John M. Niles
United States Senator fromConnecticut
In office March 4, 1843 – March 3, 1849
Preceded by	Perry Smith
Succeeded by	Truman Smith
In office December 21, 1835 – March 3, 1839
Preceded by	Nathan Smith
Succeeded by	Thaddeus Betts
9thUnited States Postmaster General
In office May 19, 1840 – March 4, 1841
President	Martin Van Buren
Preceded by	Amos Kendall
Succeeded by	Francis Granger
Personal details
Born	John Milton Niles (1787-08-20)August 20, 1787 Windsor, Connecticut, U.S.
Died	May 31, 1856(1856-05-31) (aged 68) Hartford, Connecticut, U.S.
Political party	Democratic-Republican(Before 1825) Democratic(1828– 1848) Free Soil(1848–1854) Republican(1854–1856)
Spouse(s)	Sarah Robinson Jane Pratt

John Milton Niles (August 20, 1787 – May 31, 1856) was a lawyer,editor, author and politician fromConnecticut, serving in theUnited States Senate and asUnited States Postmaster General 1840 to 1841.

Born inWindsor, Connecticut, Niles received a common school education and studiedlaw. He was admitted to the bar in 1817 and practiced inHartford, Connecticut. There, he also established a newspaper, the"Hartford Weekly Times", in 1817, where he worked as an editor as well as a contributor for over thirty years. He published two other papers, the Gazatteer of Connecticut and Rhode Island, and The Independent Whig.^[1] He married Sarah Robinson on June 17, 1824. After her death on November 23, 1824, he married Jane Pratt on November 26, 1845.

Niles became active inDemocratic Party politics and a supporter ofstates-rights doctrines. In 1820 he was appointed anassociate judge in theHartford County Court, but didn't start until 1821. He served until 1826 when he was elected to theConnecticut House of Representatives. Unsuccessful for reelection, he continued practicing law. In 1829 he was appointedPostmaster of Hartford, serving this position until 1836. He failed to be elected to an at-large Connecticut Representative seat.

After the demise ofWhig senatorNathan Smith, Niles was elected as aclass one senator to fill his seat, serving from 1835 to 1839.^[2] There, he served as chairman of theCommittee on Manufactures in the24th and25th congresses. He was not a candidate for reelection. In1839 and in1840 he was the unsuccessful Democratic candidate forGovernor of Connecticut, losing toWilliam W. Ellsworth.

AppointedUnited States Postmaster General byPresidentMartin Van Buren in 1840, Niles served until the end of the administration in 1841. As Postmaster General he ended delivery of mail on Sunday. He returned to theSenate as aclass three senator in 1844. He was actually elected in 1842 and was to start in 1843, but ill health and a credentials challenge kept him out until the next year. When he was a US Senator, in 1845, he cast the deciding vote admitting Texas to the Union as a slave state, though he was against slavery.^[3] He served from March 4, 1843, to March 3, 1849, and declined for reelection.^[4] Associating with theFree Soil Party campaign of his friendVan Buren in 1848, he became their candidate for governor in1849. He spent some time in Europe from 1851 to 1852.

In his later years, Niles pursued horticulture. He had no children and bequeathed his library to theConnecticut Historical Society and left$70,000 in trust to the city of Hartford as a charity fund, the income of which he directed to be annually distributed to the poor. He was Connecticut's member on the originalRepublican National Committee in February 1856.

Niles died in Hartford on May 30, 1856, at the age of 68 and is interred in the city's Old North Cemetery^[5]

• The Life of Oliver Hazard Perry (1820)
• The Connecticut Civil Officer (1823)
• A View of South America and Mexico, Comprising Their History, the Political Condition, Geography, Agriculture, Commerce, & c. of the Republics of Mexico, Guatemala, Colombia, Peru, the United Provinces of South America and Chile, with a Complete History of the Revolution, in Each of These Independent States (two volumes, 1826)
• History of South America and Mexico: Comprising Their Discovery, Geography, Politics, Commerce and Revolutions (two volumes, 1838)

• United States Congress."John Milton Niles (id: N000108)".Biographical Directory of the United States Congress.
• John Milton Niles atFind a Grave

• 1787 births
• 1856 deaths
• People from Windsor, Connecticut
• American people of English descent
• United States postmasters general
• Van Buren administration cabinet members
• Jacksonian United States senators from Connecticut
• Democratic Party United States senators from Connecticut
• Connecticut Free Soilers
• Connecticut Republicans
• Members of the Connecticut House of Representatives
• American newspaper editors
• Writers from Hartford, Connecticut
• Connecticut lawyers
• 19th-century United States senators
• 19th-century members of the Connecticut General Assembly

• Articles with short description
• Short description is different from Wikidata
• Use mdy dates from November 2016