Henry S. Foote

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Daguerreotype by Henry Stuart Foote from 1844

Henry Stuart Foote (born February 28, 1804 in Fauquier County , Virginia , † May 20, 1880 in Nashville , Tennessee ) was an American politician , Senator of the United States and Governor of Mississippi .

Life

Born and raised in Virginia as the son of Richard Helm Foote and Jane Stuart, Henry Foote attended Washington College (now: Washington and Lee University ) in Lexington until the age of 15 . He later studied law in Warrenton and was admitted to the bar in 1823. Two years later he moved to Tuscumbia in the state of Alabama , where he worked as editor of a democratic newspaper and his first wife Elizabeth Winters married. Although he had moved to Jackson , Mississippi in 1826 , in 1830 he was a co-founder of LaGrange College , now known as the University of North Alabama . In addition to his new hometown Jackson, Foote also practiced his legal profession in Natchez , Vicksburg and Raymond, specializing in violent crime.

Political career

The beginnings

Henry Foote first entered the political arena when he ran for a seat on the Mississippi Constituent Assembly in 1832 . Although unsuccessful, the attempt helped him gain greater prominence within his state. In 1839 he represented Hinds County in the Mississippi House of Representatives . Foote, a Democrat and supporter of Andrew Jackson at the time , wrote his first book Texas and the Texans (1841) after a stay in Texas , which dealt with the question of the independence of the state. Six years later he was elected to the United States Senate, where he chaired the Foreign Policy Committee . During his six-year tenure (1847-1852) he was able to gain a reputation as a skilled speaker who knew how to convince his opponents. On the other hand, however, Foote was a choleric person who could quickly become violent. He is known for having fought four official duels, in which he suffered gunshot wounds in the shoulder and right leg. Senator from New Hampshire , John P. Hale , he said that he hang this, he put one foot in Mississippi.

In the tension between northern and southern states

On the slave issue, Foote drew the resentment of his Mississippi compatriots as he supported the 1850 compromise that restricted the slave trade. In one of many emotional discussions on the subject, Thomas Hart Benton irritated him until Foote pulled a gun in the Senate. This and a fist fight with Jefferson Davis seemed to end Foote's political career prematurely. However, he held his office for the entire legislative period. In 1852 he ran as a unionist against Davis for the office of governor and thus supported the northern states . After winning the election, however, he was only in office for one term (until 1854). He moved to California in the hope of being able to mobilize more supporters for his political stance there. But in another election to the US Senate from California, he had to admit defeat. In 1859 he moved to Tennessee.

In the following years he found himself in the contradictory situation, as a unionist for two legislative terms a seat in the Confederate States Congress , which met in Richmond , Virginia , to hold. But his old hostility to Jefferson Davis, who was the president of that congress, and the failure of the congress to recognize Abraham Lincoln's peace policy , led Henry Stuart Foote to leave the south . While trying to cross the "enemy" northern states to get to Washington , he was arrested by Confederate forces near Alexandria , Virginia. The Confederate Congress then wanted to remove him from office, but failed because of the two-thirds majority required for this . Nevertheless, Foote fled again and finally crossed from Canada to England. Here he began his second book, The War of the Rebellion , which was completed on his return to Washington and published in 1866.

After the Civil War

In the post-war period he resumed his work as a lawyer. Shortly after his return in 1865, Attorney Daniel S. Dickinson proposed him as a candidate for the Supreme Court , but Foote, who had willingly sworn on the Constitution , left the courtroom shortly before the second oath of loyalty, as he was unable to former "Confederate" to take this oath. Although he himself no longer held any political office, he became a staunch Republican in the following years and was a supporter of US Presidents Ulysses S. Grant and Rutherford B. Hayes , who made him head of the United States Mint in New Orleans , Louisiana in 1878 made.

Sickness and death

In January 1880, Henry S. Foote had to undergo cancer surgery on the head. On May 15, the New York Times reported that he was stepping down as head of the United States Mint; five days later, on May 20, 1880, Henry S. Foote died in Nashville. His former home is now part of the Vanderbilt University campus . As a statesman who was a Democrat, Unionist, Republican and member of the Confederate Congress in his career and who was himself involved in just as much as a violent crime lawyer, Henry Stuart Foote, coupled with his rejection of the civil war, is one of the controversial and outstanding politicians of the United States of the 19th century Century.

bibliography

  • 1841: Texas and the Texans: Or Advance of the Anglo-Americans to the South-west; Including a History of Leading Events in Mexico, from the Conquest by Fernando Cortes to the Termination of the Texan Revolution
  • 1866: War of the Rebellion: Or Scylla and Charybdis, Consisting of Observations Upon the Causes, Course and Consequences of the US Civil War
  • 1874: Casket of Reminiscences
  • 1876: The Bench and Bar of the South and Southwest

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Bnet Business Network: Henry Stuart Foote ( Memento from July 8, 2012 in the web archive archive.today )
  2. ↑ Article from the New York Times, January 14, 1865
  3. ↑ Article from the New York Times, May 19, 1880
  4. ↑ Article from the New York Times, May 15, 1880

literature

  • Ben Wynne: The Man Who Punched Jefferson Davis: The Political Life of Henry S. Foote, Southern Unionist. Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge 2018, ISBN 978-0-8071-6933-9 .
  • Henry Stuart Foote: Casket of Reminiscences . 2007, ISBN 978-0-548-47136-4 .
  • Henry Stuart Foote: War of the Rebellion: Or Scylla and Charybdis, Consisting of Observations Upon the Causes, Course and Consequences of the US Civil War . 2007, ISBN 978-0-548-31071-7 .
  • John Edmond Gonzales: Henry Stuart Foote: Confederate Congressman and Exile. In: Civil War History 11 December 1965, pp. 384-395

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Foote, Henry S.
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Foote, Henry Stuart (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American politician
DATE OF BIRTH February 28, 1804
PLACE OF BIRTH Fauquier County , Virginia
DATE OF DEATH May 20, 1880
Place of death Nashville , Tennessee