USA > Pennsylvania > Lives of the governors of Pennsylvania : with the incidental history of the state, from 1609 to 1873 > Part 23
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"Thus ended," says Dr. Rawle, "the checkered life of Thomas Mifflin - brilliant in its outset - troubled and per- plexed at a period more advanced - again distinguished, prosperous, and happy - finally clouded by poverty and op- pressed by creditors. In patriotic principle never changing -in public action never faltering - in personal friendship sincerely warm -in relieving the distressed always active and humane- in his own affairs improvident -in the busi- ness of others scrupulously just."
Thom. Rean
THOMAS MCKEAN,
GOVERNOR UNDER THE CONSTITUTION OF 1790, December 17, 1799, to December 20, 1808.
MTHE State of Delaware was originally a part of Pennsyl- 1 vania, and even after their legal severance the political relations which subsisted between them were intimate. Hence it was that Governor Dickinson represented both Colonies at successive periods in the Continental Congress, and was during the last years of his life a citizen of Wilming- ton, Delaware, though he was a portion of his time acting as Governor of both States. Governor Mckean, likewise, had accorded him a common citizenship -holding the highest offices in both States at one and the same time.
Thomas McKean was born on the 19th of March, 1734, in Londonderry, Chester County, Pennsylvania. He was the son of William and Lætitia (Finney) Mckean, both natives of Ireland. After receiving rudimentary instruction in the common branches, he was placed under the tuition of the Rev. Francis Allison, D. D., who acquired a great reputation as an educator and divine. Here young MeKean gained a good knowledge of the ancient languages, and of the several sciences which were deemed requisite for a liberal education, and at the conclusion of his course entered the office of his kinsman, David Finney, of Newcastle, Delaware, as a student at law. Not long after commencing his legal studies, he was engaged as clerk to the Prothonotary of the Court of Com- mon Pleas, where he had the opportunity of seeing the prac- tice of the profession, the theory of which he was now intently studying. Two years later he was made Deputy Prothono- tary, and Register for the Probate of Wills, for the County
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of Newcastle, in which position he carried the chief respon- sibility, the Prothonotary living for the most part on his estate eighty miles from the County-seat.
Before he had attained the age of twenty-one, such had been his industry, he was admitted to practice in the several County courts, and in the contiguous counties of Penn- sylvania. In 1756, he received, unsolicited, the appointment of Deputy Attorney-General, to prosecute the pleas of the Crown in the County of Sussex, which duties he performed with great acceptability for a period of two years, when he resigned.
In 1757, he was admitted to practice in the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, and in the same year was elected Clerk of the Assembly. He was re-elected for the succeeding session, after which he declined a further service. In 1762, he was appointed by the Assembly, in connection with Cæsar Rod- ney, to codify and print the laws of the State passed previous to the year 1752.
Having thus served a good apprenticeship to political life, by the discharge of some of its minor duties, and by labori- ous service in his profession, he in this year launched upon that stormy sea where, for half a century, with a stout heart and a steady hand, he braved its billows. In the October election he was chosen a representative to the General As- sembly from the County of New Castle, and was re-elected for seventeen successive years. For the last six years of this period he resided in Philadelphia, and though his constituents in Delaware were aware of his oft-expressed desire to be relieved, they continued to return him. Finally, on the day of the general election in 1779, he attended at New Castle, where he addressed them upon the questions of the day, both State and National, and concluded by declining to be con- sidered a candidate for re-election. Placing great confidence in his judgment and penetration, a committee of citizens im- mediately waited on him and requested that he would name seven persons whom he thought most suitable to represent the County in the Assembly. Realizing the delicacy of such
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a service, he at first refused to act; but upon the further so- licitation of the committee, after consultation with their asso- ciates, and upon their urgent appeal, he wrote the names of seven persons, every one of whom was almost unanimously elected.
Recognizing the importance to the prosperity of a young and rising State of extending credit to men of deserving character and promise, the States of Pennsylvania and Dela- ware had early established public loan-offices. They were the means of effecting vast good, and were at times of incal- culable advantage to the State Governments; enabling them to realize money in events of pressing need. In 1764, Mr. McKean was appointed, by an Act of the Legislature, one of the trustees of the loan-office for the County of New Castle, for the term of four years. The appointment was renewed in 1768, and 1772, extending thus through a period of twelve years.
In the Colonial Congress of 1765, commonly known as the Stamp Act Congress, which met in New York, Mr. Mckean was a member from Delaware. It was the least in territory of all the States; and had the votes been taken according to number of population represented, its influence would have been insignificant. Mr. McKean saw this, and at the outset insisted that each State should have one vote, giving all the States an equal voice. His influence prevailed. This was the beginning of that jealousy and struggle for power be- tween the small and large States, which has extended to this day, and which is likely to produce convulsions in the future. It was the most difficult question that was met in the Con- vention which framed the Constitution of the Union. A compromise was finally agreed upon, giving the small States an equal voice in the Senate, but in the House only propor- tionate to its population. In this convention Mr. McKean was a member of the Committee which drew the memorial to the Lords and Commons, and with Mr. Livingston and Mr. Rutledge, was charged by Congress to revise the minutes of the proceedings.
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One circumstance which occurred near the close of the session, so well illustrates the open, manly boldness with which he met every question, that it merits recital. It is given by the author of the sketch of Mr. McKean published in the Signers of the Declaration. "When the business was concluded," he says, " and on the last day of the session, the President, and some timid members, refused to sign the pro- ceedings. Mr. McKean then rose, and addressing himself personally to the President, remarked, that as he had not made a solitary objection to any of the measures which had been finally adopted, nor a single observation indicative of disapprobation, he requested that he would now assign his reasons for refusing to sign the petition. To this demand, the President replied that he did not conceive himself bound to state the cause of his objections. Mr. McKean rejoined that the gentlemen present had met together to endeavor to obtain the repeal of an unconstitutional and oppressive act of the British Parliament, and a redress of other grievances ; that as unanimity and harmony had hitherto prevailed among them, it appeared very extraordinary that any member should refuse to affix his name to what he had at least apparently approved, without any excuse, or observation, on the occa- sion; and that, if there was anything treasonable, offensive, or indecent, in their proceedings, he thought it would be an act of comity, nay of duty, to advise his brethren of it. Other delegates spoke briefly to the same purport. Thus pressed to an explanation, the President, after a long pause, observed that 'it was against his conscience.' Mr. McKean now rung the changes upon the word conscience so long and loud that a plain challenge was given and accepted, in the presence of the whole Congress; but the President departed from New York the next morning before the dawn of day." Robert Ogden, a delegate from New Jersey, also refused to sign. His conduct gave great offence to his constituents, and he was burned in effigy in several towns throughout the State.
The nerve and ability displayed by Mr. McKean as delegate
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to this Congress procured for him the warm approval of his constituents, and a unanimous vote of thanks from the As- sembly. It insured also his rapid rise in public preferment. In July, 1765, he was appointed by the Governor sole Notary and Tabellion Public for the lower Counties on the Delaware, and in the same year was commissioned a Justice of the Peace, and of the Court of Quarter Sessions, for the County of New Castle. It was at the period when the people of the Colonies were greatly excited over the paralyzing blow about to fall in the taking effect of the Stamp Act. By its terms all legal papers, to be of validity, must be executed upon stamped paper. McKean was upon the bench which boldly issued an order for all the officers of the court to proceed in their usual duties, using unstamped paper. This is declared to have been the first court in any of the Colonies which issued such an order.
The early settlements upon the Delaware having been made under the dominion of a government and courts sitting in New York, it became eventually very inconvenient to consult the original records. Accordingly the Assembly, in 1769, appointed him as its agent to proceed thither and make copies of all documents relating to the titles of real estate in the Province. These copies were by law made of equal validity with the original records, thus superseding all further necessity for appeal to them.
In 1771, he was appointed His Majesty's Commissioner of Customs and Collector of the Port of New Castle. But this office was of but limited duration; for the Crown, intent upon asserting the right to tax, imposed an insignificant one to establish the principle. At this the heart of America was aroused and beat in indignation. Tyranny was scented in the breeze, and the patriots in every Colony were in fre- quent correspondence upon the measures necessary to defeat the fell design. Among the foremost of these was Mr. McKean, and when delegates came to be appointed to the First Continental Congress, which sat at New York in 1774, he was selected to represent Delaware. A little previous
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to this he had taken up his permanent residence in Phila- delphia; but his old constituents in Delaware still claimed him as their own, and he accepted their choice, and through- out the whole period of the Revolution, and until after the signing of the treaty of peace, a space of eight and a half years, he continued to represent that State in the na- tional council, though residing in another. It is found upon examination that no other member of that august assemblage was a member continuously, from the opening till the closing act. During all this period he devoted himself to the sacred cause of his country, giving the strength of his mature man- hood to the discharge of the many duties thrown upon him, and proving himself a power in that body of unequalled men. He was particularly useful in conducting the negotiations of the secret committee charged with procuring arms and am- munition from abroad, and in managing the monetary affairs of the new nation, - two of the most important and difficult of the subjects with which Congress had to deal. IIe was of the committee which drew the Articles of Confederation that bound the Colonies together, and gave to Congress the little power which it was allowed to exercise.
The Declaration of Independence found no more active advocate, or firm supporter, than Mr. McKean. He believed that the time had fully come for adopting it, and he plead in private, as well as in public, with all the power of persuasion of which he was possessed, to draw those who thought the act premature to accord with him. Singularly enough, though he was one of the most active in securing its passage, and was present when the final votes were taken, affixing his signature to the instrument with the rest, yet in the printed journals of Congress, embracing this document, and in the acts of the several States, his name does not appear as one of the signers. In a letter addressed to Mr. Alexander J. Dallas, in answer to an inquiry made relative to this omission, Mr. McKean says: "My name is not in the printed journals of Con- gress as a party to the Declaration of Independence, and this, like an error in the first concoction, has vitiated most of the
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subsequent publications; and yet the fact is, that I was then a member of Congress for the State of Delaware, was person- ally present in Congress, voted in favor of independence on the 4th of July, 1776, and signed the Declaration after it had been engrossed on parchment, where my name in my own handwriting still appears." It is interesting to trace the manner in which this error has crept into the public records. It appears that on the 19th of July, two weeks after its pas- sage, Congress directed that a copy of the Declaration should be engrossed on parchment and signed by every member. This engrossed copy was finished, and on the 2d of August was produced and signed. But previous to this day, Mckean had obtained leave of absence, being then an officer of mili- tia, and for several weeks succeeding he was not in his place, he being absent on the 2d of August, the day on which the engrossed copy was signed. He returned to his place in October, and then affixed his name to that copy, as he had also to the original one on the 4th of July. It is probable, that in the mean time copies had been taken for publication as signed on the 2d of August, and before his signature was affixed. But his presence was too notorious to occasion any question as to the fact, even without his own testimony. When the preliminary vote was taken on the 2d of July, all the States declared in favor of it, except Pennsylvania and Delaware. The latter State had three members. Of these McKean voted for it, Read against it, and Rodney, the third, was absent. Seeing that the vote of his State was likely to be lost, McKean sent a messenger at his own expense, post- haste, to summon the absent member. He arrived in time to vote for the measure, thus carrying the State in its favor; and some of the opposing members of the Pennsylvania delegation absenting themselves, the vote was finally made unanimous.
Where his influence could be exercised for the furtherance of the cause of Independence, there was his voice heard and his hand felt. In a convention of deputies from the several counties of Pennsylvania, assembled in Carpenter's Hall, in
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Philadelphia, in June, 1776, he was chairman, and was a prime mover in securing the passage of resolutions favorable to, and urging the adoption of a Declaration. The regiment of associators, of which he was colonel, passed a similar resolu- tion. He was also chairman of the Committee of Safety of Pennsylvania, and of the Committee of Inspection for the City of Philadelphia.
Having uttered the word Independence, and pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honors to its support, Congress was impressed with the necessity of preparing to strike in defence of their resolves. Accordingly on the 5th of July, the day following that on which the Declaration was adopted, it was agreed between a Committee of Congress and a Committee of Safety of Pennsylvania, that the associated militia, who could be furnished with arms, should proceed without delay to New Jersey, there to remain until a flying camp of ten thousand men could be formed to relieve them. McKean was colonel of one of these regiments, and promptly marched at its head to Perth Amboy, to the support of Washington. The lines of the enemy were about six hun- dred yards distant. On one occasion several of their shallops were discovered sailing along the opposite shore in the direction of their ships. McKean received orders to have his men in readiness to march at a moment's warning, and they were called to arms. In a letter, written a few days later from camp, he thus describes the event which followed: "I left them," he says, " under Lieutenant-Colonel Dean, to be marched to town, whilst I mounted my horse, and waited on the General for orders. On the road, which is a straight and wide lane, (something like Market Street,) all the way from the camp to the sound, and in a line with the enemy's batteries, about twenty cannon-balls flew close to me, some- times on the one side, sometimes on the other, and some just over my head. I confess I was not a little alarmed, being the first time that I had ever heard a cannon-ball, but clapped spurs to my horse, and rode on amidst the balls for the General's, where orders had just been issued to halt the
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battalion. I was going to execute them, when, on turning round, I saw a horse shot through the neck with a four- pounder within much less distance than the width of Market Street from me. The fire was so incessant, and so direct on the street that I had to return, that some gentlemen en- treated me to wait a short time; but, as the troops under my care were in full march, and Colonel Miles' battalion close behind them, I thought it my duty to stop them, as some of them otherwise would probably be killed without a chance of effecting any beneficial service. On my return I found the fire hotter than before, the enemy then playing from three batteries of three or four guns each; but, through God's favor, I escaped unhurt, and marched the troops to the camp."
As had been previously arranged, as soon as the flying camp was recruited, it took the place of the Associators, and they returned home, McKean resuming his seat in Congress, and affixing his name to the parchment-copy of the Declara- tion which had been generally signed on the 2d of August during his absence in camp. But new cares awaited him. " He found upon his return," says the biographer above quoted, " that he had been elected a member of the Conven- tion for forming a constitution for the State of Delaware. He accordingly departed for Dover on the second day after arriving home. Immediately on his arrival, after a fatiguing ride, a committee of gentlemen waited on him, and requested that he would prepare a constitution for the future Govern ment of the State. To this he consented. He retired to his room in the tavern, sat up all night, and having prepared it without a book or any assistance whatever, presented it at ten o'clock next morning to the House, when it was unanimously adopted." Had a feat like this been performed in the ages of antiquity, it would have been heralded as having been done with the aid of some god, or the favored one would himself have been deified.
The manifestation of ability to perform herculean labors, brought him an endless variety of public employments, and
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these not confined to one State. Early in August, 1777, he was tendered the office of Chief-Justice of Pennsylvania. His friends urged his acceptance. "Upon the whole," he says, in a letter to John Dickinson, " to prevent the least suspicion that I was against any government but such as I framed myself, and that I wanted to embroil the State, and occasion disaffection to the common cause, which had been liberally propagated, and to evidence that I had nothing in view but to promote the happiness of my country, I thought it my duty (though manifestly against my interest) to imitate the great Lord Hale, when pressed to the like by Cromwell, and was for the same, and better reasons, prevailed with to accept it." The duties of the office which he thus entered upon, he continued to fulfil for the long period of twenty- two years. He was during the same year chosen President of the State of Delaware, so that, in addition to being a member of Congress and Chief Justice of Pennsylvania, he was at the same time the chief magistrate of another common- wealth. The British army was now occupying Philadelphia ; and to discharge the several duties thus imposed, and elude the vigilance of the enemy, required the most untiring cir- cumspection. In a letter to John Adams, written some time afterwards, he says : " I have had my full share of the anxie- ties, cares, and troubles of the present war. For some time I was obliged to act as President of the Delaware State, and as Chief Justice of this. General Howe had just landed (August, 1777,) at the head of Elk River, when I undertook to discharge these two important trusts. The consequence was to be hunted like a fox by the enemy, and envied by those who ought to have been my friends. I was compelled to move my family five times in a few months, and at last fixed them in a little log-house on the banks of the Susque- hanna, more than a hundred miles from this place; but safety was not to be found there, for they were soon obliged to remove again on account of the incursions of the In- dians."
On the 25th of December, 1780, he addressed a letter to
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the Legislature of Delaware, expressing his "ardent wish" that they would excuse him from further attendance as their delegate in Congress, and that they would elect some person to succeed him. Or, if they desired that he should continue to represent them, that they would appoint some one to oc- cupy his place while he was absent upon the Supreme Court Circuit of Pennsylvania, and to allow him some relaxation from excessive toil at other times, when needed. He pleaded his inability to perform so many duties to his satisfaction, and that the rank he was obliged to maintain was such that his income from all his offices was insufficient. This request was not acceded to, and he continued to represent the State, though the complaint of lack of salary failed to have its effect; for during two years, 1779 and 1780, he received nothing whatever for his services.
The effort to be relieved of his Congressional labors, instead of resulting in his discharge, was followed by an increase of its burdens; for on the 10th of July, 1781, he was elected President of Congress. The duties of this position he continued to discharge until near the close of October, when, the time having arrived for the opening of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, he communicated to Congress his resignation as President. He was, however, prevailed upon to continue to preside until the 1st of November, when he was released, and John Hanson was elected to succeed him.
The period during which Mckean exercised the functions of Chief Justice, was one of the most important and trying in the whole course of jurisprudence in the Commonwealth. It was at the time when the laws were unsettled, even the constitutions of States undefined, and national existence it- self was in question. The country was in the midst of a revolution when he came to the Bench, and for several years the civil was necessarily subordinate to military rule. Hence the interpretation of organic and statute law had to be made de novo, precedents had to be established, and the whole practice of the Courts adapted to the changed relations which existed. The causes which were brought in his Court were
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many of them peculiar to a period of war and conquest, causes involving the most delicate questions, vital alike to the rights of the subject, and the vindication of justice. Trials for high treason, for attainder, for the confiscation of property, were frequent. A case, rarely transcended in importance and amount involved in any nation or in any age, was the for- feiture of the Proprietary possessions. The rulings of the Chief Justice throughout all this trying period, and in these difficult causes, were marked by great prudence and wisdom. " Chief-Justice MeKean," says a late judge of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, " was a great man ; his merit in the profession of the law, and as a judge, has never been suffi- ciently appreciated. It is only since I have been upon the Bench that I have been able to conceive a just idea of the greatness of his merit. His legal learning was profound and accurate, but, in the words of the poet,-
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The lucidity of his explication, and the perspicuity of his language, which is the first excellence in the communication of ideas, was perfect; but I never saw equalled his dignity of manner, in delivering a charge to a jury, or on a law argument to the Bar. But, what is still more, his compre- hension of mind in taking notes, so as to embrace the sub- stance, yet omit nothing material, has appeared to me in- imitable."
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