Aaron A Sargent
Aaron Augustus Sargent
American
| Y/M/D | Description | Association | Composition | Place | Locale | Food | Event |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Y/M/D | Description | Association | Composition | Place | Locale | Food | Event |
| 1852/00/00 | Aaron A Sargent builds a four room, one story house, at the top of Broad Street. | Home | Aaron A Sargent House | Nevada City, CA | |||
| 1856/05/16 | Aaron A Sargent is a delegate to the Republican National Convention in Chicago which will nominate Abraham Lincoln for President of the United States. | Politics | Election of President Abraham Lincoln | ||||
| 1860/00/00 | A A Sargent keeps an office in the Kidd and Knox Building, Nevada City. | Office | Kidd and Knox Building, Nevada City | Nevada City, CA | |||
| 1878/01/10 | Senator Sargent (R-CA) introduces S Res 12, the Susan B Anthony Amendment, providing "The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex." | Work | American Women's Suffrage |
History
Aaron A Sargent, from Massachusetts, a 49er, settled in Nevada City in 1850. A journeyman printer, he was compositor, then editor and owner of the NEVADA JOURNAL, the pioneer journal of the county. At the same time he engaged in mining, studied law and was very active in politics. He was elected District Attorney from 1855 to 1857. He soon became a leader in State politics, first as a Whig and afterwards as a Republican. He organized the Republican party in Nevada County. He was active in community and state activities: delegate to Pacific Railroad Convention in San Francisco in 1853; charter member and elected first Nobel Grant of the Oustomah Lodge (IOOF), November 1853; President of Sons of New England; secretary of Temperance Convention, July 1854; secretary, Whig Convention, June 1854; elected Town Trustee, April 1854; declined nomination for Know-Nothing candidate for State Senate, 1856; wrote the first history of Nevada County, 1856; organized and elected Director of County Library Association, 1857; 1868 elected Eminent Commander, Nevada Commandery No 6 KT.
In 1860 he was a delegate to the Republican National Convention which nominated Lincoln and in 1861 elected Representative to the 37th Congress. He distinguished himself as author and champion of the bill which created the Transcontinental Railroad, succeeding where others had failed for over a decade. He was author of the bill making the Pacific States and Territories a United States Judicial Circuit and introduced the bill to establish a Branch Mint in the State of Nevada. In 1862 he lacked 3 votes of the nomination for US Senator to succeed Senator Broderick. He returned to his law practice in Nevada City and was nominated for Governor of California, losing to Frederick F Low.
In 1865 Sargent was nominated for US Senator but the Democrats took the election by a landslide. Also in 1865 he was honored by the College of California with the degree of MA. That same year Central Pacific Railroad honored him for his work in Washington in obtaining passage of Pacific Railroad measures, by naming Central Pacific's No 7 locomotive, the "A A Sargent".
Sargent was elected to the 41st and 42nd Congresses serving from 1869 to 1873. While serving as Representative, he was elected to the United States Senate, the first citizen of Nevada County to achieve this distinction. He served in the Senate from 1873 to 1879, working untiringly for the interests of California and the Nation, and was known as the "yeoman of the Republican Party". He was champion of the women's suffrage movement and author of the bill in 1878 which became known as the Anthony Amendment advocating "The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States, or any state on account of sex". This bill was reintroduced without any change in wording until finally passed by Congress more than forty years later. He was author of the Immigration Law in 1879, the provisions of which were the first United States policy on immigration; author of the bill which revolutionized the mining industry, permitting mineral lands to be held in fee simple.
In 1880 Sargent returned to California and established a law practice in San Francisco. He was appointed by President Chester Arthur in 1882 as Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary from the United States to the Court of Berlin, Germany, a post he filled most creditably. One of his confidential and private dispatches to the Secretary of the State in Washington was printed in the press, making his position in the German Court untenable. Sargent resigned and then refused an appointment to Russia.
Sargent returned to his San Francisco law practice and died in that city, August 14, 1887. His sarcophagus rests in the Pioneer City Cemetery, two blocks from his Nevada City home. -NRHP
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