Mar 30, 2023 - Sale 2631

Sale 2631 - Lot 280

Price Realized: $ 10,000
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 1,000 - $ 1,500
(POLITICS.) Cabinet card of Thomas Peterson, "first colored voter in the United States" Photograph, 5 1/2 x 3 3/4 inches, on original photographer's printed mount, with printed caption label and provenance note on verso; minimal wear. Perth Amboy, NJ: Tobias, circa 1884
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The 15th Amendment, which forbid racial discrimination on the voter rolls, was officially certified and passed into law on 30 March 1870. The next day, a local election was held to decide whether to revise the town charter of Perth Amboy, NJ. Thomas Peterson (1824-1904) was a school custodian in Perth Amboy whose mother had been manumitted from slavery in New Jersey. Other Black men had voted before 1870--most notably in the Reconstruction South--but Peterson became the first to exercise his right to vote under the guarantee of the 15th Amendment. He cast his ballot in favor of the charter revision.

Peterson remained active in local politics, and gained a level of local celebrity for his historic role. In 1884, he was presented with a gold medal by the citizens of Perth Amboy. The medal was later acquired by the famed collector Charles Heartman, and is now held by Xavier University in New Orleans. It has been exhibited at the Smithsonian's National Museum of African American History and Culture.