In February 1859, Seba Smith finished writing the preface to his most significant literary work. Smith had dabbled in literary ventures his entire life, from his early editing of the Portland (Maine) Courier to his publication of Powhatan: A Metrical Romance in Seven Cantos. An editor, journalist, novelist, and failed poet, Smith was known to his contemporaries mostly for his creation of a single character. Beginning in 1830, and continuing through 1856, Seba Smith penned fictional letters to various newspapers under the pseudonym Major Jack Downing. When these missives were gathered together in 1859 and published as My Thirty Years Out of the Senate, the volume consisted of eighty letters and comprised over four hundred pages of written text. As he penned his preface, Smith could only marvel at how a local character, created for a small Maine newspaper, had attracted the notice of a nation.

Unfortunately for historians and literary scholars, Seba Smith never explained how he developed the character of Major Jack Downing. Pseudonyms and fictional letters had been popular since colonial times, as evidenced by characters such as Benjamin Franklin’s Mrs. Silence Dogood. Yet Smith’s Jack Downing was different from those who came before him. In each of his letters, Downing put down a date and responded to a specific historical event. For nearly three decades, Downing interacted with both his fictional family members, who lived in the town of Downingville, and actual historical figures easily recognized by readers. By creating a fictional character who provided running commentary on American politics, reacting to situations as they occurred, Seba Smith pioneered a new form of political satire.

Smith’s true genius was in his ability to recognize Jack Downing’s growing popularity and move him onto the national stage. Downing began his political career as a novice, as he traveled from the fictional Maine village of Downingville to Portland, then still the state capital, to sell ax handles and his mother’s cheese. The first seventeen letters, written by either Downing or one of his relatives, examined Maine politics. In his eighteenth letter, however, Downing made the momentous decision to travel to Washington to visit President Andrew Jackson. Seba Smith clearly sensed that his fictional creation was gaining a wider reputation and he made the most of his opportunity.

By taking his character to Washington and having him interact with Andrew Jackson, Smith turned his attention to the national political scene. As time passed, Jack Downing ingratiated himself with Jackson, leading to a series of comical events in which Democrats were placed into ridiculous positions. Downing, for example, was commissioned as a militia captain in 1831 to save the citizens of Madawaska, Maine from the incursions of the British. This series of letters made light of hostilities in a border region claimed by both Britain and the United States, but it also allowed Smith to critique Democrats for not caring about New England. Throughout the early 1830s, meanwhile, Smith excelled at taking subtle jabs at Jackson. For instance, when Jackson actually received an honorary doctorate from Harvard in 1833, Smith placed Downing at the event. “I’ve had to doctor the laws considerable ever since I’ve been at Washington,” Jackson explained to Downing, “although I wasn’t a regular bred doctor. And I made out so well about it, that these Cambridge folks thinks I better be made into a regular doctor at once.” Jokes such as this, which mocked the intelligence of both the fictional Downing and the sitting president of the United States, became a staple of Smith’s humor.

Smith crafted subtle jokes about Andrew Jackson’s intelligence, personality, and penchant towards violence, but he was not shy about critiquing Democratic politicians more generally. Within Downing’s world, Jackson was irascible and irritable, and he had to be physically restrained from pummeling others. James Polk was a warmonger who secretly dreamed of claiming all of North and South America. Martin Van Buren was an unprincipled rascal who became jealous of Downing’s friendship with Jackson. Even Downing’s fictional Democrats were venal. Downing’s Uncle Joshua, for instance, tried to secure a post office position by supporting Democrats. Downing himself became increasingly jingoistic over time, supporting the taking of all of Mexico at the conclusion of the Mexican War and joining a filibuster fleet in an attempt to invade Cuba and annex it to the United States. In all these situations, Smith used the character of Downing to critique what he viewed as the increasingly extreme views of the Democratic Party.

Downing’s forceful mockery of Democrats stretched from the presidency of Andrew Jackson to that of Franklin Pierce, and proved that Americans did not mind overtly political humor. Indeed, they welcomed it. But Smith’s career also demonstrated the pitfalls of engaging in political satire, in that he could not bring himself to skewer the Whigs or any Whig presidents. Smith penned fifty of his eighty Jack Downing letters between 1830 and 1833. His output started to wane during Jackson’s second term, and it stopped altogether during the presidential terms of Whigs William Henry Harrison and John Tyler. Smith resumed writing in 1847 and took aim at James K. Polk and his handling of the Mexican War. A few sporadic letters appeared during the administrations of Zachary Taylor and Millard Fillmore, who were both Whigs, but Smith’s satire did not resume in earnest until 1853, when Democrat Franklin Pierce took office. Despite a long and successful career as a satirist, Smith was unable to figure out how to mock presidents unless they belonged to the political party he believed deserved his mockery.

This month marks the 160th anniversary of the publication of Smith’s My Thirty Years Out of the Senate. Regrettably, few Americans today have heard the name Seba Smith, let alone engaged with the escapades of Major Jack Downing. Although lauded as the greatest humorist of his era, Smith’s work quickly faded from popular memory. With the exception of a reissue produced in 1973, My Thirty Years Out of the Senate remains out of print. Even historians have largely overlooked Downing in their studies of Jacksonian popular culture. Given the current popularity of humorists such as Stephen Colbert, whose comic persona resembles that of Major Jack Downing, one can only wonder if future generations will remember the ways in which modern comics critiqued politicians and public policies through satire. Will the Colberts of the comedic world be studied one hundred years from now, or, like Smith, will they fade from popular memory? At the very least, modern Americans should acquaint themselves with Seba Smith and remember his greatest creation, Major Jack Downing, who tried for over three decades to “exert a salutary influence upon public affairs and the politics of the country.”