Constantine W. Buckley
Richmond, Fort Bend County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Texas Confederate Legislator (1815 - 1865) Came to Texas from Georgia, 1838. Clerk, Republic of Texas State Department. Prominent Fort Bend County planter, lawyer, district judge and legislator. Served as one of the speakers of Texas House of Representatives in critical Civil War years, 1861-65. Legislators passed laws to raise, equip and supply 90,000 Texas soldiers who fought on all fronts and provided for defense of State's 2,000-mile frontier and coast against Indians, enemy troops and ships. As naval blockade reduced imports, the Legislature established plants to make guns, powder, cloth, salt. Contracts, subsidies and land grants were provided to encourage private industry to help meet heavy wartime demands for arms, supplies, clothing, food. Buckley and the other lawmakers taxed property and business and required farmers to turn in tithes of produce to meet the crisis. Funds were voted to buy cotton for State exchange for goods in Mexico; to aid soldiers' dependents; and to provide hospitals and medical care for troops--in and out of state. The Legislature was in almost continuous session. Poor pay and inflated Confederate money caused many members to live in tents and covered wagons on the capital grounds, and cook over campfires.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Constantine W. Buckley came to Texas from Georgia in 1838, clerked for the Republic's State Department, and became a prominent Fort Bend County planter, lawyer, and judge. During the Civil War he served as a speaker of the Texas House through the crisis years of 1861–65, when the legislature scrambled to raise and equip 90,000 soldiers, build state arms and powder plants, tax property and produce, and aid soldiers' families as the naval blockade choked off imports. Poorly paid and living in tents on the capitol grounds, the lawmakers stayed in near-continuous session.
Why it matters
Buckley's career illuminates the immense wartime machinery a Confederate state government built to sustain armies in the field, far from the battlefields themselves.
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Related people
- · Constantine W. Buckley
Related events
- · American Civil War
Themes & tags
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