Thomas Pinckney

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Thomas Pinckney

Thomas Pinckney (born October 23, 1750 in Charleston , Province of South Carolina , † November 2, 1828 ibid) was an American soldier, politician and diplomat .

Early years

Thomas Pinckney, son of Eliza Lucas Pinckney , brother of Charles Cotesworth Pinckney and cousin of Charles Pinckney , attended Westminster School and Oxford University in England, the French Military Academy in Caen and the Inner Temple School in London . He returned to South Carolina in 1774, was licensed to practice bar and began practicing in Charleston. He became an ardent supporter of the revolutionary movement and entered the Continental Army in 1775 , where he made it to captain .

Political career

After the end of the war, he first devoted himself to his plantation before turning to politics. Between 1787 and 1789 he was governor of South Carolina. It was during this time that an assembly presided over by Pinckney ratified the 1787 Constitution for South Carolina. This made South Carolina, like the other twelve founding states, officially a state of the United States.

After the end of his tenure, he was a member of the South Carolina House of Representatives from 1791 . President George Washington named him the United States Ambassador to Great Britain . He held this office from January 12, 1792 to July 28, 1796. From November 1795 to November 1796 he also acted temporarily as a special envoy in Spain , where he used the Pinckney Treaty to draw the boundaries between the United States and the then Spanish Negotiated possession of Florida and Louisiana . In succession to William L. Smith he was from November 23, 1797 to March 3, 1801 Member of the Federalist Party in the House of Representatives . He was involved in the impeachment proceedings against Senator William Blount from Tennessee in 1798 .

He then worked again as a lawyer and on his farm. He was also major general in the British-American War in 1812 . In the presidential election in 1796 , Pinckney stood for election as vice-president of John Adams , but curiously lost to the presidential candidate Thomas Jefferson . Due to the rule at the time that the candidate with the second highest number of electoral votes became Vice President, and the fact that the candidates for the presidency and for the vice presidency were not formally separated, presidential candidate Jefferson became vice president of his opponent Adams, while Pinckney only took third place. The electors could each give an equal vote for both offices. Theoretically, a vice-presidential candidate could have been elected president. Many electors who voted for Adams did not give Pinckney their second vote. Jefferson, on the other hand, had narrowly failed at Adams and therefore became Vice President.

Pinckney died in 1828 and was buried in St. Philip's Churchyard . His son Charles later served as Lieutenant Governor of South Carolina.

Honor

The town of Pinckneyville, Georgia , was named after him after he traveled through the area. This city no longer exists because its people left it to found nearby Norcross . Pinckneyville is the name of a middle school in the Norcross area.

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personal data
SURNAME Pinckney, Thomas
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American soldier, politician, and diplomat
DATE OF BIRTH October 23, 1750
PLACE OF BIRTH Charleston , South Carolina
DATE OF DEATH November 2, 1828
Place of death Charleston , South Carolina