Nathan Sargent from John M. Clayton, Mar. 25, 1844

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March 25 1844 New Castle Del

(Confidential)

My dear Sir,

Yesterday I was called on by a friend who had ridden post haste from New York to inform me that he was for Mr. Fillmore for V.P. and wished me to decline in his favour.  I demurred, alleging that New York had already had 1 P (V.B). & 4 V.P’s Aaron Burr, George Clinton, Dl Tompkins [Daniel D. Tompkins] & Martin Van Buren.  To this he replied that N.E. (Mass) had held nearly one half the secretaries & ministers not reckoning  the multitude from Virginia, and that V?  & Mass had governed the country nearly all the time [ab. urb. cond.].  I then told him that Penna Maryland Del & New Jersey (4 states) the "Middle Section" had never held a P. or a V.P. & yet they had a population four hundred thousand stronger than either N.Y. or N.E.  This seemed to astonish him.  He looked like a man who had suddenly found out that New York was not about 3/4 of the United States!

This gentleman said that John Davis had resolved (& he knew it) to decline at the Convention & that Abbot Lawson could not run  because he was, like Davis, concerned in negotiating the loan to Illinois &c. &c. (a d d bank of stuff) and that A.L. [Abbot Lawson] was weak, unfit &c. &c.

I told him I would decline if we could