Solomon George Haven was a lawyer and politician from western New York state in the decades preceding the Civil War. Born in Chenango County, N.Y., in 1810, Haven was educated in the common schools and by a private tutor, and initially intended to pursue a medical career, but in his early twenties he changed plans. In 1835, after studying law in Buffalo, he was admitted to the New York bar and became a partner in Fillmore, Hall, and Haven, a prosperous firm headed by Millard Fillmore. Ambitious and politically active, Haven held several elective offices, including commissioner of deeds, district attorney of Erie County (1844-46), and mayor of Buffalo (1846-47), before gaining election to the U.S. House in 1851. Because of his close association with Fillmore, Haven was reputed to wield considerable influence in Washington, and he appears to have been heavily in demand on the social calendar during his years in Congress. He was popular with his constituents as well and was returned to office in three consecutive terms before finally going down to defeat in 1856.

Although Haven, like Fillmore, had been elected as a Whig, his true political inclinations leaned toward a more conservative politics, and near the end of his political career he became openly associated with the nativist Know Nothings, supporting Fillmore's failed run for the presidency in 1856 on the American Party ticket. Out of office, Haven returned to his law practice with vigor and a new partner, James Smith, and argued at least three cases before the Supreme Court during the late 1850s. Following Fillmore's electoral defeat, however, and the dissolution of the American Party, Haven grew increasingly embittered toward politics, but made one last, unsuccessful bid for congress in 1860. Haven died on Christmas eve of the following year and is buried in Forest Lawn Cemetery.

Scope and contents:

The Haven Papers consists of 103 letters written from Haven to James Smith, his law partner in Buffalo, N.Y., 33 letters to his wife, Hatty, plus a few miscellaneous letters addressed to other political acquaintances. With the exception of a very few letters written in the 1830s and 40s, almost all of the letters were written during the period of Haven's congressional career, with the heaviest concentration being from 1853 to 1856.

The letters to Smith contain scattered commentary on the Supreme Court, before which Haven apparently argued three times in this period, on Erie County politics, and on their legal practice in Buffalo. There is somewhat more extensive commentary on New York state politics including discussions of most of the major figures in the state at the time, references to the various intraparty factions, and discussion of the political newspapers in this period of political transition. The great strength of these letters is the detailed commentary on congressional politics concentrated on the struggle over the Kansas-Nebraska Bill, the election of the Speaker of the House, 1855-56, and the doings of the various party conventions in 1856, especially the Know Nothing convention in Philadelphia. By this time, Haven had become a fierce American Party supporter, a fiscal conservative, and an ardent critic of the political games being played by most of the Democratic and Republican schemers in Washington and Albany.

Haven's letters to his wife, mostly written in 1853 and 1854, are fairly intimate, though seldom very descriptive. Haven writes primarily about his life in Washington and the social obligations he was only to glad to avoid. He was a regular guest for dinner at the White House and appears to have been in fair demand at parties.

M-2103, M-2834
Cat. 2/90 ch, 10/94 rsc

Subject index to the Solomon G. Haven Papers

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