49

Rare JOHN TYLER Political Autograph Letter Lamenting a J. C. Calhoun Speech

Currency:USD Category:Collectibles / Autographs Start Price:4,000.00 USD Estimated At:5,000.00 - 6,000.00 USD
Rare JOHN TYLER Political Autograph Letter Lamenting a J. C. Calhoun Speech
Autographs
John Tyler Letter Lamenting a Speech Delivered by John Calhoun Two Weeks Before the Death of John C. Calhoun!
JOHN TYLER (1790 - 1862). Tenth President of the United States following the death of Harrison, annexed Texas, and remained loyal to Virginia following its secession from the Union.
March 12, 1850-Dated, Rare Important Political Content, Autograph Letter Signed, "J. Tyler", 3 pages, measuring 8" x 10", Sherwood Forest Plantation [Virginia], Very Fine. This Letter is to his son, Robert, regarding the recent resolutions adopted at the Democratic Union meeting that was held a few weeks prior. Written in deep brown ink on light blue period paper, having a separation along the main vertical fold and splits at the edges of the horizontal folds with small chip at fold on page 3. John Tyler writes, in part:

"My Son: --- My attention had been drawn to the proceedings of the Democrats of Philadelphia before your letter reached me. With out at the time knowing who was the author of the resolutions I had praised them in conversation with others and recommended them to general perusal. They are precisely what they should have been. The Democratic Party can only hope for success by discarding from among them the free soilers, abolitionists and all such cattle. Let the Whigs if they please court them and take them to their embraces but let true lovers of the Union repudiate them as unworthy of their association. They do indeed deserve the deepest curses of the patriot for having put in jeopardy the noblest and fairest fabric of govt the world ever saw. When I think of it, all the milk of my nature is turned into gall. I hope that there is still intelligence and patriotism enough in the community to baffle their narrow and illiberal designs. [John C.] Calhoun's speech does him no credit. It is too ultra and his ultimata impracticable. How is agitation to be quieted or an amendment to the Constitution to be obtained and how above all, can it be expected, that the North will concede a power which has grown up under the Constitution and by our own concessions? How idle to complain of the ordinance of '87 as one of the causes of disturbance to the equilibrium of which he complains. That ordinance is our own and was prescise - the Constitution, and it is idle for us to complain of it. In short I regard his speech as calculated to do injury to the Southern Cause, and in that view I regret its delivery - Webster’s speech has not yet reached us... --- With Love to all -- Your Father - (Signed) J Tyler”. (Postscript follows)

This Letter is particularly timely. John C. Calhoun died at an old brick Capitol boarding house in Washington, D.C. on March 31, 1850 of tuberculosis at the age of 68. He was interred at the St. Philip's Churchyard in Charleston, South Carolina in the section for non-members. Calhoun's fierce defense of states' rights and support for the Slave Power had influence beyond his death. Southern supporters drew from his thought in the growing divide between Northern and Southern states on this issue. They wielded the threat of Southern Secession to back Slave state demands.