The ancestors of Edmund Randolph were among the most influential of the Virginia colonists. Both his grandfather and his father served as attorney general of the colony under appointment by the king. The Randolph family was famous for oratorical ability. Peyton Randolph, an uncle of Edmund, was long regarded as the first orator in Virginia and without a superior in the whole country. Edmund became a student at William and Mary College, and from the beginning of his college career took high rank as an orator, a reputation he retained until the last day of his life.

After leaving college he studied law with his father, and almost from the day of his admission to the bar took rank among the ablest and most successful lawyers of the commonwealth. He began his active life just as the agitation in the colonies over the acts of the British Parliament was fast leading the people to the point of armed resistance. His father espoused the cause of the king and Parliament, and went to London, where he died a few years later. At the time of his father's removal to London Edmund was twenty-one years of age. He refused to follow his father, and became one of the most active and eloquent champions of the cause of the colonies. When the war came he joined the army under General Washington, and was appointed an aid-decamp on the staff of the general. In November, 1776, he was given leave of absence from the army, owing to the death of his uncle, Peyton Randolph, who, at the time of his death, was one of the most distinguished members of the Continental Congress.

Congress tendered him the appointment as "mustermaster" for the Williamsburg District, and about the same time he was elected a member of the Virginia Convention. He declined the lucrative office of "mustermaster" tendered him by Congress to accept, without pay, that given him by the people of Virginia. Mr. Randolph was the youngest member of that famous convention, being only twenty-three years of age, but he was soon one of the most active and influential. Notwithstanding his youth he was made a member of the committee appointed to prepare a declaration of rights, the most important committee raised by the convention. At the close of the convention the Virginia Assembly elected Mr. Randolph attorney general of the state, and the people of Williamsburg elected him mayor of the town. For a time he filled both offices. He was the third of his family to serve Virginia as attorney general, his father and his grandfather having been commissioned by the king to that office.

While acting as attorney general of the state he continued in the general practice of his profession. His success at the bar was very great, few important cases being heard and determined without his appearing on one side or the other. In 1779, while still serving as attorney general, he was elected to the Continental Congress. He remained in Congress but a few months, resigning because of the press

ing duties of his office of attorney general. In 1780 he was again elected to Congress, and held his seat until 1782, when he again resigned.

In May, 1785, he was present at the consultations held at Mount Vernon and Alexandria which resulted in the famous meeting at Annapolis to take into consideration the commerce of the country, a meeting which eventuated in the Convention at Philadelphia which drafted the constitution for a "more perfect Union." In November, 1786, he was elected Governor of Virginia, and as such governor attended the Constitutional Convention in 1787. In the Convention he served on a number of the important committees, and took a prominent part in the various discussions. He was not satisfied with the Constitution as finally drafted and accepted by the Convention, and refused to sign it.

After the Convention adjourned he changed his mind, and in the Virginia Convention, called to pass upon the question of ratification, he became one of the most earnest and ardent champions of ratification, preferring it to disunion, or a longer struggle with a government under the inefficient Articles of Confederation. It was largely through his influence the Constitution was ratified by Virginia, the margin in its favor being only eleven votes. Later it was charged he obtained this ratification by suppressing a letter from Governor Clinton, of New York.

The first Congress held under the new Constitution, by an act approved September 24, 1789, established the judicial courts of the United States. The act provided there should be appointed by the President "a meet person, learned in the law," to act as Attorney General. President Washington at once tendered this position to Mr. Randolph. He was confirmed and commissioned on September 26, two days after the act creating the office was approved, but he did not enter upon the discharge of its duties until February 2, 1790.

Although the Attorney General at that time was not the head of an executive department, President Washington called Mr. Randolph into all consultations, having great confidence in his ability as a lawyer, and in his patriotism. At that time there was a most intimate friendship between the two men, Mr. Randolph having acted for the General in a trust capacity while he was absent as head of the army. /

The act establishing the judicial system had been the cause of much friction in Congress, especially in the House of Representatives, and the House requested Mr. Randolph to revise it. His report has been classed as one of the ablest papers of the kind ever presented to Congress. He had to adapt the whole judiciary machinery of the country to meet the exigencies of the time, a work that was very onerous and required the activities of a very astute mind.

The Attorney General was not required to reside at the seat of government and was permitted to continue in the practice of his pro

fession, but the labor of putting into effect the judicial system was so arduous that Mr. Randolph was compelled to retire from the active practice, and as the salary of the office was too small to maintain his family he had to resort to accepting into his office students to make both ends meet.

✓ There were not very many important cases in which the government was interested before the courts during the service of Mr. Randolph as Attorney General. The most important was the celebrated case of Chisholm v. the State of Georgia. The question at issue was the suability of a state. It was a new question under the Constitution and aroused an intense feeling. Mr. Randolph argued the case before the Supreme Court of the United States, and so cogent and powerful were the arguments he presented that the court unanimously gave a decision against the state. This decision eventuated in the adoption of the twelfth amendment to the Constitution./

In the cabinet counsels Mr. Randolph displayed as much courage in giving his convictions on the questions brought before the members by the President as did Mr. Hamilton, and frequently clashed with that distinguished statesman. Mr. Madison at one time said that Mr. Randolph controlled the administration. When the question arose as to what should be the attitude of this country in the war then prevailing between France and England, Attorney General Randolph took strong ground in favor of the enforcement of a strict neutrality, and prepared the proclamation issued by President Washington, a proclamation that has had a greater influence in moulding international law than any other single document of modern times. One of the latest English writers on international law says the policy of the United States in 1793 constitutes an epoch in the development of the usages of neutrality, and represents the most advanced opinions as to what the obligations of neutrality are.

During the continuance of the agitation over the actions of Genet, the minister of the French Republic, Mr. Randolph, at the request of President Washington, visited several of the states to observe and report on the condition of public sentiment. On the resignation of Mr. Jefferson as Secretary of State, the President asked Mr. Randolph to assume the duties of that office. It was a position of great difficulty at that time. One of the first acts of the new Secretary was to insist that the President should demand of the French government the recall of M. Genet, and it was through his persistence the country finally got rid of that disturbing element.

Secretary Randolph also urged the appointment of an envoy extraordinary to negotiate a commercial treaty with Great Britain. The President desired to send Mr. Hamilton on this mission, but Secretary Randolph strenuously opposed the selection, not from hostility to Hamilton, but on the ground that the New York statesman had always been regarded as extremely friendly to England and his appointment would

arouse distrust in France. He suggested John Jay, Chief Justice, for the place and he was finally appointed.

It devolved upon Secretary Randolph to prepare the instructions for Mr. Jay and to carry on with him the necessary correspondence during the long and tedious negotiations, keeping him at all times well informed as to the changes of public sentiment. For thus sending an envoy to negotiate with Great Britain, President Washington was violently assailed by some of the papers of the country that were friendly to France. To these attacks Mr. Randolph replied in a series of thirteen letters under the signature of "Germanicus." So strong were these letters and so clear and comprehensive in their statement of the motives of the President that they gave a fatal blow to American Jacobinism.

Troubles with the representative of the French Republic multiplied. Fauchet, who had succeeded Genet, undertook to ship gunpowder to France under passports of the United States. For this violation of the law and assumption of authority, he was roundly taken to task by Secretary Randolph, and was given to understand that the administration was not disposed to submit to a repetition of the conduct of Genet. The treaty negotiated by Mr. Jay was considered by the President and his cabinet, Secretary Randolph taking strong grounds against its ratification by the President unless certain modifications should be accepted by the British government. It was while this matter was pending an expose came which resulted in driving Mr. Randolph out of the cabinet and darkening all his future life.

In March, 1795, the French corvette, Jean Bart, was captured by an English cruiser. Among the papers found on board were a number of despatches from Fauchet to the French government, some of them seriously compromising Mr. Randolph. In giving an account of the issuance by President Washington of a proclamation against those engaged in the "Whiskey Rebellion" in Western Pennsylvania, M. Fauchet used the following language concerning Mr. Randolph:

Two or three days before the proclamation was published, and of course, before the cabinet resolved on its measures, the Secretary of State came to my house. All his countenance was grief; he requested a private conversation. It was all over, he said to me; a civil war is about to ravage our unhappy country. Four men by their talents, their influence and energy may save it. But, debtors of English merchants, they will be deprived of their liberty if they take the smallest step. Could you loan them instantaneously funds to shelter them from English persecution?

These letters were sent to the British minister at Philadelphia, who showed them to Mr. Wolcott, Secretary of the Treasury. He immediately communicated with the other members of the cabinet, and it was determined to send a pressing request for the President (who was then at Mount Vernon) to return at once to Philadelphia. When President Washington arrived in Philadelphia the French despatches were shown to him. After carefully considering them the President sent for Secretary Randolph and handed them to him asking for an explanation. In

stead of offering an explanation the Secretary tendered his resignation, which was at once accepted.

Fauchet was then at Newport, preparing to sail for France. Mr. Randolph hastened to that place and compelled the Frenchman to give him a certificate completely exonerating him. But the stigma on his name was never wholly dispelled. From other sources it was later learned that M. Fauchet was impecunious, and it was believed the letter to his government was framed up to secure money from his government under cover of using it to purchase the influence of Mr. Randolph.

After his retirement from the office of Secretary of State it was charged he had misused and failed to account for a large sum of money entrusted to him to meet the expenses of our foreign representatives. He indignantly denied the charge and offered to submit the matter to the adjudication of the comptroller of the treasury. That officer gave judgment against him for a sum in excess of fifty thousand dollars. To pay this he sacrificed his own fortune and that of some of his friends. Although he paid over to the treasury nearly one hundred thousand dollars, owing to a failure to discharge all the interest claimed, he is still carried on the books of the Treasury Department as being technically a defaulter. Many years later the whole matter was investigated by some experts and the impression reached that the decision of the comptroller was wrong, and Mr. Randolph had been made to pay over the large sums while in fact he was not indebted to the government a dollar, nor had he misused any of the funds entrusted to him.

On retiring from the cabinet Mr. Randolph returned to Richmond and resumed the practice of his profession. He was engaged in many important cases, among them being the defense of Aaron Burr on his trial for treason.

TIMO

TIMOTHY PICKERING

IMOTHY PICKERING-Postmaster General from August 19, 1791, to January 2, 1795; Secretary of War from January 2, 1795, to December 10, 1795; Secretary of State from December 10, 1795, to May 12, 1800. Born July 17, 1745, at Salem, Massachusetts. Educated at Harvard College. Married, April 8, 1776, Miss Rebecca White. Died at Salem, Massachusetts, January 29, 1829.

1775-Judge of the Court of Common Pleas for Boston.
1776-Member General Court of Massachusetts.

1777-Adjutant General Continental Army.

1778-Quartermaster General Continental Army.

1789-Member Pennsylvania Constitutional Convention.

1791-Postmaster General.

1795-Secretary of War.

1795-Secretary of State.

1802-Chief Justice Essex Court of Common Pleas, Massachusetts.

1803-United States Senator.

1814-Member national House of Representatives.