Signing Their Rights Away Page 11

  In his later years, Bassett lived happily on his vast estate. He hosted Methodist camp meetings, entertained countless guests, and indulged a passion for philanthropy. But a series of strokes left him increasingly weak and helpless. He died in 1815, at the age of seventy, although this signer’s descendants served in Congress well into the twentieth century.

  The Invisible Signer

  BORN: 1752

  DIED: April 25, 1810

  AGE AT SIGNING: About 35

  PROFESSION: Surveyor, farmer, businessman

  BURIED: Christ Church, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

  Jacob Broom is so obscure …

  How obscure is he?

  He’s so obscure, we’re not even sure what he looks like. Good luck trying to find him in Howard Chandler Christy’s famous 1940 mural Scene at the Signing of the Constitution of the United States; in that painting, Broom’s face is blocked by the head of fellow signer John Dickinson. Other books on the signers show Broom’s face in dark silhouette or merely replaced by an artful question mark. A verified image of him has never been found, and so he’s the only signer whose looks are a mystery.

  Luckily, what Broom accomplished is not in question, though history hasn’t always done justice to this small-state signer with a big heart. He may not have spoken often, but in one memorable moment he prevented the entire convention from shutting down. Without his bold actions, the Constitution might not exist.

  Broom was born in Wilmington, Delaware, the only Constitution signer to be born in the First State. Believed to be descended from the royal Plantagenet family in England—Plantagenet means “broom-plant”—Broom was the son of a blacksmith-turned-farmer and a Quaker mother. Though not tremendously wealthy, the family did have land holdings, silver, and gold; they were solidly gentry. Broom was schooled at home and at the Wilmington Old Academy. He studied surveying and became a merchant and land dealer. He married Rachel Pierce in 1773, and the couple had eight children.

  Broom was less active in politics than many of his cosigners, but he was a successful businessman and dabbled in the local politics of Wilmington, his hometown. He was a justice of the peace (which, at the time, didn’t require a law degree) and a borough assessor. He was also an assistant burgess, an elected representative of the people six times over, and went on to be chief burgess, a post he held four times.

  Broom put his surveying talents to use for General George Washington, drawing maps used during the 1777 battle of Brandywine Creek in Pennsylvania. The two men developed an appreciation for each other. After the American Revolution ended in victory, Washington arrived in Wilmington to a hero’s reception—there was a thirteen-gun salute, an extravagant meal, and an impassioned speech from Broom: “Your glorious endeavors to rescue our country from a determined plan of oppression have been not only attended with the most brilliant success, but crowned with the noble rewards of liberty, independence, and the final accomplishment of an honorable peace.” He also encouraged Washington, “that with a parental consideration, your excellency will occasionally contribute your advice and influence to promote the harmony and union of our infant governments which are so essential to the permanent establishment of our freedom, happiness, and prosperity.”

  Broom’s brief stint in state and national office began in 1784, when he was elected to the Delaware legislature. He served three terms. He was chosen to go to the Annapolis Convention but did not attend. However, he was present for the opening session of the Constitutional Convention, on May 25, 1787, and voted to elect Washington as convention president.

  Broom was not especially talkative during the debates. He reportedly suggested Wilmington as the future capital of the United States, an idea that went nowhere. He seconded fellow Delaware delegate George Read’s motion for nine-year senate terms and believed national legislators should be paid by Congress. He supported the idea that a president should be chosen by electors appointed by the state legislature, rather than by the people themselves, and he felt the president should serve for life, as long as he behaved himself. He was not afraid of giving power to a strong national government and agreed with South Carolinian Charles Pinckney that Congress should have the power to veto legislation passed by a state, if it saw fit.

  On those few occasions when Broom did speak up, his words were delivered with plenty of conviction. As a representative of the smallest state, he agreed that if representation in the House was going to be based on population, then everyone should have an equal voice in the Senate. This, he said to his fellow delegates, “could not be denied after this concession of the small States as to the first branch.”

  By July 16, the battle over representation in Congress was coming to a head. Talk of an adjournment sine die—meaning indefinitely—appeared likely. Everyone feared that an indefinite adjournment would mean the delegates would leave the talks and never return.

  But then, out of the thick and steamy Philadelphia summer heat, rose the usually quiet Jacob Broom. Sine die was not an option. It would be disastrous. He pleaded with his fellow delegates that “something must be done by the Convention, though it should be by a bare majority.”

  Jaws dropped. Who was this little broom-plant to speak so passionately?

  But somehow the plea worked. Congress agreed to adjourn not indefinitely, but only until the next day, at which point they would continue to hammer out the details. The convention—and the Constitution—was saved. If news of his valiant effort had been circulated more widely among local artists, perhaps we’d have a portrait of Broom today. Alas, no such luck.

  Broom returned to local politics and was active in Wilmington for the remainder of his years. He helped found the town’s first library in 1787. Washington appointed him first postmaster of Wilmington in 1790, and he worked as head of the water, sewer, and street departments. He was a seventeen-year trustee in the Wilmington Academy, which became the College of Wilmington. He was a lay leader active in the Old Swedes Church and served as director of the board of the Bank of Delaware and the Wilmington Bridge Company, which constructed, among other things, a toll bridge. If only Broom could see tiny Delaware now! How he would marvel at the four American dollars required to travel from Wilmington to the Maryland state line—a distance of a mere thirty miles.

  And Broom still found time for his business pursuits. In 1795, he opened the first cotton mill in that part of the country and, two years later, built an even larger one along the Brandywine River, which later burned down. It took several years before he rebuilt it, and he eventually sold the land, which was equipped with a dam and a millrace, to Eleuthère Irénée du Pont. The property became a part of the massive du Pont empire. Today, the area is a national historic site in Wilmington, and visitors may tour Hagley Museum and Library, which celebrates American industrial history and enterprise from the eighteenth century to the present. Jacob Broom’s house is located nearby, not far from the original cotton mill. It is a private residence.

  Broom died at age fifty-eight in Philadelphia and is buried in Christ Church Burial Ground. Yet even posthumously he continued his contributions to society; he left money to the Female Benevolent Society, which served women in need, and the Wilmington Association for Promoting the Education of People of Color, a school established to educate black children.

  VIII. Maryland

  The Signer Immortalized by the Star-Spangled Banner

  BORN: November 16, 1753

  DIED: May 3, 1816

  AGE AT SIGNING: 33

  PROFESSION: Merchant, doctor

  BURIED: Westminster Hall Burying Ground, Baltimore, Maryland

  Many Americans know the story of the Star-Spangled Banner, the flag that flew high over Fort McHenry, in the Chesapeake Bay, during the War of 1812. The bombs burst, the rockets glared, and in the end the flag was still there. Although it’s a powerful tale, few people can identify the namesake of that famous fort. He is James McHenry, an Irish immigrant signer of the Constitution who reached the upper echelons of the new Am
erican government—only to be booted out of office by a jealous and paranoid president.

  McHenry was born in what is now Northern Ireland. In 1771, his wealthy merchant parents sent him to America, where he studied medicine with Benjamin Rush, the famous physician and signer of the Declaration of Independence. McHenry’s flowery descriptions of his new homeland persuaded his parents to send his brother to the colonies as well. Later, the whole family joined them and opened a prosperous store in Baltimore. While in his early twenties, McHenry took part in the fighting during the Revolutionary War, serving as an army sawbones. He was captured by the British in New York, ministered to American troops while in confinement, and was later released on parole; he was allowed to return home to his parents’ store under the condition that he take no further action on the American side. He obeyed this regulation until 1778, when he was “freed” in a prisoner exchange. He immediately went back to war, ministering to troops at Valley Forge and performing the duties of an aide-de-camp under Washington and the Marquis de Lafayette. During this time he became bosom buddies with Alexander Hamilton, who led troops under Lafayette’s command.

  Chosen by Maryland to serve in the state legislature, McHenry waited until the British surrendered at Yorktown before resigning his post and heading to Annapolis. He served there and in Congress for a few years. He also gave up medicine forever, thanks to a healthy inheritance from his father, who died in 1782. Now financially independent, McHenry took up poetry and sent his work to friends and loved ones, including a woman named Peggy Caldwell, whom he married in 1784.

  Sent by his state to the Constitutional Convention, McHenry intended to be present for all the sessions, but in fact he was absent between June 1 and August 4 to tend to his sick brother in Baltimore. When he was in attendance at the debates, he took copious personal notes, which have provided historians with insight into the process and worldview of this earnest but lightweight politician. In his own notes William Pierce, the Georgia delegate, took jabs at McHenry: “He is a Man of specious [talents], with nothing of genius to improve them. As a politician there is nothing remarkable in him, nor has he any of the graces of the Orator.”

  Now, admittedly, McHenry tried to sit on the fence during the debates, which was problematic because the five delegates from Maryland were often split philosophically. (Only three would ultimately sign the document.) When McHenry was in attendance and voting, he was usually able to throw this swing state into the nationalist—that is, big government—camp. After signing the Constitution in September, McHenry tried to justify his actions in his journal, in which he comes off like a bewildered, nervous little man who knows he’s out of his league. “I distrust my own judgment,” he confessed, “especially as it is opposite to the opinion of a majority of gentlemen whose abilities and patriotism are of first cast; and as I have already frequent occasions to be convinced that I have not always judged right.” Determined to give the Constitution the push it needed, he returned to Maryland and persuaded his fellow citizens to accept it. They did, and Maryland became the seventh state to ratify.

  McHenry worked another eight years in state politics and no doubt would have lapsed into obscurity if not for his old commander, George Washington. Now president for a second term, Washington was casting about for a secretary of war. Three men turned him down before he hit upon asking his old administrative officer, McHenry. The Baltimore sawbones-turned-shopkeeper-turned-statesman took the job in 1796. He presided over many important new tasks, including, among others, enlarging the army and navy under the new Constitution, ordering construction of warships, and raising money to construct the star-shaped fort in Baltimore’s port that would be named in his honor.

  But McHenry often seemed to be floundering under a morass of paperwork. He relied on his old friend Hamilton for advice and sometimes parroted Hamilton’s ideas directly in reports. His leadership was so incompetent that eventually even Hamilton—who never shied away from giving offense—complained to Washington: “My friend McHenry is wholly inefficient for his place, with the additional misfortune of not having the least suspicion of the fact.” The old general’s response must have shocked Hamilton: “I early discovered, after he entered upon the duties of his office, that his talents were unequal to great exertions, or deep resources. In truth, they were not expected, for the fact is, it was a Hobson’s choice.”

  The stilted language of the eighteenth century might blunt the impact of this statement, so allow us to paraphrase: the man running the defense of these young United States, hand-picked by George Washington, was, by the general’s own admission, an inept Hobson’s choice, or a free choice in which only one option is offered.

  Of course, then as now, political posts were sometimes rewards for loyalty, and Washington did display a tendency to repay his friends and former aides with high-paying jobs—but this kind of cronyism seems extreme. Incredibly, McHenry continued to serve in the same position under the next president, John Adams (most likely because there was no precedent for changing cabinets; Adams may have disliked Washington’s staff, but he was stuck with them).

  But when Adams lost the election of 1800 to Thomas Jefferson, the chief executive summoned McHenry to his office and asked for his resignation. McHenry was bowled over by the verbal insults; he would later write that Adams often spoke as if he were “actually insane.” His dismissal is usually portrayed as unjustified, but some historians argue that McHenry truly was disloyal to Adams and had worked to sabotage his campaign.

  No matter. McHenry had his life—and his writing—to return to. Now forty-six, he slunk back into private life at his country estate outside Baltimore, wrote poetry, socialized with friends, worked for his local Bible society, and in general stayed out of the limelight. Despite his association with the War of 1812, he bitterly opposed it, as did most Federalists. In a remarkable coincidence, his son fought at Fort McHenry during the same battle at which the national anthem was written. In the last years of his life, McHenry was struck with paralysis and could no longer walk. He died in 1816, at age sixty-two, and is buried in the same cemetery as Edgar Allan Poe.

  The Signer with the Mysterious Middle Name

  BORN: 1723

  DIED: November 16, 1790

  AGE AT SIGNING: About 64

  PROFESSION: Landowner, administrator

  BURIED: Location unknown; somewhere near Port Tobacco, Maryland

  In an era before driver’s licenses and social security numbers, the only way for people to establish their identity was to use their name and the place in which they were born or lived. For example, when one wealthy signer of the Declaration of Independence put his pen to that document, he used his name and the name of his estate: “Charles Carroll of Carrollton.” It was his way of distinguishing himself from all the other Charleses in his family.

  The remarkable thing about Daniel of St. Thomas Jenifer is that no one really knows why his parents, Daniel and Elizabeth Jenifer, decided to use the name St. Thomas. The family was living near Port Tobacco, Maryland, when their son was born, and they seemed intent on distinguishing him from current and future Daniels in the family (though they named a later son plain-old Daniel, causing untold grief and frustration for scores of genealogists and historians). Back then, people couldn’t be certain that an infant would survive to adulthood, so they sometimes hedged their bets by giving babies in the same family the same name. This was especially important if a wealthy male child needed to have a specific name in order to come into his inheritance.

  But why St. Thomas? Some historians believe this founding father was named after a local church. That’s a nice thought, but the church in question was run by Catholic Jesuits, and the Jenifers raised their son in the Episcopalian faith. Others claim a Jenifer ancestor traveled through St. Thomas, in the West Indies, on his way to Maryland. Another theory holds that the Jenifer family originated on St. Thomas Island, off the coast of Cornwall, England. Nobody knows for sure.

  Moreover, details of Jenifer’s ear
ly years and training are sparse. As a young man, he spent his time managing his father’s plantations in Charles County, Maryland. An able administrator, he branched out to work as a top “receiver general,” or tax and bill collector, for the last two proprietors in Maryland. The colony had been settled by wealthy landowners who ran it like a commercial enterprise; there were no towns, cities, or local government. Basically, the proprietors (who often never set foot in America) ran their own private kingdoms and promised a cut to the English king. For these last few holdouts, Jenifer settled boundary disputes, collected rents, and paid taxes on their behalf. He did a good job, and the colonists liked him enough to give him a number of important posts. He was a justice of the peace, worked on the committee that established the Mason-Dixon Line, and became a top advisor to the last royal governor of Maryland, Sir Robert Eden.

  But by 1775, when Sir Eden was ousted by patriots, Jenifer had joined the revolutionary cause and began working in Maryland’s new state senate. He was assigned to Congress as well, but most of his work during the Revolutionary War exploited his talents in land management. If Maryland patriots seized a loyalist property, Jenifer managed the fallout, selling off the confiscated land and possessions, issuing the paperwork spelling out the new chain of ownership, and thus building revenue for the struggling new state. From 1782 onward, as de facto treasurer, he was one of the most powerful and best-paid office holders in the state. He wasn’t among the first picks to attend the Constitutional Convention in 1787, but, after one of the four candidates backed out, Jenifer was packing his bags and heading to Philadelphia.