The Portland daily press., 1864-11-29
The late Senator Hammond .

In the recent death of JAMES HAMILTON
HAMMOND, the South has lost one of its most
intellectual and influential men. The Rich
mond Wing of Nov. 10th, pays very high
compliment to his memory. He was born
Nov 10, 1907, and died at his residence in
South Carolina at the age of 81. He gradual
ed at S. G. College, studied law and was adj
mitted to the bar in 1928. Soon after he be
came editor of political journal, in which
capacity he was strenuous advocate of the
State Rights doctrines of Mr.. Calhoun, advo
eating nulincatlon as remedy Tor anegeu
Federal expressions.
In 1885 he was elected to Congress and
served one term; then visited Europe and re-
NAMED year. The Wing says:
In 1912 he was elected Governor of South
Carolina. While Governor he published
letter to the Free Church of Glasgow, and two
others in reply to an anti-slavery circular OF
Thomas Garrison, the English abolitionist, in
which he set forth the sanctions, the utility.
and the benefcence of slavery with clear
ness OF statement, an opulence of authority
and illustration and cogency of reasoning
never surpassed in any of the numberless es-
says and dissertations on this subject. These
letters are models of style, and thoroughly
exhaust the subject they discuss.
In l857he was elected to the Senate of the
| United States to fill the vacancy occasioned
by the death of Senator A. P. Butler. While
there he made speech of great power and
eloquence on the subjects that then agitated
| and shortly after separated the two sections
of the Union. Since the outbreak of hostili-
| ties he has remained quietly at home, super
intending the affairs of his large estate, until
declining health withdrew him from active
occupations. His death extinguishes what we
have long regarded the best intellect in the
Confederacy.
No one will question Mr. Hammond's intel
lectual strength. He was, in this regard, a
man of power. Though an aristocrat of the
first water and though he held the laboring
classes in supreme contempt, and though his
doctrines led legitimately to the destruction
of the federal government, he was neverih y
less man of some regard for honor, and did
not meanly endorse infamy because it could be
made useful to his own party. While nearly
the whole South were seeking to force that in
famous and gigantic swindle-the Lecompton
Constitution-upon the people of Kansas, and
while even A. FL. Stephens was the leader of
the House who attempted to engineer this
thing through. Senator Hammond denounced
it as "reeking with blood and fraud" and said
it should have been "kicked from the doors OF
Congress"
1t was Mr.. Hammond, in the very speech
referred to in the closing part of the above
extract, who styled the laboring classes of
the North the "mudsilLs" of society-a term
which showed the comparative estimate in
which he held the producing classes. Not
outstanding this invidious epithet, applied
by the plantation lord" to the laboring men
of the country, his own origin was of hum
BILE character, his father, before emigrating to
the South, having been Yankee school teach
er in the "Old Bay State" He went South,
as thousands have since, to "ply his voca-
ton" in dispelling the ignorance there pre-
vailing.