REVOLUTIONARY REVELATIONS
Hopkins suggested early in 1772 that no British ship should be operating in or near Rhode Island without permission, as he told the colony’s deputy governor.
In fact, he leveled a threat of his own. Hopkins implied that he might arrest Dudingston. He issued a warrant for Dudingston’s arrest in October 1773, but he did not follow up on it.
A little over a year after the incident took place, Hopkins made it clear that he had no serious intention of prosecuting anyone for burning a British ship. The incident became a national issue when Thomas Jefferson urged committees of correspondence in other colonies to coordinate a united response to the British should they attempt to punish the miscreants who attacked the Gaspee. They never did, although the British offered a reward of £1,000 to anyone who would turn them in, which was magnanimous, since the ship cost only £545 to build and outfit. That demonstrated how seriously the British took the incident, although Hopkins did not. He moved on.
Hopkins’s Crowning Achievement
Hopkins started serving with the First Continental Congress in 1774. When the discussion about the Declaration of Independence began in 1776, he was eager to participate.
Thus, when the delegates lined up to sign the Declaration of Independence, Stephen Hopkins had waited longer than most of the others for the privilege.
Quotations to Live (and Die) By!
“MY HANDS TREMBLE, BUT MY HEART DOES NOT.”
—STEPHEN HOPKINS, ACKNOWLEDGING HIS AGE AND CEREBRAL PALSY WHEN HE SIGNED THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE
Hopkins lived for another nine years after signing the declaration. He left the Continental Congress in 1778, returned to Rhode Island, and served in its legislature from 1777−79. The man from the smallest colony left a huge impression on the people and the country he left behind.
JOHN JAY
New York, New York
December 12, 1745−May 17, 1829
Actions Speak as Loud as Words
John Jay had one of the sharpest pens in the patriots’ arsenal. He fired his first cursive shot with an Address to the People of Great Britain in 1774. Jay continued his attacks on paper as a delegate to the First and Second Continental Congresses; chief justice of New York; minister to Spain; secretary of foreign affairs; chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court; and governor of New York. His pen never ran out of ink, and his words almost always hit their target—as did his actions. But he didn’t exactly endear himself to Americans when he negotiated the Treaty of Amity, Commerce, and Navigation with the British in 1794, which led to the formation of political parties in the United States and affirmed the Senate’s sole right to ratify treaties.
A Precocious Child
At a time when some young people were just starting their college educations, John Jay graduated from King’s College in 1764 with the highest honors. He was only nineteen years old at the time. Four years later he passed the New York bar exam, which marked his entry into politics.
The Committee of Correspondence was a good place for Jay to start his political career. He made news in 1774, the year he became a member, when he politely warned the British that rebellion was a possibility in his Address to the People of Great Britain. He said, in part, “be not surprised… that we… whose forefathers participated in all the rights, the liberties, and the Constitution you so justly boast of… should refuse to surrender them to men who found their claims on no principles of reason, and who prosecute them with a design, that by having our lives and property in their power, they may with the greater facility enslave you.”
The publicity generated by his address helped get him elected to the First Continental Congress despite his youth (he was only twenty-nine when he became a delegate).
In 1775, he wrote similar addresses to the people of Canada, Jamaica, and Ireland. But in one way he became the victim of his own success. He was selected as a delegate to New York’s Fourth Provincial Congress, which took him away from Philadelphia and deprived him of a chance to sign the Declaration of Independence.
Justice Is Done
New York state had big things in store for Jay. He was named as the chief justice of the state’s Supreme Court in September 1777. But he was too much in demand nationally to stay there long, especially after the state made a special exception for him and sent him to the Continental Congress.
When Jay was appointed as chief justice of New York state, its constitution prohibited justices from holding any post other than in the U.S. Congress, and then only if there was a “special occasion.” One arose: Vermont seceded from New York and New Hampshire in November 1778. New York sent Jay to Congress to settle territorial claims arising from the secession.
Within three days of his arrival at Congress, he was named its president.
Jay stayed in Congress for a year and then assumed the post of American ambassador to Spain. That was a steppingstone to his next major assignment in 1781: working with Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and Henry Laurens to negotiate a treaty with Britain.
The original plan was to seek the guidance of the French government in the negotiations. Jay did not understand why the Americans had to rely on any foreign power for advice. He wrote a letter to Congress encouraging it to bypass French involvement and deal directly with Britain. Congress agreed. The team negotiated terms that were favorable to the United States, such as British recognition of America’s independence and the formation of boundaries that would allow U.S. expansion in the west. That was a coup for the United States—and Jay.
FEDERAL FACTS
When the Treaty of Paris was signed on September 3, 1783, the most surprised people in the room were the representatives of the French and Spanish governments. They did not realize how effectively Jay and his friends had dealt with the British without their help.
No Rest for the Weary
Jay returned to the United States on July 24, 1784, to accolades and new assignments. He was elected to Congress, which named him secretary of foreign affairs. He held the position until 1790. At the same time, he used his pen to argue for ratification of the U.S. Constitution.
REVOLUTIONARY REVELATIONS
Using the pen name “Publius,” Jay wrote five of the eighty-five essays known as the “Federalist Papers”: numbers 2, 3, 4, 5, and 64. Alexander Hamilton and James Madison wrote the others. The “Federalist Papers,” a series of documents that pushed for the ratification of the U.S. Constitution, appeared in two New York newspapers between October 1787 and August 1788.
President George Washington asked Jay to pick any position in his administration. Jay opted for chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. He remained in that position from November 1789 to June 1795, during which time Washington also asked Jay to negotiate a treaty with Britain to wrap up the loose ends left over from the Treaty of Paris. What resulted was the Treaty of Amity, Commerce, and Navigation, also known as the Jay Treaty. Americans were so displeased with the terms of the Treaty of Amity, Commerce, and Navigation they burned Jay in effigy.
According to the terms, British control of northwestern posts would be eliminated within two years, the Americans could file claims for damages from British ship seizures, and the United States was granted limited trade rights in the West Indies. Those outcomes displeased ordinary Americans, who believed it was a one-sided treaty that favored the British.
Some citizens threw stones at Alexander Hamilton in New York City to express their displeasure after he spoke in defense of the treaty; others roundly protested against President Washington for signing it. It was not Jay’s finest moment.
FEDERAL FACTS
The Treaty of Amity, Commerce, and Navigation that Jay negotiated had two major impacts on American politics. It led to the formation of political parties and established the precedent by which only the Senate could approve treaties. After Congress ratified the treaty, Americans formed angry mobs and accused senators of signing a “death warrant to America’s liberties.” The bloc that ap
proved the treaty was known from that point as Federalists. The senators who voted against the treaty became the Jeffersonian Republicans. When the House of Representatives asked to review the treaty, President Washington refused its request. That preserved the Senate’s exclusive role in approving treaties.
Final Acts
After his stint on the United States Supreme Court, John Jay returned to New York, where he served two terms as governor. In 1801, he decided he was more suited to farming than to public office. He retired to the land that he loved, and which he believed no one should be able to take away.
Quotations to Live (and Die) By!
“NO POWER ON EARTH HAS A RIGHT TO TAKE OUR PROPERTY FROM US WITHOUT OUR CONSENT.”
—JOHN JAY
He spent the next twenty-eight years on that farm. After writing, regulating, and ruling in support of his country for twenty-seven years, he had earned the rest. Jay had compiled a record of achievement that few of his peers could equal.
THOMAS JEFFERSON
Shadwell, Virginia
April 13, 1743–July 4, 1826
Ever the Writer
The record of public service and accomplishments Thomas Jefferson achieved in his lifetime is well documented. He entered public life in 1768 when he was elected to the Virginia House of Burgesses. Later, he attended the Continental Congress; wrote the Declaration of Independence; served as governor of Virginia; served as secretary of state, vice president and president of the United States; and coordinated the Louisiana Purchase. He made a lot of enemies along the way, which is a sure sign that he must have been doing something right at least most of the time.
A Prolific Author
There was nothing in Thomas Jefferson’s early life to suggest that he was destined for greatness. He attended the College of William & Mary, studied law with George Wythe from 1762−67, inherited his father’s estate, Monticello, when he was twenty-one years old, was admitted to the Virginia bar in 1767, and got elected to the colony’s House of Burgesses a year later.
That was the normal path for Jefferson’s peers in the mid-eighteenth century. One thing distinguished Jefferson from other young men: his cleverness with words. That became his hallmark, showcased in his first significant document A Summary View of the Rights of British America, in which he reminded the king of Britain that Americans had rights, too. He wrote the essay in 1774, the same year he retired from his law practice in order to pursue a political career.
Many of the ideas in that document appeared in the Declaration of Independence, which he wrote with limited help in 1776. After that, he returned to Virginia, where he devoted himself to the state’s affairs.
Jefferson continued writing political documents over the next few years, revising Virginia’s laws (1776) and drafting the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom (1777) and the Bill for the More General Diffusion of Knowledge (1778) to promote education in Virginia. He also served as Virginia’s governor between 1779−81.
REVOLUTIONARY REVELATIONS
British troops paid Jefferson a visit at his Monticello home in 1781 to capture him. A young militiaman named Jack Jouett rode around British lines to warn Jefferson that they were in the neighborhood. Jefferson escaped with ten minutes to spare.
After the war ended his political career exploded.
Evil Personified?
Following the Revolutionary War, Jefferson served in a variety of positions, including United States minister to France and secretary of state. He was the United States’ first secretary of state, serving from 1790−93.
Jefferson was there to help his longtime friend George Washington through his two terms as president. They differed in some political respects: Jefferson was opposed to the formation of a national bank and the Jay Treaty, backed by Alexander Hamilton and authored by John Jay.
The political differences among the leaders prompted Jefferson to form his own party, the Democratic-Republicans. It was under that banner that Jefferson became the third president of the United States, even though, as the Connecticut Courant suggested, some people considered him the devil incarnate.
Quotations to Live (and Die) By!
“MURDER, ROBBERY, RAPE, ADULTERY AND INCEST WILL BE OPENLY TAUGHT AND PRACTICED, THE AIR WILL BE RENT WITH THE CRIES OF DISTRESS, THE SOIL SOAKED WITH BLOOD, AND THE NATION BLACK WITH CRIMES. WHERE IS THE HEART THAT CAN CONTEMPLATE SUCH A SCENE WITHOUT SHIVERING WITH HORROR?”
—EDITORIAL IN THE CONNECTICUT COURANT, COMMENTING ON WHAT WOULD HAPPEN IF THOMAS JEFFERSON WON THE PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION IN 1800
When John Adams turned over the presidency to Thomas Jefferson in 1801, it marked the first peaceful transfer of authority from one party to another in the history of the United States.
Jefferson assumed the presidency at a crucial time for the United States. France and Britain were at war again, and one of Jefferson’s primary goals was to keep the United States out of the conflict. He succeeded in that, but he ended up presiding over the First Tripolitan War with the Barbary States, which were interfering with American merchant ships in the Mediterranean Sea. During the Revolutionary War, the French navy protected American merchant ships from harassment by the Barbary pirates under the terms of the 1778–1783 Treaty of Alliance between the two countries. The pirates earned their money by capturing foreign ships and holding their crews for ransom. After the war ended, the French no longer provided that protection. The Americans were on their own, and they expected help from their government. When Jefferson was inaugurated as president in 1801, the pasha of Tripoli demanded $225,000 from his administration—without even capturing a ship. Jefferson refused the pasha’s demand and declared war on the Barbary States, albeit reluctantly.
FEDERAL FACTS
Two of Jefferson’s crowning achievements as president were the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, which doubled the size of the United States, and his authorization of the Lewis and Clark Expedition. Meriwether Lewis and William Clark explored the land included in the Louisiana Purchase and other western territory.
For the Public Good
By 1809, when James Madison, Jefferson’s friend and successor, assumed the presidency, Jefferson had completed forty years of public service. Finally, he had the opportunity to devote his time to pursuits that had fascinated him since his younger days, such as farming and science.
REVOLUTIONARY REVELATIONS
Thomas Jefferson sold his collection of nearly 7,000 books to the Library of Congress in 1815. The library needed them to replace its collection that the British army burned when it passed through Washington, D.C., during the War of 1812.
For the first time, he could devote more time to his presidency of the American Philosophical Society, which was founded in 1743 as the country’s first learned society, as well as see to the distribution of his books and the foundation of a university for the people of Virginia. His establishment of the University of Virginia was a major milestone for the state. He began planning the project in 1819; it opened in 1825, the year before he died.
Jefferson, ever the writer, penned his own epitaph. On his gravestone he listed what he thought were his three most significant accomplishments: writing the Declaration of Independence, drafting the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, and founding the University of Virginia. They were important achievements, but his accomplishments over the course of his lifetime exceeded what can be etched on a single gravestone.
JOHN PAUL JONES
Kirkbean, Scotland
July 6, 1747−July 18, 1792
A Long Voyage Home
Jones was one of the most daring—and ill-tempered—commanders in the Continental Navy. He came to America under suspicious circumstances, which are not always included in his biographies. That did not affect his navy career or his reputation for bravery, though. Jones would not give up in a naval engagement, which inspired his sailors to be tough and determined. He is best known for his victory over the British warship Serapis off the coast of England. Jones took the fight to the Bri
tish navy—and dared them to stop him.
REVOLUTIONARY REVELATIONS
Jones was born John Paul. He added the Jones sometime in the mid-1770s, possibly due to an incident in Tobago in 1773 in which he killed a member of his crew aboard the Betsy. The sailor started a mutiny. Jones let his temper get the best of him. He confronted the mutineer with a sword to force him into obedience. According to Jones, the man attacked him with a piece of wood, so he killed him in self-defense. A few days later, Jones fled Tobago, traveled to America, changed his name, and “reinvented” himself. That was his story, and he stuck to it.
An Early Start
John Paul Jones began his sailing career at the age of twelve, when he sailed to America aboard a merchant vessel named Friendship. Its destination was Rappahannock, Virginia, where Jones’s older brother, William, lived. John Paul lived with William for a while when he was not at sea learning his trade.
Jones got his first chance to command a ship by luck. He was traveling aboard a ship, ironically named John, as a passenger. Both the captain and the first mate died at sea of yellow fever. Jones assumed command of the John and brought it safely into port. The company rewarded him by appointing him as captain of the ship. At age twenty, he had his first command.
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