Silas Moore Stilwell
Silas Moore Stilwell (born June 6, 1800 in New York City , † May 16, 1881 ibid) was an American politician. He was the son of Stephen Stilwell, of the American Revolutionary War fought and 1804 a glass factory in Woodstock ( New York opened).
Career
Silas Moore Stilwell attended Woodstock Free Academy until 1812 when his father went bankrupt . He then went to New York City, where he began to work. He was engaged in surveying in the west in 1814 and eventually settled in Tennessee . There he decided to embark on a political career when he became a member of the Tennessee House of Representatives in 1822 . Some time later he moved to Virginia , where he served as Clerk of Tazewell County and is a member in the Virginia House of Delegates was. He was admitted to the bar there in 1824. Four years later he returned to New York and represented Manhattan in the New York State Assembly from 1830 to 1833 . During this time he proposed an Act to Abolish Imprisonment for Debt and Wrongly Punished Debtors in 1830, which was passed on April 26, 1831 and became known as the Stilwell Act . He ran unsuccessfully for the Whig Party in 1834 for the office of lieutenant governor of New York, but was beaten by the Democrat John Tracy . The following year he was elected a New York City Alderman and chairman of the city council. That year the political parties were evenly divided so that he had the casting vote in all votes, which made him known as the "King Caucus". He was also acting mayor at the time of the Great Fire of New York in 1835. He was also US Marshal for the Southern District of New York during the administration of US President John Tyler . At that time he was sent to The Hague on a special assignment to negotiate a loan for the US government. After the end of his tenure, he resumed his practice as a lawyer. During the American Civil War he wrote the National Banking Act of 1863. He also wrote on financial matters, many of his articles appearing in the New York Herald between 1860 and 1872 under the pseudonym "Jonathan Ohlbuck".
He was married to Caroline Norseworthy. Her son was Silas M. Stilwell (1854-1891), a lawyer in New York City.
Works
- A System of Credit for a Republic and Plan of a Bank for the State of New York (1838).
- A System of National Finance - Notes Explanatory of Mr. Chase's Plan of National Finance (Washington, DC, 1861).
- National Finances: a Philosophical Examination of Credit (1866).
Web links
- The Political Graveyard
- Stilwell's son's obituary in The New York Times on December 23, 1891
- Envelope from A System of National Finance
- " The New York civil list: containing the names and origin of the civil divisions, and the names and dates of election or appointment of the principal state and county officers from the Revolution to the present time " by Franklin Benjamin Hough, Weed, Parsons and Co., 1858
Individual evidence
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Stilwell, Silas Moore |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | American attorney, marshal, writer and politician |
| DATE OF BIRTH | June 6, 1800 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | New York City |
| DATE OF DEATH | May 16, 1881 |
| Place of death | New York City |