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Early Republic (1784 - c.1830) |
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Hamilton Serves as Surety for Loan to Fellow Attorney and Second in His Duel with Burr
ALEXANDER HAMILTON,
Manuscript Document Signed, Bond, Receipts, Deed, Release of Deed, Widow’s Relinquishment, June 5, 1802–March 24, 1807. 6 pp., 8 x 13 in.
This compound legal document features the signatures of Alexander Hamilton, Elizabeth Hamilton, two of their sons, and the executors of his will. In June 1802, Alexander Hamilton became one of two sureties for a bond that Nathaniel Pendleton gave to John E. LeConte to ensure the repayment of $6,000 that LeConte loaned to Pendleton. To secure their support as sureties, Pendleton conveyed 4,000 acres of land in Ohio and Clinton County, New York, to Hamilton and the other surety. Pendleton made regular payments of interest and principal to LeConte and completed the repayment by June 1806. In March 1807, Hamilton’s executors (including Pendleton) reconveyed the land to Pendleton, and Elizabeth Hamilton relinquished her dower rights. Her sons James A. Hamilton and John C. Hamilton signed the relinquishment as witnesses.
Item #27210, $18,000
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Jefferson’s Famous Letter on the “Wall of Separation” Between Church and State
THOMAS JEFFERSON,
Newspaper. Aurora General Advertiser. [Philadelphia:] Published (Daily) at William Duane, Successor to Benjamin Franklin Bache, in Franklin-Court, Market-Street, February 1, 1802. 4 pp., 13½ x 21½ in. The Danbury letters are on p. 2.
"Believing with you, that religion is a matter which lies solely between man and his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, and not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should ‘make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;’ thus building a wall of separation between church and state."
Item #25964, SOLD — please inquire about other items
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The U.S.S. Chesapeake Prepares for the Mediterranean, and the Senate Debates Judiciary Establishments
[EARLY REPUBLIC],
Newspaper. The Providence Gazette. Providence, R.I., January 30, 1802. 4 pp., 12 x 19 in.
This issue of the Providence Gazette features reports from several debates in the Senate and the House of Representatives, notice from the Boston Franklin Association of printers, reports on a vaccine for smallpox, news of tampered mail, and the printing of an almanac.
Item #30000.004, $400
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Letter to Vice President Aaron Burr From Revolutionary War Officer and Future New York Mayor Marinus Willett re Protecting New York’s Harbor and Opposing Brooklyn Navy Yard Site (Because the Navy’s Agent Didn’t Buy Enough Land)
MARINUS WILLETT,
Autograph Letter Signed, to Vice President Aaron Burr, January 7, 1802. 2 pp., 7¾ x 9¾ in. Docketed M. Willett, January 7, 1802.
Governor Clinton wanted a report from the federal government “signifying the number of troops that will be allowed to Garrison there [in New York harbor], and whether the General Government will not from a Consideration of the Importance of the safety of the port to the revenue add something to what may be expanded [sic] by the state.”
Willett appeals to Vice President Aaron Burr for help from the Jefferson administration to improve New York City’s harbor defenses based upon the city’s commercial importance. He also discusses initial plans for the Brooklyn Navy Yard.
Item #23067.01, SOLD — please inquire about other items
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President Jefferson Sends, Rather than Delivers, His First State of the Union
THOMAS JEFFERSON,
State of the Union Message. Thomas’s Massachusetts Spy, Extra, December 18, 1801, signed in type twice. Broadside. Worcester, Massachusetts: Isaiah Thomas Jr. 1 p., 12-1/2 x 19-3/4 in.
“Agriculture, manufactures, commerce, and navigation, the four pillars of our prosperity, are then most thriving when left most free to individual enterprise.”
This important first message contains his observations on Indian relations in America, the U.S. Navy versus the Barbary Pirates, the maintenance of armed forces, relying on a latent militia in peacetime while establishing the Navy and coastal defenses, the census and predictions of population growth along with “the settlement of the extensive country still remaining vacant within our limits,” decreasing the costs of government by removing unnecessary public offices, a laissez-faire approach to economics, the Judiciary, and taxation, foreseeing the removal of “all the internal taxes,” and stating that “sound principles will not justify our taxing the industry of our fellow citizens to accumulate treasure, for wars to happen we know not when, and which might not, perhaps, happen, but from the temptations offered by that treasure.”
Unlike his predecessors, Jefferson did not deliver the message in person, but delivered it in writing through his personal secretary Meriwether Lewis. In doing so, Jefferson began a tradition that persisted until President Woodrow Wilson delivered his first State of the Union message to Congress in 1913.
Item #20822.99, $5,800
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Alexander Hamilton Writes to His Beloved Wife, Eliza, About the Deteriorating Health of Her Younger Sister, Peggy
ALEXANDER HAMILTON,
Autograph Letter Signed “A.H.”, Albany, Tuesday, Feb(ruary) 25, 1801 to Elizabeth (“Eliza”) Schuyler Hamilton, regarding the deteriorating health of her sister, Margarita “Peggy” Schuyler Van Rensselaer. One sheet folded to make four pages, 5 x 7-3/4 in. Addressed on integral leaf in Hamilton’s hand: “Mrs. Hamilton/No. 26 Broadway/New York”, wax seal partially intact on same; further docketed at bottom by Hamilton, “Mrs. H.”
“My Dear Eliza/Your sister Peggy has gradually grown worse & it is now in a situation that her dissolution in the opinion of the Doctor is not likely to be long delayed. The L. Governor sends the bearer to bring home his Child--I have not time to add more
Adieu my Eliza A.H.”
Item #27110, $20,000
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Thomas Paine: “Contentment”
THOMAS PAINE,
Autograph Poem Signed “T.P.,” to Mrs. Barlow. [c. 1798-1799]. 2 pp., 7¼ x 9⅜ in.
“This prayer is Common Sense./ Let others choose another plan,/ I mean no fault to find,/ The true Theology of Man/ Is happiness of Mind. T.P.”
The original manuscript of a poem by the great Revolutionary pamphleteer, Thomas Paine, written to Mrs. Joel Barlow, the wife of a famed American poet. In the poem, Paine explains his ideas on happiness and love and makes direct references to America and his most famous work, Common Sense. The poem, entitled “Contentment or, If You Please, Confession,” was written in response to a comment by Mrs. Barlow (the Barlows were living in Paris at the time). Turning away from what he calls “the superstition of scripture Religion,” Paine proposes a new religion—“happiness of mind.”
Item #21491.99, $65,000
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Large 1801 Folio Engraving of Thomas Jefferson as New President
[THOMAS JEFFERSON],
Print. Engraved by David Edwin, published by George Helmbold Jr., 1801. 1 p., 13 x 19¾ in. (image); 14⅞ x 22 ½ in. (sheet). ,
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