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At the Institute’s core is the Gilder Lehrman Collection, one of the great archives in American history. More than 85,000 items cover five hundred years of American history, from Columbus’s 1493 letter describing the New World through the end of the twentieth century.

Knox, Henry, 1750-1806 to Samuel Holden Parsons

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Gilder Lehrman Collection #: GLC02437.03120 Author/Creator: Knox, Henry, 1750-1806 Place Written: Boston, Massachusetts Type: Autograph letter signed Date: 29 March 1785 Pagination: 6 p. : docket ; Height: 32 cm, Width: 19.7 cm Order a Copy

Offers an extensive apology for not writing sooner. Discussions public objection to the Society of the Cincinnati. Writes, "A democracy what is greatly commercial is a solecism in politics... Our feoderal [sic] Government must be settled upon more rational principles, or some events which we do not at present foresee, will compel us to adopt systems which we may at times have contemplated with horror- I believe a republican Government, formed upon national principles and those principles propagated and perpetuated by habits, may exist a great length of time..." Discusses his views of democracy, republicanism, monarchism, and aristocracy at great length. GLC02437.03121 is a later copy of this letter.

Knox, Henry, 1750-1806
Parsons, Samuel Holden, 1737-1789

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