Daniel Haines was an American lawyer, statesman and politician. He also served as an associate justice on the New Jersey Supreme Court from 1852 to 1866.
Background
Daniel Haines was born on January 6, 1801, in New York City, New York, United States, the son of Elias Haines and was descended from James Haines (or Hinds) who emigrated to Salem, Massachusetts, in 1637 and later moved to Southold, Long Island. His mother was Mary Ogden, the daughter of Robert Ogden and a niece of Governor Aaron Ogden.
Education
Daniel Haines received his early education under Dr. Edmund D. Barry, a distinguished teacher, and at the academy in Elizabethtown, New Jersey. After graduating at the College of New Jersey in 1820, he entered the law office of Thomas C. Ryerson in Newton, Sussex County.
Career
In 1823 Daniel Haines was admitted to the bar and began to practise in Hamburg, Sussex County. In 1839 he was nominated and elected for one year to the upper house of the legislature. Here he was immediately thrown into a political controversy known as the “Broad Seal War. ” It was the ability and tact which he displayed in this contest that brought him forward as a political leader of recognized ability, and led to his election, in 1843, as governor. According to the constitution of 1776, the office of governor carried with it that of chancellor, and Haines’s opinions are held in high regard. In 1847 Haines was again the Democratic nominee for governor and was elected under the new constitution for a term of three years.
In 1852 Haines was appointed an associate justice of the supreme court. Reappointed, he held this office until November 1866. Though his knowldege of the law was not profound, his chief qualification being that of broad and somewhat varied experience, he was a man of sound judgment and honest purpose.
He was especially interested in prison reform and in 1868 he was appointed by the legislature to study prison systems in his own and other states. In 1870 he was sent as a delegate to the National Congress on Penitentiary and Reformatory Discipline at Cincinnati, where he was elected a member of a committee to organize a national reform association and to make preparations for the calling of an international congress which met in London in 1872. He was a delegate to the London conference and for one year (1872) was vice-president of the National Prison Association of the United States.
Achievements
Religion
Haines was a ruling elder in the Presbyterian Church, a member of the Bible Society and other religious societies.
Politics
Despite the fact that Daniel Haines inherited Federalist traditions, he took an active part in promoting the election of Andrew Jackson and was instrumental in securing for Jackson, in the election of 1824, all the votes cast in the small township of Vernon, where he resided. In 1860 Daniel Haines supported the Douglas ticket because he believed “that the election of Lincoln as a sectional candidate might precipitate war”, but after the attack on Sumter he supported the Union cause to the limit, taking an active part in raising troops.
Connections
Daniel Haines was twice married. His first wife was Ann Maria Austin of Warwick, New York, whom he married on June 28, 1827. She died on December 8, 1844, and on July 6, 1865, he married Mary Townsend.