Tuesday, February 3, 2026

Senator Henry Clay to George William Curtis, July 4, 1848

ASHLAND, July 4, 1848.

DEAR SIR,—I comply so far with the request contained in your note of the 23d ultimo, as to acknowledge its receipt, and to say that, submitting to the decision of the Philadelphia Convention, so far as I was personally affected by it, I can not give my countenance or encouragement to the use of my name in connection with the Presidency. Abstaining from the expression of any opinion in regard to the nomination which was actually made, I will only observe that Ohio, Indiana, and Massachusetts, and other Northern States, had it in their power to prevent it, if they had chosen to unite upon one whose attachment to the Whig cause was never doubted; but they did not think proper to do so. Ought they then to complain of what was done, upon the ground that General Taylor is not pledged to the support of Whig measures and principles?

I tender my thanks to you for the friendly sentiments toward me which you were kind enough to express, and I am, etc.

SOURCE: Calvin Colton, Editor, The Private Correspondence of Henry Clay, pp. 568-9

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