Senator John Slidell

John Slidell (1793 – July 9, 1871) was an American politician, lawyer, slaveholder, and businessman who became a prominent national figure in the decades preceding and during the American Civil War. A native of New York, he was the older brother of Alexander Slidell Mackenzie, a United States naval officer. As a young man he left his home state and moved to Louisiana, where he established himself in law, commerce, and politics and began a long public career that would span state office, service in both houses of the United States Congress, and diplomatic work for the Confederate States of America.

After settling in Louisiana, Slidell read law and entered legal practice, building connections in the state’s commercial and political circles. He became active in the Democratic Party and rose within Louisiana’s political establishment. His early public service included membership in the Louisiana House of Representatives, where he participated in shaping state legislation during a period of economic expansion and increasing sectional tension in the United States. His work in state politics laid the foundation for his later election to national office and helped secure his reputation as a skilled advocate of Southern and especially Louisiana interests.

Slidell advanced to the national stage as a member of the United States House of Representatives from Louisiana, aligning himself with the Democratic Party’s pro-slavery, states’ rights wing. In Congress he supported policies favorable to the plantation economy and the expansion of slaveholding interests, reflecting both his own status as a slaveholder and the priorities of many of his constituents. His legislative activity in the House, combined with his growing influence in party affairs, positioned him for higher office and deepened his involvement in the increasingly polarized politics of the antebellum era.

John Slidell served as a Senator from Louisiana in the United States Congress from 1843 to 1861. A member of the Democratic Party, he contributed to the legislative process during four terms in office, representing Louisiana during a significant period in American history that encompassed debates over territorial expansion, the Mexican–American War, the Compromise of 1850, and the mounting sectional crisis of the 1850s. As a member of the Senate, he participated in the democratic process and represented the interests of his constituents, consistently advocating for Southern positions on slavery, states’ rights, and the protection of the slaveholding economy. His long tenure made him one of the leading Democratic figures from the Deep South in the years immediately preceding secession.

With the secession of Southern states and the formation of the Confederate States of America in 1861, Slidell left the United States Senate and cast his lot with the Confederacy. In September 1861 he was appointed the Confederate commissioner to France, tasked with securing diplomatic recognition of the Confederate government and negotiating commercial and financial arrangements to support the Southern war effort. To take up this post, he ran the Union naval blockade from Charleston, South Carolina, in company with James Murray Mason of Virginia, who had been appointed Confederate commissioner to Great Britain. The two men reached Havana, Cuba, and there embarked on the British mail steamer RMS Trent for passage to Europe.

In November 1861, while en route across the Atlantic, the RMS Trent was intercepted by the United States Navy, and Slidell and Mason were seized and taken into custody, an incident that became known as the Trent Affair. They were transported to Fort Warren in Boston Harbor, where they were held as prisoners. News of their capture produced a wave of triumphalism in the North, and even President Abraham Lincoln initially shared in the celebratory public mood. However, as Lincoln and his cabinet considered the grave diplomatic consequences of provoking Great Britain, they reassessed the legality and wisdom of the seizure. After careful diplomatic exchanges with the British government, the United States acknowledged that the capture had been conducted contrary to established principles of maritime law and that private citizens could not be treated as “enemy despatches.” Slidell and Mason were subsequently released, and a potentially disastrous war between the United States and Britain was averted.

Following their release, Slidell and Mason departed the United States on January 1, 1862, sailing for England. From there, Slidell proceeded at once to Paris, where, in February 1862, he paid his first visit to the French minister of foreign affairs and began his work as Confederate commissioner to France. His principal mission was to obtain formal recognition of the Confederate States by the French government and to negotiate a commercial arrangement that would secure French access to Southern cotton in the event the Union blockade could be broken. France, however, refused to act without the cooperation of Great Britain, and Slidell’s efforts to secure diplomatic recognition and a binding commercial agreement ultimately failed. He did, nonetheless, achieve some limited successes, including negotiating a loan of $15,000,000 from the banking house of Emile Erlanger & Co. and arranging for the acquisition of the warship Stonewall for the Confederate government.

Slidell remained in Europe for the duration of the Civil War, continuing to press the Confederate cause in French political and financial circles even as the prospects for Southern independence diminished. After the collapse of the Confederacy in 1865, he did not return to political life in the United States and spent his later years abroad, effectively living in exile from the country where he had once held high office. John Slidell died on July 9, 1871. His long career, spanning state and national legislatures and culminating in his controversial role as a Confederate diplomat, reflected the deep sectional divisions of his era and the central place of slavery and Southern interests in his public life.