Thomas Settle Jr. (1831-1888) of Greensboro, N.C., was a North Carolina Supreme Court justice, 1868-1871; chair of the Republican National Convention, 1872; and United States district judge at Jacksonville, Fla., 1877-1888. Settle's son, Thomas Settle III (1865-1919), was a lawyer in Rockingham County and Guilford County, N.C.; state district solicitor, 1886-1893; and Republican United States representative, 1893-1897. The collection includes political, personal, legal, and business papers of Thomas Settle Jr. and his son, Thomas Settle III. Correspondence with many individuals concerns the establishment of the Republican Party in North Carolina during Reconstruction, and thereafter party organization, activities, patronage, conventions, factions, finances, and campaigns and elections in North Carolina and nationally; political issues in North Carolina, Florida, and the nation, mainly 1872-1897, including amendments to the North Carolina state constitution of 1876, charges of election fraud, election law reform, taxes, tariff, currency, banking regulations, prohibition, suffrage, state and national activities of the Populist Party; federal legislation, 1892-1897; and African Americans. Also included are papers concerning personal business, finances, lands, and legal cases. Judge Settle's Florida letters concern both his interest in North Carolina politics and cases he tried in northern Florida involving railroads, shipping, and homestead entries. The papers of Thomas Settle III date from 1884 to 1897. Also included are four political scrapbooks, 1866-1912, and clippings and scattered papers relating to the political activities of Mary Settle (Mrs. B.C.) Sharpe, 1902-1904. The Addition of February 2012 is a bound volume with manuscript notes attributed to Judge Thomas Settle. The notes relate to five political speeches delivered by Settle in support of post-Civil War Reconstruction and civil rights during his 1876 North Carolina gubernatorial campaign as Republican candidate. Settle's notes document Reconstruction politics and mention the Ku Klux Klan, African Americans, and anti-Union Democrats.
