Seth Kaller, Inc.

“I Trust We May Live To See The Stars & Stripes Floating Over The Citadel Over Quebec.”

CALEB CUSHING. Autograph Letter Signed, to an unidentified recipient, Newburyport, [ Massachusetts], September 28, 1839. 2 ½ pages.

Inventory #20021       Price: $1,750

Partial Transcript

In all this matter of our British relations, I think the public mind is poisoned by the undue circulation & influence of the New York newspapers…Englishmen are editors or sub-editors in several of the papers that profess to be American. New York lives, thrives & has its being in the importation of British goods…in the blindness of their stupidity, the great Wall Street presses have bused & undervalued the Canadian…& done every thing they could to rivet the chains of the Canadians, though the independence of the latter & their annexation to the United States would of itself double the wealth & importance of New York. With time, however, I cannot but hope that the whole country will regard the questions as we do…I trust we may live to see the stars & stripes floating over the citadel of Quebec.

Historical Background

Cushing later served as Attorney General of the United States, and Minister to China, negotiated Panama Canal treaty, and was nominated by President Grant for Chief Justice, but was not confirmed by the Senate.

Caleb Cushing (1800-1879); Represented Massachusetts as a Whig in the U.S. Congress (1835-1843); appointed by President Tyler as Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to China (1843-5); also empowered to negotiate a treaty of navigation and commerce with Japan; again a member of Mass. house of representatives (1845-6); colonel of a Massachusetts regiment in Mexican-American War; appointed brigadier general by President Polk (1847); unsuccessful candidate for Governor (1847-9); again elected to the State house (1850); declined position as attorney general of Massachusetts (1851); mayor of Newburyport, Mass. (1851-2); judge of Mass. supreme court (1852); appointed by President Pierce as Attorney General of the United States (1853-1857); chairman of the Democratic National Conventions at Baltimore and Charleston in 1860; appointed by President Johnson as a commissioner to codify the laws of the United States (1866-1870); instructed to negotiate a treaty for a ship canal across the Isthmus (1868); appointed by President Grant counsel for the United States before the Alabama claims Arbitration Tribunal in Geneva (1872); nominated by Grant to be Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, but not confirmed by the Senate (1874); Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to Spain (1874-1877). (excerpt from: bioguide.congress.gov)