Founding Fathers: Complete Biographies, Their Articles, Historical & Political Documents. Emory Speer
could be procured from the cabinet of Fox and North, was signed 3 Sept., 1783, and Jay returned to New York in July, 1784, having been elected by congress secretary for foreign affairs, then the most important post in the country, which he held until the establishment of the Federal government in 1789. In that work he had taken a deep interest, as is shown by his correspondence with Washington and Jefferson, and on the formation of the National constitution he joined Hamilton and Madison in contributing to the “Federalist,” and published an address to the inhabitants of New York in favor of the constitution. He was an active member of the New York convention, which, after a long struggle, adopted the constitution “in full confidence” that certain amendments would be adopted, and Jay was appointed to write the circular letter that secured the unanimous assent of the convention. On the organization of the Federal government, President Washington asked Jay to accept whatever place he might prefer, and Jay took the office of chief justice of the supreme court, when he resigned the post of president of the Abolition society. In 1792 he consented to be a candidate for the governorship of New York, but the canvassers declined on technical grounds to count certain votes given for Jay, which would have made a majority in his favor, and Gov. Clinton was declared elected. In 1794 Jay was nominated by Washington as a special envoy to Great Britain, with which our relations were then strained, and he concluded with Lord Grenville on 19 Nov., 1794, the convention known in American history as “Jay's treaty,” which was assailed with furious denunciations by the Democratic party, whose tactics severely tested the firmness of Washington's character and the strength of his administration. The treaty and its ratification against an unexampled opposition avoided a war with Great Britain. An English opinion of the treaty, which in America was denounced as a complete surrender to England, was expressed by Lord Sheffield when, on the occurrence of the rupture with America, he wrote, “We have now a complete opportunity of getting rid of that most impolitic treaty of 1794, when Lord Grenville was so perfectly duped by Jay.” Five days before his return from England, Jay was elected governor of New York, an office to which he was re-elected in April, 1798. On the close of his second term, in 1801, Jay declined a return to the chief justiceship of the supreme court, to which he was reappointed by President Adams, and passed the remainder of his life on his estate in Westchester county, N. Y., a property which had descended to Mr. Jay through his mother, Mary Van Cortlandt. It is situated some forty-five miles north of New York city about midway between the Hudson river and Long Island sound. The Bedford house, as the mansion is called, is placed on an eminence overlooking the whole beautiful rolling region between the two great bodies of water. It is now the summer residence of his grandson, John Jay. See illustration on page 410. The last office that he filled was the presidency of the American Bible society. Daniel Webster said of him: “When the spotless ermine of the judicial robe fell on John Jay, it touched nothing less spotless than itself.” The life of John Jay has been written by his son, and also by Henry B. Renwick (New York, 1841). See “The Life and Times of John Jay,” by William Whitlock (New York, 1887).
He married on 28 April, 1774, Sarah Van Brugh Livingston, eldest daughter of Gov. William Livingston. She accompanied her husband to Spain, and later was with him in Paris, where she was a great favorite in society, and they resided with Benjamin Franklin at Passy. John Adams's daughter says of her at this time: “Every person who knew her here bestows many encomiums on Mrs. Jay. Madame de Lafayette said she was well acquainted with her, and very fond of her, adding that Mrs. Jay and she thought alike, that pleasure might be found abroad, but happiness only at home in the society of one's family and friends.” During the week of Washington's inauguration he dined with the Jays, and a few days later Mrs. Washington was entertained at Liberty hall by Gov. Livingston, Mrs. Livingston, and Mrs. Jay. During the following season hospitalities were frequently exchanged between the president and the Jays. The portrait of Mrs. Jay is from an original portrait painted by Robert E. Pine, and now in the possession of her grandson, John Jay. — John Jay's elder brother, Sir James, physician, b. in New York city, 27 Oct., 1732; d. in Springfield, N. J., 20 Oct., 1815. He studied medicine, and, while visiting England in 1762 on business of his own, was employed to solicit contributions for King's (now Columbia) college. At this time (25 March, 1763) he was knighted and became involved in a suit in chancery arising out of the collections made for the college, but he returned to New York prior to the Revolution. Later he was instrumental in the passage of the New York act of attainder, and during the British occupation of the city was confined in the New York prison, but was at once released on the arrival of Sir Guy Carleton in 1782. He published two pamphlets (London, 1771 and 1774) relative to the collections made for the colleges in America and also “Reflections and Observations on the Gout” (London, 1772). — John Jay's eldest son, Peter Augustus, lawyer, born in Elizabethtown, N. J., 24 Jan., 1776; died in New York city, 20 Feb., 1843, was graduated at Columbia in 1794, and became his father's private secretary, and in that capacity accompanied him when he was sent as minister to England in 1794. On his return he studied law and achieved a high rank at the New York bar. In 1816 he was a member of the assembly, being active in promoting legislation for the building of the Erie canal, and with his brother William supported the bill recommending the abolition of slavery in New York state. He held the office of recorder of New York city in 1819-'21, and was a member of the New York constitutional convention in 1821. Mr. Jay was a trustee of Columbia in 1812-'17, and again in 1823-'43, being chairman in 1832. In 1840-'3 he was president of the New York historical society, and he was connected with several literary and charitable societies. He received the degree of LL. D. from Harvard in 1831, and from Columbia in 1835. His great learning and strength of intellect, his masterly reasoning, his wisdom and his pre-eminent moral excellence, combined with his thorough refinement and dignity as a man, made him a very marked and remarkable jurist and member of society. Mr. Jay was one of the members of the Kent club, composed of prominent members of the bar, and was active in the social affairs of New York city. — John Jay's second son, William, jurist, born in New York City, 16 June, 1789; died in Bedford, N. Y., 14 October, 1858, studied the classics at Albany with the Rev. Thomas Ellison, of Oxford, England. Among his classmates was James Fenimore Cooper, with whom he formed a life-long friendship, and who inscribed to Jay “Lionel Lincoln” and some of his “Letters from Europe.” Jay was graduated at Yale in 1808, and studied law with John B. Henry of Albany, but was compelled to relinquish the profession by weakness of the eyes. He retired to his father's home at Bedford, and in 1812 married Augusta, daughter of John McVickar, a lady “in whose character were blended all the Christian graces and virtues.” In 1815 he published a “Memoir on the Subject of a General Bible Society for the United States,” and in 1810 assisted Elias Boudinot and others in forming the American Bible society, of which he was for years an active and practical promoter, and its principal champion against the vigorous attacks of the high-churchmen led by Bishop Hobart. The interest in the controversy extended to England, and Jay's numerous letters and pamphlets on the subject have been commended as models of that sort of warfare. In 1818 Jay was appointed to the bench of Westchester county by Gov. De Witt Clinton. His office as first judge was vacated by the adoption of the new constitution in 1821, but he was subsequently reappointed, without regard to politics, until he was superseded in 1843 by Gov. Bouck at the demand of a pro-slavery faction. In 1826, Jay, who in 1819, during the Missouri controversy, had written strongly against the extension of slavery, demanding that congress should “stand between the living and the dead, and stay the plague,” was instrumental in calling the attention of the New York legislature and of congress to the necessity of reforming the slave-laws of the District of Columbia. A free colored man, Gilbert Horton, of Somers, Westchester co., who had gone to Washington, was there arrested as a runaway and advertised by the sheriff to be sold as a fugitive slave, to pay his jail fees, unless previously claimed by his master. Jay called a public meeting, which demanded the interposition of Gov. DeWitt Clinton. This was promptly given, Horton was released, and a petition circulated for the abolition of slavery in the District. The New York assembly, by a vote of fifty-seven to thirty-nine, instructed their representatives in congress to vote for the measure. Pennsylvania passed a similar bill, and upon the memorial presented by Gen. Aaron Ward, the house of representatives, after a prolonged debate, referred the subject to a special committee. In 1828-'9 the debate was renewed in congress, and resolutions and petitions multiplied, from Maine to Tennessee.
Among Jay's writings at this time were essays on the Sabbath as a civil and divine institution, temperance, Sunday-schools, missionary and educational efforts, and an essay on duelling, to which,