Beschreibung:

1p, 7.25 x 8.75 in., Clarksville, TN, 19 Feb. 1853. To President Franklin Pierce recommending Col. George Smith of Memphis for the position of Navy Agent. With 1.5 x 1.25 in. oval lithographic portrait below signature. Cave Johnson (1793-1866) was born in Robertson County, TN. He attended Cumberland College (Nashville), but the War of 1812 broke out, and Cave and several of the young men formed a volunteer unit. Andrew Jackson declined the unit, saying that they could better serve their country by finishing their education. Johnson seems to have had a bit of a problem with authority, and was expelled from Cumberland in 1813. He studied law for a while, but then enlisted to serve under Jackson in the Creek War of 1813. He then returned to his legal studies and was admitted to the bar in 1814. He moved to Clarksville in 1817 and was elected to the House of Representatives in the Jacksonian landslide of 1828, where he served for 14 years. In the House, he befriended James K. Polk, and when Polk was elected President in 1844, he appointed his friend, Cave, as Postmaster General. It is said that Johnson created the modern post office, in which the sender prepaid and affixed an adhesive stamp on the letter, rather than the COD payment system that had been in place. As cities were growing, he also streamlined urban postal service, in part by putting mail boxes on street corners in cities. He returned to Clarksville after Polk's term of office, practicing law and serving several posts. He was president of the Bank of Tennessee from 1854 to 1860. As war seemed imminent, he led the resistance to secession in Tennessee. Eventually, he accepted that the southern states had no choice but to separate. In a letter published in the Clarksville Jeffersonian, May 29, 1861, and later picked up by the New York Times, he seems to have been pushed over the edge by the outbreak of war (and Southerners consistently point to the Union invading the South, and overlook Beauregard's firing on Ft. Sumter). He states that "The conduct of the Administration, in making war upon the States, is such a subversion of the Constitution, that makes it the duty of each State to exercise, at once, all the rights reserved in the Constitution to secure their independence and future prosperity. ...I have concluded to give my vote for Representation, under the belief and hope that a united front would best promote the interests of the State, and trust to making a proper Confederation when we shall have secured peace." This final decision, however, cost him his seat in the Tennessee Senate in 1866. Johnson died later the same year. He did, however, impart a bit of advice to his son before he died, that we might think about even now: "We should always bear in mind the distinction between the Government and the administration of the government. Our government is the best ever made.... We should not therefore destroy or attempt it but by a change of Rulers in the legal mode." (letter in Tennessee State Library Association collection - see Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture). The section omitted above expresses Johnson's opinion that the last administration - referring to Lincoln's - was the worst [ever made]. Most historians would disagree. Condition: Minor toning. Adhesive stain along top edge on verso where it apparently was affixed to a larger sheet at some point.