BUSS, Harriet M.

Inquire · Offered by Peter Harrington

Autograph letter signed, discussing the turbulent presidential election of 1848. A politically engaging letter from Harriet M. Buss (1826-1895) to her parents Silas and Sally Buss. Writing as a student, Buss went on to teach hundreds of formerly enslaved people over the course of her career, including Robert Smalls, a future member of the United States House of Representatives, and help establish Shaw University, a historically Black college.Buss was "incensed by the foolishness and incompetence of the men running the nation and believed that women were better suited to solve America's problems" (White). This is clear in this letter which discusses her engagements following a visit home and in the run-up to the 1848 presidential election, held on 7 November. She bemoans the fact that "Ladies this way are not much interested in Politics, so that I am obliged to talk with Gentlemen when I say much about Government matters", adding "how I wish the Ladies could vote. I think that Cass [Democratic Senator Lewis Cass] and Taylor [General Zachary Taylor of the Whig Party] would lose their seat in the White House this year". She comments on the various speakers that have visited the town ("there is a Taylor meeting at Millbury, and a large company have gone from this Village") and the ripe political atmosphere: "There was a large Free Soil Meeting here last evening, a gentleman from Boston lectured, I believe his name was Parks, he is said to have been a fine speaker; I did not hear

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