John Jay (December 23, 1745 (December 12, 1745 OS) – May 17, 1829) was an American statesman, Patriot, diplomat, one of the Founding Fathers of the United States, signer of the Treaty of Paris, and first Chief Justice of the United States (1789–95).
Jay was born into a wealthy family of merchants and government officials in New York City. He became a lawyer and joined the New York Committee of Correspondence and organized opposition to British rule. He joined a conservative political faction that, fearing mob rule, sought to protect property rights and maintain the rule of law while resisting British violations of human rights.
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| John Jay |
Jay served as the President of the Continental Congress (1778–79), an honorific position with little power. During and after the American Revolution, Jay was Minister (Ambassador) to Spain, a negotiator of the Treaty of Paris by which Great Britain recognized American independence, and Secretary of Foreign Affairs, helping to fashion United States foreign policy. His major diplomatic achievement was to negotiate favorable trade terms with Great Britain in the Treaty of London of 1794.
Jay, a proponent of strong, centralized government, worked to ratify the U.S. Constitution in New York in 1788 by pseudonymously writing five of The Federalist Papers, along with the main authors Alexander Hamilton and James Madison. After the establishment of the U.S. government, Jay became the first Chief Justice of the United States, serving from 1789 to 1795.
As a leader of the new Federalist Party, Jay was the Governor of the State of New York (1795–1801), where he became the state's leading opponent of slavery. His first two attempts to end slavery in New York in 1777 and 1785 failed, but a third in 1799 succeeded. The 1799 Act, a gradual emancipation he signed into law, eventually granted all slaves in New York their freedom before his death in 1829.
Early life and education
Education
Jay spent his childhood in Rye. He was educated there by his mother until he was eight years old, when he was sent to New Rochelle to study under Anglican priest Pierre Stoupe.In 1756, after three years, he would return to homeschooling in Rye under the tutelage of his mother and George Murray.
In 1760, Jay attended King's College (later renamed Columbia College as the undergraduate college of Columbia University).During this time, Jay made many influential friends, including his closest, Robert Livingston—the son of a prominent New York aristocrat and Supreme Court justice.Jay took the same political stand as his father, a staunch Whig.In 1764 he graduated from King's College and became a law clerk for Benjamin Kissam (1728–1782), a prominent lawyer, politician, and sought after instructor in the law. In addition to Jay, his students included Lindley Murray.
Entrance into lawyering and politics
In 1768, after reading law and being admitted to the bar of New York, Jay, with the money from the government, established a legal practice and worked there until he created his own law office in 1771.[4] He was a member of the New York Committee of Correspondence in 1774 and became its secretary, which was his first public role in the revolution.
Jay represented the conservative faction that was interested in protecting property rights and in preserving the rule of law, while resisting what it regarded as British violations of American rights. This faction feared the prospect of "mob rule". He believed the British tax measures were wrong and thought Americans were morally and legally justified in resisting them, but as a delegate to the First Continental Congress in 1774,Jay sided with those who wanted conciliation with Parliament. Events such as the burning of Norfolk, Virginia, by British troops in January 1776 pushed Jay to support independence. With the outbreak of the American Revolutionary War, he worked tirelessly for the revolutionary cause and acted to suppress the Loyalists. Jay evolved into first a moderate, and then an ardent Patriot, because he had decided that all the colonies' efforts at reconciliation with Britain were fruitless and that the struggle for independence, which became the American Revolution, was inevitable.
Marriage and family
On April 28, 1774, Jay married Sarah Van Brugh Livingston, eldest daughter of the New Jersey Governor William Livingston and his wife. At the time of the marriage, Sarah was seventeen years old and John was twenty-eight.She accompanied Jay to Spain and later was with him in Paris, where they and their children resided with Benjamin Franklin at Passy.Jay's brother-in-law Henry Brock Livingston was lost at sea through the disappearance of the Continental Navy ship Saratoga during the Revolutionary War. While in Paris, as a diplomat to France, Jay's father died. This event forced extra responsibility onto John Jay. Jay's brother and sister Peter and Anna, both blinded by smallpox in childhood,became the diplomat's responsibility. John Jay's brother Augustus suffered from mental disabilities that required Jay to provide not only financial but emotional support. Jay's brother Fredrick was in constant financial trouble, causing John additional stress. Meanwhile, his brother James was in direct opposition in the political arena, joining the loyalist faction of the New York State Senate at the outbreak of the Revolutionary War, which made him an embarrassment to the John Jay family.
Jay family homes in Rye and Bedford
The life and legacy of John Jay and his descendants can be explored today at two of his homes, both located in Westchester County and each designated a National Historic Landmark.
From the age of three months old until he attended Kings College in 1760, John Jay was raised in Rye, on a farm acquired by his father Peter in 1745 that overlooked Long Island Sound.[18] After negotiating the Treaty of Paris that ended the Revolutionary War, Jay returned to his childhood home to celebrate with his family and friends in July, 1784.Jay inherited this property upon the death of his older brother Peter in 1813 after John had already established himself at Katonah. He conveyed the Rye property to his eldest son, Peter Augustus Jay, in 1822. This property remained in the Jay family through 1904.
What remains of the original 400-acre (1.6 km2) property is a 23-acre (93,000 m2) parcel called the Jay Estate, and the 1838 Peter Augustus Jay House, built by Peter Augustus Jay over the footprint of his father's original childhood home, "The Locusts."
Stewardship of the site and several of its buildings for educational use was entrusted in 1990 by the New York State Board of Regents to the Jay Heritage Center. In 2013, the non-profit Jay Heritage Center was also awarded stewardship and management of the site's landscape which includes a meadow and gardens
As an adult, John Jay inherited land from his grandparents and built Bedford House, located near Katonah, New York where he moved in 1801 with his wife Sarah to pursue retirement. This property passed down to their younger son William Jay and his descendants. It was acquired by New York State in 1958 and named "The John Jay Homestead." Today this 62 acre park is preserved as the John Jay Homestead State Historic Site.
Both homes in Rye and Katonah are open to the public for tours and programs.
Governor of New York
While in Britain, Jay was elected in May 1795, as the second governor of New York State (following George Clinton) as a Federalist. He resigned from the Supreme Court service on June 29, 1795, and served six years as governor until 1801.
As Governor, he received a proposal from Hamilton to gerrymander New York for the presidential election of that year;[when?] he marked the letter "Proposing a measure for party purposes which it would not become me to adopt", and filed it without replying.President John Adams then renominated him to the Supreme Court; the Senate quickly confirmed him, but he declined, citing his own poor health and the court's lack of "the energy, weight and dignity which are essential to its affording due support to the national government."
While governor, Jay ran in the 1796 presidential election, winning five electoral votes, and in the 1800 election, winning one vote.
Death
On the night of May 14, 1829, Jay was stricken with palsy, probably caused by a stroke. He lived for three days, dying in Bedford, New York, on May 17. Jay had chosen to be buried in Rye, where he lived as a boy. In 1807, he had transferred the remains of his wife Sarah Livingston and those of his colonial ancestors from the family vault in the Bowery in Manhattan to Rye, establishing a private cemetery. Today, the Jay Cemetery is an integral part of the Boston Post Road Historic District, adjacent to the historic Jay Estate. The Cemetery is maintained by the Jay descendants and closed to the public. It is the oldest active cemetery associated with a figure from the American Revolution.
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