 Parker served in the Virginia State Senate from 1817 to 1820 and was elected a Democratic-Republican to the United States House of Representatives in 1818, serving from 1819 to 1821.He returned to the House of Delegates in 1828, 1829 and from 1834 to 1836.Parker died on October 21, 1836 in Northampton County, Virginia and was interred in a private cemetery on Kendall Grove Farm near Eastville, Virginia.