This article is about the U.S. Representative from Indiana from (1843–1849). For the U.S. Representative from Indiana from (1855–1861), see John U. Pettit. For the District Attorney of Washington County, Pennsylvania, see John Pettit (attorney).
John Pettit (June 24, 1807 – January 17, 1877) was an American lawyer, jurist, and politician. A United States Representative and Senator from Indiana, he also served in the court systems of Indiana and Kansas.
Pettit was elected as a Democrat to the Twenty-eighth, Twenty-ninth, and Thirtieth Congresses (March 4, 1843 - March 3, 1849); he was an unsuccessful candidate for renomination in 1848. In 1850 he was a delegate to the Indiana state constitutional convention and a presidential elector on the Democratic ticket in 1852. He was appointed to the U.S. Senate to fill the vacancy caused by the death of James Whitcomb and served from January 18, 1853, to March 4, 1855; he was an unsuccessful candidate for reelection in 1854.
During his tenure in Congress Pettit was known for annually objecting to the appointment of congressional chaplains on constitutional grounds, arguing that as Congress had no power to legislate in matters of religion, it could not pay for its preaching. Instead, he proposed that chaplains be hired and paid for by voluntary contributions from the members. His objections were routinely overridden.[1]
While in the Senate he was chairman of the Committee on Private Land Claims (Thirty-third Congress). During the Senate debate on the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854, Pettit argued in favor of expanding slavery to Kansas, and famously said that Jefferson's idea (in the United States Declaration of Independence) that "all men are created equal" was not a "self-evident truth" but instead "is nothing more to me than a self-evident lie."[2] The debate over Pettit's inflammatory words is credited[by whom?] with reviving Abraham Lincoln's interest in national politics.
