In 1905, he returned to Allentown, serving as district attorney of
Lehigh County from 1908 to 1912. He was a Pennsylvania Republican State Committeeman from 1912 to 1920 and a trustee of
Franklin & Marshall College in
Lancaster, Pennsylvania, and of
Cedar Crest College in Allentown.
Congress Gernerd was elected as a Republican to the
Sixty-seventh Congress but was an unsuccessful candidate for reelection in 1922.
After Congress He resumed the practice of law in Allentown and served as a delegate to the
1928 Republican National Convention. ==Death==