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Phelps, Samuel Shethar (1793-1855) to unknown

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Gilder Lehrman Collection #: GLC03678.02 Author/Creator: Phelps, Samuel Shethar (1793-1855) Place Written: Washington, D.C. Type: Autograph letter signed Date: 22 August 1850 Pagination: 6 p. : docket ; 25 x 20.2 cm. Order a Copy

Docketed with blue ink. Possibly to J. H. Barrett (refer to GLC03678.01). Discusses the Compromise of 1850 (the Pearce Act) in detail. Phelps offers his opinion on the act, which related to the extension of slavery in territories acquired by the Mexican American War: "... this country is and will remain a desert and neither slavery or population will ever exist there." Phelps voted for the Compromise of 1850 because, "there was danger that the govt. itself might be dissolved if these questions about slavery were not disposed of... It was not violence that I apprehended but the... silent workings of disease in the body politic." Notes that other supporters include Webster, Winthrop, Green, Truman Smith and others (presumably Senators Daniel Webster, Robert Winthrop, and Albert Green).

Phelps was a Senator from Vermont 1839-1854. Barrett, from Ludlow, Vermont, was a lawyer, teacher, and the editor of several newspapers.

[excerpts] [draft]
"... In regard to Mr. Pearce's Texas bill I intended to write you before this but perceiving that the Whig Press in Vermont approved the bill I deemed it unnecessary and therefore omitted it. The objection to that bill if any is made must relate to the boundary, - the money nobody here cares about..."

"... The Senate having settled the details of the bill... There was danger that the government itself might be dissolved if these questions of slavery were not disposed of. I have stood in no fear of Bowie knives, or revolving pistols of Southern chivalry or bravado... The silent workings of disease in the body of politics, which if not arrested, might prove fatal... I am sustained by such men as Webster, Davies, and Winthrop... If the Whigs of New England choose to throw us all overboard... they must navigate the ship without us..."

Phelps, Samuel Shethar, 1793-1855
Barrett, Joseph Hartwell, 1824-1910
Green, Albert Collins, 1792-1863
Winthrop, Robert Charles, 1809-1894
Webster, Daniel, 1782-1852
Smith, Truman, 1791-1884

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