James K. Polk Papers
Document Type
Website
Abstract
The papers of James K. Polk (1795-1849), governor of Tennessee, representative from Tennessee, Speaker of the House of Representatives, and eleventh president of the United States, contain approximately 20,500 items dating from 1775 to 1891, with the bulk falling in the period 1830-1849. The collection includes correspondence, presidential letterbooks, diaries, speeches and messages, account and memorandum books, family papers, financial and legal records, printed matter, portraits, and other papers relating chiefly to Polk’s political career in Tennessee and on the national level.
The Library of Congress acquired approximately 10,000 items from Mrs. Fall in 1903. The Chicago Historical Society transferred additional correspondence and the bulk of Polk’s diaries to the Library of Congress in 1910. Sadie Fall Gardner Grant (Mrs. Rollin P. Grant), a daughter of Sarah Polk’s niece, augmented the Polk papers with a significant donation of materials in 1927. Between the years 1954 and 1973, the Library of Congress produced a microfilm edition of the materials in series 1-9 and 11, with a related index published in 1969. In the years since, scattered extant original documents have been added to the collection.
Publication Date
2017
Recommended Citation
Polk, James K. and Library of Congress. National Digital Library Program., "James K. Polk Papers" (2017). AALL Legal Website of the Month. 75.
https://ir.law.utk.edu/aall_websites/75