George Read

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George Read George Read's signature

George Read, Sr. (born September 18, 1733 in North East , Cecil County , Province of Maryland , colony of the Kingdom of Great Britain , † September 21, 1798 in New Castle , Delaware , USA ) was a British-American lawyer and statesman . He signed the United States ' Declaration of Independence , was a delegate to the Continental Congress and the Philadelphia Convention , Governor of Delaware, US Senator for Delaware, and is one of the Founding Fathers of the United States .

Youth and family

Read's father, John, was a wealthy English resident of Dublin who came to Maryland as a young man and became one of the founders of Charlestown . His mother was Mary Howell Read. George Read was still a child when his family moved to New Castle County near the village of Christiana. He attended Reverend Francis Alison's Academy in New London Township with Thomas McKean and studied law in Philadelphia with John Moland. He was admitted to the Philadelphia bar in 1753, returned home a year later and opened a law firm in New Castle .

In 1763 Read married Gertrude Ross Till, daughter of the Reverend George Ross, the Anglican rector of the Immanuel Church in New Castle and widowed sister of George Ross , who later, like Read, was one of the signatories of the US Declaration of Independence. They had five children, John, George Junior, William, John, and Mary, who later married Gunning Bedford, Sr. , who then became governor of Delaware. The family lived at The Strand in New Castle. Her house was in what is now the garden of what is now the Read House, owned by the Delaware Historical Society. They were members of the Episcopal Church in the USA .

In 1763, John Penn , the incumbent governor of Pennsylvania, appointed Read as Attorney General for the three counties of Delaware. Read remained in this office until he left for the Continental Congress in 1774 . He was also a member of the Colonial Assembly of Delaware for twelve periods from 1765 to 1776.

American independence

The Delaware the 18th century was politically divided into weak factions as " Court Party " (Court Party) and "Country Party" (Country Party) were known. The superior court party was predominantly Anglican, most strongly represented in Kent and Sussex Counties, worked well with the colonial government and favored reconciliation with the government of the Kingdom of Great Britain . The weaker country party was mostly Ulster Scots , centered in New Castle County , who quickly advocated independence from Great Britain. Read was, so to speak, a summary of the Court Party's politicians and, more than anyone else, its leader. As such, he worked primarily in partnership with Kent County's John Dickinson and in opposition to their friends and neighbors Thomas McKean and Caesar Rodney .

Read, like most people in Delaware, was very much in favor of trying to settle the differences with Britain. He opposed the Stamp Act and similar parliamentary laws and supported anti-import laws and reasonable protests, but was heartily against the option of clear independence. Even so, he presided over the Delaware Correspondence Committee from 1764 and was elected to sit alongside the much more radical Thomas McKean and Caesar Rodney in the First and Second Continental Congresses from 1774 to 1777 . The fact of his participation was kind of strange, and when Congress voted on American independence on July 2, 1776, Read surprised many by voting against. It caused Caesar Rodney to ride to Philadelphia overnight to break the tie in the Delaware delegation in favor of independence. When it came time to finally adopt the United States' Declaration of Independence , Read signed it, despite natural caution against the cause of independence.

Government of Delaware

Anticipating the US Declaration of Independence, the Parliament of Delaware declared its separation from the government of the Kingdom of Great Britain on June 15, 1776 . When the Declaration of Independence was actually adopted, it called elections to a constitutional congress in Delaware to draft the new state's constitution. Read was elected to Congress, became its president, and led the passage of the Thomas McKean drafted document that became the 1776 Constitution of Delaware .

Read was then elected to the first legislative council, that is, the State Senate of the Delaware Parliament, and was chosen as speaker for both terms (1776/77 and 1777/78). After the capture of Delaware President John McKinley and the brief tenure of incumbent President Thomas McKean , Read became incumbent president himself on October 20, 1777 and remained so until March 31, 1778. These were the months of the crisis in Delaware when the British Philadelphia and controlled the Delaware River . Read and his family narrowly escaped capture while fleeing Philadelphia from the British Army. As incumbent president he tried, mostly in vain, to recruit additional soldiers and to protect the state from attacks from Philadelphia and from ships on the Delaware River. The 1777-78 session of the Delaware Parliament was held in Dover for safety and the Sussex County delegation to the Delaware House of Representatives never met because interference in the election invalidated the result.

After Caesar Rodney was elected to replace him as President, Read continued his service in the Delaware State Senate during the 1778–79 period. After a year off to maintain his troubled health, he was elected to the Delaware House of Representatives for periods 1780/81 and 1781/82. He returned to the State Senate in 1782/83 and 1787/88. In 1782 he was appointed judge at the Naval Court of Appeals.

Constitutional Congress and US Senator

Read was called back to serve the nation in 1786. He represented Delaware at the Annapolis Convention (1786) . Because so few states were represented, the congregation produced only one report calling a larger-scale congress to be held in Philadelphia the following year .

When the Philadelphia Convention was held, Read again represented Delaware. Wright & Morris write in “Soldier-Politicians of the Constitution”: “Read immediately voted for a new national government under a new constitution. He said, " Improving the Articles of Confederation was just like making new clothes out of old things. "

He was the leader in the struggle for a strong central government. At the same time he supported the abolition of all states and the consolidation of a country under a strong national government. "Nobody has to fear the states, the people are with us," he told Congress, which was shocked by this radical proposal. Since no one supported his request, he gave himself to the protection of small states against the encroachments of their larger, better-known neighbors satisfied, which, he feared "unite would to swallow the smaller states to consolidation, subdivision or impoverishment." He warned that Delaware "could become a digit in the Union" if the principle of equal representation expressed in the New Jersey (Little States) Plan was not adopted and the method of correction from the Articles of Confederation was not adopted would be held. He favored giving Congress a veto right over state laws in order to make federal legislation immune to populist whims by allowing senators to stay in office for nine years and by granting the federal president broad appointment rights. He freely threatened to lead the Delaware delegation out of Congress if the rights of the small states were not expressly guaranteed in the new constitution. With those rights secured, he led the ratification movement in Delaware, which, in part as a result of his efforts, became the first state to ratify the new constitution.

Following the adoption of the United States Constitution , the Delaware Parliament elected Read on October 25, 1788 as one of its two Senators in the US Congress . His shortened first term began on March 4, 1789, in 1790 he was re-elected for a full six-year term. As a senator, he supported the acceptance of national debts, the establishment of a national bank and the collection of consumption taxes. He resigned from his position as Senator to accept the appointment as Chief Justice of the Delaware Supreme Court and served in that capacity until his death.

Read submitted his resignation to the U.S. Senate on September 18, 1793, before the first session of the third Congress , but it was not until February 7, 1795, four weeks before the end of Congress, that Henry Latimer was elected to him for the remainder the term of office until March 3, 1797 to replace. Delaware's Class I seat in the US Senate was orphaned from September 18, 1793 to February 7, 1795 as a result.

Death and inheritance

Read died on September 21, 1798 in New Castle (Delaware) and was buried in the Immanuel Episcopal church cemetery there. William T. Reis and his “Leben und Korrespondenzen” describe Read as “tall, gentle and gracefully formed, with a pleasing appearance and bright brown eyes. His manners were dignified, verging on severity, but polite and fascinating at times. He exuded a great sense of security, not only because of his profound legal knowledge, sound decision-making and impartial decisions, but also because of his strict integrity and the simplicity of his private nature. "A fellow delegate to the Philadelphia Convention noted that" his legal knowledge is said to be very great should, but his rhetorical power was tiresome and boring to the last; his voice is weak and his articulation so poor that it takes some patience to follow him. ”Historians like John Munroe have generally stated that all in all Read was the dominant figure in Delaware politics during his time. Directly or indirectly, he provided steady and reliable leadership for the new state in its most difficult times.

At "The Strand" in New Castle there is a house that his son George Read II built. Owned by the Delaware Historic Society, it has been restored and opened to the public. New Castle named a school after George Read.

Public offices

At that time, elections were being held in Delaware in early October. Members of the Delaware House of Representatives took office for one year on October 20. Before 1776 six MPs were generally elected, one from each country. After 1776 the number was increased to seven and a House of Lords was established, the Delaware Senate, which elected three councilors from each country for three years.

The Delaware Parliament elected members of the Continental Congress for one year and the President of Delaware for three years. They also elected the US Senators , who took office on March 4 and remained in office for six years. However, Read's first term was only two years to allow rotation.

Office Type place Elected Assumption of office Handover Remarks
Prosecutor Jurisprudence New Castle (Delaware) October 20, 1763 October 20, 1774
Delaware House of Representatives legislative branch New Castle (Delaware) October 1, 1764 October 20, 1764 October 21, 1765
Delaware House of Representatives legislative branch New Castle (Delaware) October 1, 1765 October 21, 1765 October 20, 1766
Delaware House of Representatives legislative branch New Castle (Delaware) October 1, 1766 October 20, 1766 October 20, 1767
Delaware House of Representatives legislative branch New Castle (Delaware) October 1, 1767 October 20, 1767 October 20, 1768
Delaware House of Representatives legislative branch New Castle (Delaware) October 1, 1768 October 20, 1768 October 20, 1769
Delaware House of Representatives legislative branch New Castle (Delaware) October 1, 1769 October 20, 1769 October 20, 1770
Delaware House of Representatives legislative branch New Castle (Delaware) October 1, 1770 October 20, 1770 October 21, 1771
Delaware House of Representatives legislative branch New Castle (Delaware) October 1, 1771 October 21, 1771 October 20, 1772
Delaware House of Representatives legislative branch New Castle (Delaware) October 1, 1772 October 20, 1772 October 20, 1773
Delaware House of Representatives legislative branch New Castle (Delaware) October 1, 1773 October 20, 1773 October 20, 1774
Continental Congress legislative branch Philadelphia August 2, 1774 September 5, 1774 October 26, 1774
Delaware House of Representatives legislative branch New Castle (Delaware) October 1, 1774 October 20, 1774 October 20, 1775
Continental Congress legislative branch Philadelphia March 16, 1775 May 10, 1775 October 21, 1775
Delaware House of Representatives legislative branch New Castle (Delaware) October 1, 1775 October 20, 1775 June 15, 1776
Continental Congress legislative branch Philadelphia October 21, 1775 October 21, 1775 November 7, 1776
State constitution Constitutional Assembly New Castle (Delaware) August 19, 1776 August 27, 1776 September 21, 1776
Delaware Senate legislative branch New Castle (Delaware) October 21, 1776 October 28, 1776 October 20, 1777 Speaker
Continental Congress legislative branch Philadelphia November 7, 1776 December 12, 1776 December 17, 1777
Continental Congress legislative branch Baltimore November 7, 1776 December 20, 1776 February 22, 1777
President executive Dover (Delaware) October 20, 1777 March 31, 1778 officiating
Delaware Senate legislative branch Dover (Delaware) October 21, 1776 March 31, 1778 October 20, 1779
Delaware House of Representatives legislative branch Dover (Delaware) October 1, 1780 October 20, 1780 October 20, 1781
Delaware House of Representatives legislative branch Dover (Delaware) October 1, 1781 October 20, 1781 October 20, 1782
Delaware Senate legislative branch Dover (Delaware) October 1, 1782 October 20, 1782 October 20, 1785
Delaware Senate legislative branch Dover (Delaware) October 1, 1785 October 20, 1785 October 20, 1788
Philadelphia Convention Constitutional Assembly Philadelphia May 14, 1787 September 17, 1787 Delaware
United States Senate legislative branch new York March 4, 1789 March 3, 1791
United States Senate legislative branch Philadelphia March 4, 1791 September 18, 1793

literature

  • DG Barthelmas, The Signers of the Declaration of Independence: A Biographical and Genealogical Record, McFarland Press, Jefferson (North Carolina) 1977
  • John M. Coleman, Thomas McKean, Forgotten Leader of the Revolution, American Faculty Press, Rockaway (New Jersey) 1984, ISBN 0-912834-07-2
  • Robert G Ferris, Richard E. Morris, The Signers of the Declaration of Independence, Interpretive Publications, Inc., Flagstaff (Arizona) 1973, ISBN 0-936478-07-1
  • Carol E. Hoffecker, Democracy in Delaware, Cedar Tree Books, Wilmington (Delaware) 2004, ISBN 1-892142-23-6
  • Roger A. Martin, Memoirs of the Senate, Roger A. Martin, Newark (Delaware) 1995
  • Roger A. Martin, A History of Delaware Through its Governors, McClafferty Press, Wilmington
  • John A. Munroe, The Philadelawareans, University of Delaware Press, Newark (Delaware) 2004, ISBN 0-87413-872-8
  • John A. Munroe, History of Delaware, University of Delaware Press, Newark (Delaware) 1993, ISBN 0-87413-493-5
  • John A. Munroe, Federalist Delaware 1775-1815, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, New Jersey 1954
  • GS Rowe, Thomas McKean, The Shaping of an American Republicanism, Colorado Associated University Press, Boulder (Colorado) 1984, ISBN 0-87081-100-2
  • Jane Harrington Scott, A Gentleman as Well as a Whig, University of Delaware Press, Newark (Delaware) 2000, ISBN 0-87413-700-4
  • Christopher L. Ward, The Delaware Continentals, 1776-1783, Historical Society of Delaware, Wilmington (Delaware) 1941, ISBN 0-924117-21-4

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ READ, George, (1733-1798) , Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, accessed November 25, 2019
personal data
SURNAME Read, George
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British-American lawyer and statesman, one of the founding fathers of the United States
DATE OF BIRTH September 18, 1733
PLACE OF BIRTH at North East , Cecil County , Maryland
DATE OF DEATH September 21, 1798
Place of death New Castle , Delaware