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Estimate: $ 500 - $ 750
(CIVIL WAR--CONFEDERATE.) Clayton, Alexander M. Letter to Jefferson Davis, hoping for the establishment of a Supreme Court. Autograph Letter Signed as justice of the Mississippi District Court to President Jefferson Davis. 4 pages, 10 x 8 inches, on one folding sheet; mount remnants and a minor tear at center fold. Calhoun County, MS, 12 November 1864
The Confederate States of America never instituted a Supreme Court, leaving the state-based district courts as the highest branch of its judicial system. Alexander Mosby Clayton (1801-1889) here discusses sessions held at Jackson and Grenada as head of the Mississippi court: "A great many indictments were found for illicit trade with the enemy, and unlawful dealing in their currency. The holding of the court was, I think, productive of good, and if the military will only keep the country secure, there will be a regular administration of justice." The limits of military authority were a major concern: "I held that the General in command has the power to arrest citizens within the lines of his encampment . . . upon reasonable grounds of belief that they are disloyal." Most importantly, he urges the creation of a long-debated Confederate Supreme Court: "The decision of the district judge is reluctantly acquiesced in. It is looked upon as the law of the case, not as the general law of the land, and it settles nothing for the future. If our government is regarded as fixed and stable, why should Congress hesitate to establish one of its co-ordinate departments?" Provenance: Collection of Elsie O. and Philip D. Sang (though not in their 1978 sale).
