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Pro Slavery Yale man Re: S. Carolina in 1833 "if force shall be used against them they will Secede from the Union, & commence of Government of their own" Superb Content Jackson, Clay, Calhoun
Pro Slavery Yale man Re: S. Carolina in 1833 "if force shall be used against them they will Secede from the Union, & commence of Government of their own" Superb Content Jackson, Clay, Calhoun
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Pro Slavery Yale man Re: S. Carolina in 1833 "if force shall be used against them they will Secede from the Union, & commence of Government of their own" Superb Content Jackson, Clay, Calhoun

This letter, filled with great political content, was written by Chief Justice David Daggett of the Connecticut Supreme Court of Errors. It discusses local gossip and national politics, especially the election of 1832 and South Carolina's threat to secede if not allowed to nullify the Tariffs of 1828 and 1832. Daggett addressed this letter to his friend William Leffingwell to the care of Messrs. Welles & Greene of Havre, France. Leffingwell died fewer than two years later in New Haven.

[AMERICAN POLITICS]. David Daggett, Autograph Letter Signed, to William Leffingwell, January 29, 1833, New Haven, Connecticut. 4 pp., 7.875" x 9.625". Thin paper; bleedthrough; residue on final page from prior mounting; repair to loss in opening seal, not affecting text; very good.

Complete Transcript
New Haven Janry 29, 1833.
My dear friend,
I received your letter of 1st of Decr a few days since and was greatly pleased to find that it left you in health & spirits. I read it to my wife & M. Linn. I showed it to F. Linn, Mr Street & family and Mrs Leffingwell, the widow of your son. His death you will have heard from others before this reaches you. Mrs Daggett said give my respects to Mr L. & tell him that I am surprised that he did not visit the grave of John Calvin when at Geneva. Susan whose health is renovated considerably by a very fashionable medicine, rather novel in this region, the Hygenian Pills of Dr. Morrison of London which is a sovereign cure for all diseases from corns on the foot to the most inveterate liver afflictions. The current news of the day will be detailed to you by your other numerous correspondents. Wm Hillhouse Esquire died last Wednesday of the lung fever. He was confined only two or three days. He was 75 years old & left no will. My neighbour Mrs. De Forest has sold her farm to Mr. Murgrave who boarded at Thompsons last summer for (including the carpets) $12,750. This was too low but it was prudent I think in her Our winter has been the most mild for the last 30 years. Today is rain without snow & there has been not sufficient to cover the ground during the season. The mercury has been only down for a few hours, down to one above zero This proves a great blessing to those who cannot afford a supply of fuel. Susan says tell Mr. L that I should not suppose a gentleman of 55 would quit such a climate as ours has been this winter, for even the genial weather of Italy.
As to politics of our town & State I can say but little. We gave a great majority for Clay in this State. So did Mass. R. Island Vermont (rather against Jackson & for Wirt) Maryland Delaware & Kentucky but Jackson had a majority in all the other States except So Carolina who voted for Floyd, a Virginia nullifier. So Carolina has had a State Convention in which the Tariff has been denounced & the Legislature are directed to pass laws prohibiting the collection of any revenue under the Acts of 1828 & 1832, after the 1st of Feby next (which is now close by) & proceeding to arm to make the necessary assistance, & declaring that if force shall be used against them they will Secede from the Union, & commence of Government of their own. The Legislature in obedience to this ordinance of the Convention have passed all the necessary laws. The President, as soon after the meeting of Congress as he was furnished with these proceedings, issued his proclamation, declaring the doings of So Carolina unconstitutional & rebellious, & saying that he would exert all the power at present rested on him to compell obedience, &, if it became necessary he would ask Congress to give him power sufficient to accomplish the object. On the 10th of this month he sent another message to Congress asking for those powers as So Carolina still appeared to resist. Calhoun has resigned his place of Vice President & emptied a seat in the Senate which was given him by So Carolina. A bill has been reported by a Comttee of the Senate to whom the message was committed, giving the President full power to use all the Naval & military force of the United States to cause the Laws to be executed. This bill is now undergoing a firm debate but will be passed by large majorities in both houses. In the mean time, a bill is before the House of Reps to redraw the duties so as to appease So Carolina. This cannot be passed, of course, by the 1st Feby & on that day the Law of So Carolina is to go into operation if the Tariff be not repealed. Jackson will delight to punish Calhoun & probably will have an opportunity tho, I think after all it will be a bloodless civil war. We are now, my friend, back to 1789-90, federal & antifederal. Jackson will be upholden in these measures or the Union will be dissolved, & we shall be back again to the rope of sand, the confederation. I have not seen Judge White since your letter was received. Mrs. Daggett says he is more sprightly than he has been in 20 years, & really he appears so. His wife I believe is a very good woman & makes his life very pleasant. We all join in wishes for your health & happiness, & in your return to your native State. If you see any of my old acquaintances in Malta or elsewhere, give my compliments to them. My kind regards to Mr McCracken. I read your letter to Mr. Smith Jr. & accept the assurance of my esteem & affection
Yours &c
D. Daggett

Historical Background
South Carolinians had expected Jackson to reduce substantially the protective Tariff of 1828. When he failed to do so, Vice President John C. Calhoun split with Jackson and proposed the theory of state nullification of a federal law. In July 1832, Jackson signed the Tariff of 1832, a compromise measure that satisfied most members of Congress. South Carolina, however, remained opposed and adopted an Ordinance of Nullification in November 1832, declaring both tariffs unconstitutional and unenforceable in the state after February 1, 1833, a date that looms large in this letter.

On March 1, 1833, Congress passed the Force Bill, authorizing President Jackson to use force against South Carolina, and also adopted the Compromise Tariff of 1833, which satisfied South Carolinians. Jackson signed both bills into law on March 2. The South Carolina convention reconvened and repealed its Ordinance of Nullification on March 15, but three days later, it also nullified the Force Bill as a restatement of the principle of states' rights.

The Anti-Masonic Party held the first nominating convention in American history in September 1831 in Baltimore to select candidates for president and vice president. The Anti-Masons nominated William Wirt (1772-1834) of Maryland and Amos Ellmaker (1787-1851) of Pennsylvania. The National Republican Party also met in Baltimore, in December 1831. It nominated Senator Henry Clay (1777-1852) of Kentucky for president and Congressman John Sergeant (1779-1852) of Pennsylvania for vice president, both on the first ballot.

The unanimous candidate of the Democratic Party was incumbent President Andrew Jackson (1767-1845) of Tennessee, but the convention held in Baltimore replaced Vice President John C. Calhoun of South Carolina with Martin Van Buren (1782-1862) of New York. Calhoun had become politically alienated from President Jackson over a variety of issues. Calhoun had pushed for a reprimand of then-General Jackson for his actions in the 1818 invasion of Florida. Calhoun and his wife had also socially ostracized Peggy Eaton, the wife of Secretary of War John Eaton. Finally, in January 1832, Calhoun cast the tie-breaking vote in the Senate against the confirmation of Martin Van Buren as Minister to Great Britain.

South Carolina Democrats refused to support Jackson's re-election because of the ongoing Nullification Crisis over the tariff. In protest, they nominated Governor John Floyd (1783-1837) of Virginia for president and Henry Lee (1782-1867) of Massachusetts for vice president.

The campaign largely revolved around the Second Bank of the United States, and President Jackson's determination to kill it. Despite his critics, Jackson remained very popular with the general public, who saw him as protecting common people against a privileged elite.

Jackson won a resounding victory with 54.2 percent of the popular vote to Clay's 37.4 percent and Wirt's 7.8 percent. Jackson carried 16 states with 219 electoral votes, while Clay won 6 states with 49 electoral votes. Wirt carried Vermont with its 7 electoral votes. The South Carolina legislature gave Floyd all 11 of that state's electoral votes, largely as a protest against Jackson. In the closest statewide result in American presidential history in terms of actual votes, Clay won Maryland by 4 votes out of more than 38,000 cast.

After the election, the National Republicans, Anti-Masons, disaffected Democrats, and the few remaining Federalists formed an anti-Jackson coalition that became the Whig Party.

Daggett mentions that his daughter Susan Edwards Daggett Dwight (1788-1839) had taken Dr. Morison's Hygeian Pills. James Morison (1770-1840) was a British quack physician who "cured" himself in 1822 by taking several vegetable pills of his own manufacture. His medicines became highly popular in England, and in 1828, he opened a store in London to sell them. Morison believed that "bad blood" was the cause of all disease and that his vegetable laxatives, sold as Hygeian Vegetable Universal Medicine, were the only cure. Although in moderation, they were no more dangerous than the arsenic, strychnine, and mercury found in conventional medicines, Morison's pills could be fatal if taken in large quantities. Although Morison died in 1840, his sons took over the business, and sales continued briskly into the 1860s. One historian calculated that more than a billion of Morison's pills were sold between 1825 and 1849. They were sold in Great Britain into the 1920s.

David Daggett (1764-1851) was born in Massachusetts, as a descendant of a long-established ancestor who came with John Winthrop's company in 1630. He enrolled at Yale College at the age of 16 and graduated in 1783, then earned a master's degree. In 1786, he married Ann Munson (1767-1839), and they had nineteen children. He studied law, gained admission to the bar in 1786, and established a practice in New Haven. He served in the Connecticut House of Representatives (1791-1797) and the Connecticut State Council (1797-1804, 1809-1813). After serving as the state's attorney for the county of New Haven from 1811 to 1813, he was elected as a Federalist to the U.S. Senate in 1813 and served from 1813 to 1819. In 1824, he became an instructor at the New Haven Law School, and in 1826, he was appointed the Kent Professor of Law at Yale, holding both positions until his health forced him to resign. In 1826, he was elected to the Connecticut Supreme Court of Errors, and he was made Chief Justice in 1832, a position he held until 1834, when the state constitution mandated that he retire at age 70. From 1828 to 1829, he served as mayor of New Haven. Daggett was a strong anti-abolitionist and held racist views toward African Americans. He opposed African American education and supported colonization for free blacks. In 1833, he ruled as chief justice of the state supreme court that because African Americans could not be U.S. citizens, they could be denied education. In 1840, he married Mary L. Lines (d. 1854).

William Leffingwell (1765-1834) was born in Norwich, Connecticut, and graduated from Yale College in 1786. That year, he married Sally Maria Beers (1765-1830), and they had seven children. He became a merchant in his father's business and served as postmaster of Norwich from 1789 to 1793. He moved to New York City in 1793 and became a shipping merchant in partnership with Hezekiah B. Pierpont. Losing much financially in the war between France and England, he became a stock and insurance broker, at which he amassed a considerable fortune. He retired to New Haven in 1809, as the richest citizen of that place. After his first wife died, he married Hannah Chester (1779-1860) of Wethersfield, Connecticut.

This item comes with a Certificate from John Reznikoff, a premier authenticator for both major 3rd party authentication services, PSA and JSA (James Spence Authentications), as well as numerous auction houses.

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