Benjamin F. Hallett

Benjamin Franklin Hallett was a Massachusetts lawyer and Democratic Party activist, most notable as the first chairman of the Democratic National Committee.

Early life and education

Benjamin Franklin Hallett was born in Barnstable, Massachusetts. After graduating from Brown University in 1816, he studied law and began a journalistic career in Providence, [Rhode Island|Providence], Rhode Island. He soon moved to Boston, where he began with the Boston Advocate, shifting to the Boston Daily Advertiser in 1827. At that time he espoused the views of the Anti-Masonic Party, but when that particular group went out of fashion he switched to the Democratic Party as an enemy of Henry Clay. He joined and became a prominent member of the Suffolk County, Massachusetts bar.

As a candidate for Congress in 1844 and 1848 he was defeated both times by Whig Robert C. Winthrop. In the latter race Charles Sumner was also a candidate, representing the Free-Soil Party. In 1848 he became, for four years, the first Chairman of the Democratic National Committee.
In March 1853, President Franklin Pierce appointed Hallett to succeed George Lunt for a four-year term as United States District Attorney for the District of Massachusetts. At the 1856 Democratic National Convention, Hallett was chairman of the Platform Committee.

In 1860 he was chosen as a delegate, but skipped the Charleston, South Carolina, meeting. Trying to regain the seat he had vacated, the convention at Baltimore voted 138 to 112 to deny Hallett the seat. He then joined the walk-out Convention that nominated John C. Breckinridge and Joseph Lane.

Hallett died at his home in Boston on September 30, 1862.