Aaron V. Brown
Encyclopedia
Aaron Venable Brown was a Governor of Tennessee and Postmaster General
United States Postmaster General
The United States Postmaster General is the Chief Executive Officer of the United States Postal Service. The office, in one form or another, is older than both the United States Constitution and the United States Declaration of Independence...

 in the Buchanan administration
James Buchanan
James Buchanan, Jr. was the 15th President of the United States . He is the only president from Pennsylvania, the only president who remained a lifelong bachelor and the last to be born in the 18th century....

. He was also the law partner of James K. Polk
James K. Polk
James Knox Polk was the 11th President of the United States . Polk was born in Mecklenburg County, North Carolina. He later lived in and represented Tennessee. A Democrat, Polk served as the 17th Speaker of the House of Representatives and the 12th Governor of Tennessee...

.

Biography

Brown was a native of Virginia
Virginia
The Commonwealth of Virginia , is a U.S. state on the Atlantic Coast of the Southern United States. Virginia is nicknamed the "Old Dominion" and sometimes the "Mother of Presidents" after the eight U.S. presidents born there...

, but a graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill is a public research university located in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, United States...

 where he was valedictorian of the class of 1814. He later entered into the practice of law with James K. Polk
James K. Polk
James Knox Polk was the 11th President of the United States . Polk was born in Mecklenburg County, North Carolina. He later lived in and represented Tennessee. A Democrat, Polk served as the 17th Speaker of the House of Representatives and the 12th Governor of Tennessee...

. He was a member of the Tennessee State Senate from 1821 to 1827 and of the Tennessee House of Representatives
Tennessee House of Representatives
The Tennessee House of Representatives is the lower house of the Tennessee General Assembly, the state legislature of the U.S. state of Tennessee.-Constitutional requirements:...

 from 1831 to 1835, and a member of the United States House of Representatives
United States House of Representatives
The United States House of Representatives is one of the two Houses of the United States Congress, the bicameral legislature which also includes the Senate.The composition and powers of the House are established in Article One of the Constitution...

 for three terms, 1839 to 1845. He won the Democratic nomination for governor in 1845 and was elected.

When the Mexican-American War began, largely through the actions of his old friend Polk, who was now President
President of the United States
The President of the United States of America is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president leads the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces....

, Brown issued a call for 2,600 volunteers. When approximately 30,000 men answered this call, Tennessee's reputation as the Volunteer State was forever secured.

Like his friend Polk, Brown was also defeated for re-election as governor of Tennessee. He did not participate further in statewide elected politics, but was selected as a delegate to the Nashville Convention
Nashville Convention
The Nashville Convention was a political meeting held in Nashville, Tennessee, on June 3 – 11, 1850. Delegates from nine slave holding states met to consider a possible course of action if the United States Congress decided to ban slavery in the new territories being added to the country as a...

 of 1850 held at Nashville's McKendree Methodist Church. This is probably the first place in Southern
Southern United States
The Southern United States—commonly referred to as the American South, Dixie, or simply the South—constitutes a large distinctive area in the southeastern and south-central United States...

 history where secession was ever openly and seriously discussed outside of South Carolina
South Carolina
South Carolina is a state in the Deep South of the United States that borders Georgia to the south, North Carolina to the north, and the Atlantic Ocean to the east. Originally part of the Province of Carolina, the Province of South Carolina was one of the 13 colonies that declared independence...

. Some historians credit the pressure that it instigated as helping to lead to the Compromise of 1850
Compromise of 1850
The Compromise of 1850 was a package of five bills, passed in September 1850, which defused a four-year confrontation between the slave states of the South and the free states of the North regarding the status of territories acquired during the Mexican-American War...

. He was a delegate to the Democratic National Convention
Democratic National Convention
The Democratic National Convention is a series of presidential nominating conventions held every four years since 1832 by the United States Democratic Party. They have been administered by the Democratic National Committee since the 1852 national convention...

 in 1852 where Franklin Pierce
Franklin Pierce
Franklin Pierce was the 14th President of the United States and is the only President from New Hampshire. Pierce was a Democrat and a "doughface" who served in the U.S. House of Representatives and the Senate. Pierce took part in the Mexican-American War and became a brigadier general in the Army...

 and William R. King
William R. King
William Rufus DeVane King was the 13th Vice President of the United States for about six weeks , and earlier a U.S. Representative from North Carolina, Minister to France, and a Senator from Alabama...

 were nominated. In 1854 he delivered an address to the University of North Carolina's literary societies. In 1854 a volume of his speeches was published in Nashville, Speeches, Congressional and Political, and Other Writings, of ex-Governor Aaron Venable Brownhttp://books.google.com/books?id=4lFCAAAAIAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=aaron+v.+brown&ei=1ylBS8isOoykyATDlJn_DQ&cd=1#v=onepage&q=&f=false. Brown was subsequently rewarded for his service as a loyal Democrat by being appointed Postmaster General
United States Postmaster General
The United States Postmaster General is the Chief Executive Officer of the United States Postal Service. The office, in one form or another, is older than both the United States Constitution and the United States Declaration of Independence...

 in the Administration of President James Buchanan
James Buchanan
James Buchanan, Jr. was the 15th President of the United States . He is the only president from Pennsylvania, the only president who remained a lifelong bachelor and the last to be born in the 18th century....

, and was still holding this office at the time of his death. He is buried in Nashville's Mt. Olivet Cemetery. His speeches were published in Nashville (1854). New International Encyclopedia
New International Encyclopedia
The New International Encyclopedia was an American encyclopedia first published in 1902 by Dodd, Mead and Company. It descended from the International Cyclopaedia and was updated in 1906, 1914 and 1926.-History:...


External links

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