Born on a farm near Pikeville, Tennessee in Bledsoe County on April 16, 1872, McReynolds attended the rural schools, People"s College at Pikeville, Tennessee, and Cumberland University at Lebanon, Tennessee. He studied law, was admitted to the bar in 1893, and commenced practice at Pikeville.
In 1894 and 1896, McReynolds served as assistant district attorney of the sixth judicial circuit court of Tennessee. He moved to Chattanooga in 1896 and continued the practice of law. He was appointed judge of the criminal court for the sixth circuit of Tennessee on April 16, 1903.
lieutenant was there that he heard the case State of Tennessee versus Editor Johnson, the case that later became United States of America versus Joseph F. Shipp.
He was subsequently elected and twice re-elected to the same office. He served until February 1, 1923, when he resigned, having been elected to Congress.
McReynolds was elected as a Democrat to the Sixty-eighth and to the eight succeeding Congresses. During the Seventy-second through Seventy-sixth Congresses, he was the chairman of the United States House Committee on Foreign Affairs.
He served from March 4, 1923 until his death.
In 1933, he was a delegate to the International Monetary and Economic Conference at London, England. McReynolds died in Washington, District of Columbia on July 11, 1939. He was interred in Forest Hill Cemetery in Chattanooga, Tennessee.
