Catholic parochial schools, came back to haunt him in the 1850s, when anti-Catholic feelings were high, especially among ex-Whigs in the Republican Party. William Seward was elected as U.S. Senator from New York as a Whig in 1849, and emerged as the leader of the anti-slavery "Conscience Whigs". Seward opposed the Compromise of 1850, and was thought to have encouraged Taylor in his opposition.In February 1855, he was re-elected as a Whig to the U.S. Senate, and joined the Republican Party when the New York Whigs merged with the Anti-Nebraskans later the same year. He decided in 1858 to run as the Republican presidential nominee. In 1859, confident of gaining the presidential nomination and advised by his political ally and friend Thurlow Weed that he would be better off avoiding political gatherings where his words might be misinterpreted by one faction or another, Seward left the country for an eight-month tour of Europe that included a visit to Syria, where Ayub Beg Tarabulsy gave him several Arabian horses.[25] During that hiatus, his lesser-known rival Abraham Lincoln worked diligently to line up support in case Seward failed to win on the first ballot. Abraham Lincoln appointed Seward his Secretary of State in 1861.The night before Lincoln's inauguration, Seward wanted to resign as Secretary of State. However, Lincoln did not accept his letter of resignation. Although it took Seward several months to recover from his wounds, he emerged as a major force in the administration of the new president, Andrew Johnson. He frequently defended his more moderate reconciliation policies towards the South, to the point of enraging Radical Republicans who had once regarded Seward as their ally. Seward retired as Secretary of State after Ulysses S. Grant took office as president. During his last years, Seward traveled and wrote prolifically. Most notably, he traveled around the world in fourteen months and two days from August, 1870 to October, 1871. On October 10, 1872, Seward died in his office in his home in Auburn, New York, after having difficulty breathing. He was buried in Fort Hill Cemetery in Auburn, New York, with his wife and two children, Cornelia and Fanny. His son, Frederick, edited and published his memoirs in three volumes. In 1870, some years after his wife Frances' death, Seward adopted his 26 year old companion Olive Risley