JAMES
BUCHANAN. Autograph Letter Signed to Dr. N[athaniel].
Chapman and others, Washington [DC], 8 May 1847. 1 page, 10" x
8", plus integral blank leaf.
A future President who had already been a Congressman, Senator, and
minister to Russia, James Buchanan was Secretary of State in the Polk
administration at this date. In this letter with many fine associations,
he addresses a committee in his home state of Pennsylvania, expressing
his regret that he cannot attend a special testimonial dinner in honor
of Richard Rush.
“I feel honored by your invitation to attend ‘a farewell
dinner to Mr. Rush to be given by some of his friends’ in Philadelphia
on Monday next,” Buchanan asserts. “It would afford
me much pleasure to unite with them in this testimonial of respect to
a gentleman so eminently worthy of their regard: and, I have, therefore,
to regret that my public duties render this impossible.”
He has signed, “Yours very respectfully / James Buchanan.”
Richard Rush, an eminent Philadelphia lawyer and statesman, was the
son of Benjamin Rush, a Signer of the Declaration of Independence. By
this date, the younger Rush already had a distinguished career, having
held several Cabinet posts and performed important service as the U.S.
minister to Great Britain. He had recently been named the American minister
to France, so the farewell dinner in his honor doubtless preceded his
departure for Europe. Buchanan would have been invited not only as a
prominent Pennsylvanian but as the Cabinet officer responsible for the
diplomatic service. With the Mexican War still ongoing, however, Buchanan’s
own “public duties” would have been pressing.
Buchanan’s principal correspondent here is Nathaniel Chapman,
a noted physician who had been a pupil of Benjamin Rush and who would
become the first president of the American Medical Association a year
after this.
The letter has some tears to the left margin, resulting in a few paper
losses, one of which just touches the text. There is also a little soiling,
mostly in marginal areas. Overall, the letter is in good condition.
$500.00
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