Jonathan Dayton autograph letter signed ("Jona: Dayton"). Two pages on one leaf, 7.75" x 9.75", Elizabethtown, New Jersey; January 4, 1810. Docketed. Jonathan Dayton, signer of the U.S. Constitution, writes a letter to another signer lamenting the number of Federalists being replaced in the administration of President James Madison. Letter from Dayton, a prominent Federalist, former signer of the U.S. Constitution, and disgraced figure due to his connection to the Aaron Burr conspiracy, to Gouverneur Morris, also Federalist and signer of the Constitution, in which he congratulates Morris on his recent marriage and bemoans the new appointments of President James Madison at the expense of Federalist officeholders. The letter reads, in part: "Upon my visit to town on Saturday the report of you having recently formed a matrimonial connexion [sic]...was confirmed...I offer you with the truest sincerity my most cordial congratulations. Were the affairs of our Nation in such hands as would admit a hope of your being employed at the head of our foreign diplomacy, where a Washington, if living & governing, would place you, I should lament this change of your single state, as an unfortunate one, but situated as we are, & shall probably long be, the most important public employments will be given to characters of very different stamp, and 'the post of honor continue to be, a private station.' It would have been a great gratification to me, in the course of the past year, & especially within the last month, to have heard your sentiments very fully upon the subject of our great national concerns, & with this view, as well as with the wish of paying you our respects, & renewing our regards..." Signed, "Jona: Dayton". Jonathan Dayton (1760-1824) signed the Constitution as a representative of New Jersey and was a member of the Continental Congress from 1787 to 1788. He served in both the U.S. House of Representatives (1791 to 1799) and the U.S. Senate (1799 to 1805) and was elected the third speaker of the House in 1795. A land speculator himself, Dayton got involved in the Aaron Burr scheme to set up an empire in the western United States and was arrested for treason in 1807. While he was later exonerated, the entanglement ended his political career. The city of Dayton, Ohio, is named after him, as he owned 250,000 acres of the state's land at one time. Gouverneur Morris (1752-1816) served as a delegate for New York in the Continental Congress (1777-1778) and signed the Articles of Confederation in July 1778. He then attended the Constitutional Convention in 1787 as a delegate for Pennsylvania (following his 1779 move from New York to Philadelphia). He signed the U.S. Constitution, of which he authored a significant amount, including the famous Preamble, on September 17, 1787. Morris was appointed U.S. Minister Plenipotentiary to France by President George Washington from 1792 to 1794 and served in the U.S. Senate from 1800 to 1803. It is accompanied by an engraving of Morris published by Johnson, Fry & Co. Condition: Smoothed folds. HID03101062020 © 2022 Heritage Auctions | All Rights Reserved

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