Reuben Chapman

Reuben Chapman (July 15, 1799 – May 17, 1882) was an American lawyer and Democratic politician who represented Alabama in the United States House of Representatives for six consecutive terms from 1835 to 1847 and later served as the thirteenth governor of Alabama from 1847 to 1849. He was born on July 15, 1799, in Bowling Green, Caroline County, Virginia, where he spent his early years before seeking professional opportunities in the expanding Southwest.

Chapman received his early education in Virginia and read law in the customary manner of the period, preparing for admission to the bar rather than attending a formal law school. In 1824 he moved from Virginia to Alabama, part of a broader migration of professionals and planters into the developing cotton frontier. He settled in north Alabama, where he established a law practice and quickly gained prominence as an attorney. His legal work, combined with his alignment with Jacksonian Democratic principles, brought him into state and regional political circles and laid the foundation for his later congressional career.

Chapman entered national politics as a Democrat and was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives from Alabama, serving from March 4, 1835, to March 3, 1847. During these six terms in Congress, he represented the interests of his Alabama constituents at a time of intense national debate over banking policy, territorial expansion, and the evolving sectional conflict over slavery. As a member of the Democratic Party, he participated actively in the legislative process, supporting the party’s states’ rights and pro-expansion positions and helping to shape federal policy during the administrations of Andrew Jackson, Martin Van Buren, John Tyler, and James K. Polk.

Chapman’s congressional service was marked not only by his legislative work but also by a notable diplomatic controversy involving the French ambassador to the United States, Louis Adolphe Aimé Fourier, comte de Bacourt. In 1844 the ambassador made remarks that Chapman and Virginia congressman George W. Hopkins considered insulting. Chapman responded by challenging the comte de Bacourt to a duel, a reflection of the honor culture that still influenced political life in the antebellum South. The French ambassador ultimately declined the challenge. That same year, the ambassador also offended Virginia congressman Lewis Steenrod, although the precise words exchanged were not recorded. The hostility between Chapman, Hopkins, and the ambassador persisted to such a degree that, in 1846, President James K. Polk requested that the French government recall Monsieur Fourier and appoint a new representative to the United States, underscoring the seriousness of the dispute.

In 1847 Chapman left Congress after twelve years of service to assume the governorship of Alabama. Elected as the state’s thirteenth governor, he held office from 1847 to 1849. His gubernatorial term coincided with the Mexican–American War and ongoing debates over the extension of slavery into newly acquired territories. As governor, Chapman continued to advance Democratic policies and to represent the interests of Alabama’s largely agrarian, slaveholding population. His administration dealt with questions of state finance, internal improvements, and the broader national issues that would soon deepen sectional tensions, although Alabama remained firmly within the Democratic fold during his tenure.

After leaving the governorship in 1849, Chapman returned to private life and the practice of law in Alabama. He remained a respected figure in state politics and public affairs, emblematic of the generation of Southern Democrats who had risen to prominence in the Jacksonian era and guided their states through the turbulent decades preceding the Civil War. In his later years he resided in Huntsville, Alabama, where he continued to be associated with the legal and political community, though he no longer held major public office.

Reuben Chapman died in Huntsville, Alabama, on May 17, 1882. His long career as a lawyer, six-term member of the U.S. House of Representatives, and governor of Alabama placed him among the significant political figures of his state in the antebellum period.