Essay: George Read

Read’s mother was the daughter of a Welsh planter, and his Dublin-born  father was a landholder. George was born on September 18, 1733. Soon after George’s birth, which was located near the village of North East in Cecil County, Maryland, his family moved to New Castle, Delaware, where the youth, who was one of six sons, grew up. He attended school at Chester, Pennsylvania, and Rev. Francis Alison’s academy at New London, Pennsylvania, and about the age of 15 he began reading with a Philadelphia lawyer.
In 1753, George Read worked at a bar and began to practice.He traveled back to New Castle, hung out his shingle, and before long enlisted a clientele that extended into Maryland. During this period he resided in New Castle but maintained Stonum a country retreat near the city. In 1763, he married Gertrude Ross Till. She bore four sons and a daughter. Read, like most other people in Delaware, was very much in favor of trying to reconcile differences with Great Britain. He opposed the Stamp Act and other unfair Acts from Parliament but supported anti-importation measures and dignified protests. He was reluctant to pursue the option of outright independence.
In 1764, he led the Delaware Committee of Correspondence and was elected to serve along with McKean and Rodney in the First and Second Continental Congress from 1774 to 1777. He was frequently absent, and when the Congress voted on American Independence on July 2, 1776, Read surprised many people by voting against it. That meant that Rodney had to ride overnight to Philadelphia to break the deadlock in Delaware’s delegation for independence. However, when the Declaration of Independence was finally adopted, Read signed it.
In 1776 Read was called upon to join the Constitutional Convention in Delaware, where he served as president of the committee that drafted the document. In 1777 the British captured Delaware governor John McKinley and Read took over as governor in the emergency. He lead the state through the crisis of the war, raising money, troops, and supplies for the defense of his state.
The Legislative Council was created in 1776 and its Legislative Councilmen had a three-year term. State Assemblymen had a one-year term. The whole General Assembly chose the Continental Congressmen for a one-year term and the State President for a three-year term. However, Read served as State President only temporarily, filling the vacancy created by the resignation of Thomas McKean and awaiting the selection of a successor by the General Assembly. The Chief Justice of the state Supreme Court was also selected by the General Assembly for the life of the person appointed.
Read was then elected to the first Legislative Council of the Delaware General Assembly and was selected as the Speaker in both the 1776-77 and 1777-78 sessions. In the time of President John McKinley’s capture, George Read was in Philadelphia attending Congress. He had barely escaped when somebody was trying to capture him while he was going back home. He became President on October 20, 1777, serving until March 31, 1778. The British occupied Philadelphia and were in control of the Delaware River. Read tried to recruit additional soldiers and to protect the state from raiders from Philadelphia and off ships in the Delaware River, which failed. The Delaware General Assembly session of 1777-78 had to be moved to Dover, Delaware, for safety, and the Sussex County General Assembly delegation was never seated because disruptions at the polls had invalidated the election results.
After Rodney was elected to replace him as President, Read continued to serve in the Legislative Council until 1778–79. After a year of rest nursing ill health, he was elected to the House of Assembly for the 1780-81 and 1781-82 sessions. He returned to the Legislative Council in the 1782-83 session and served two terms until the 1787-88 session. On December 5, 1782, he was elected Judge of the Court of Appeals in Cases of Capture.
Read was again called to national service in 1786 when he represented Delaware at the Annapolis Convention. Because so few states were represented, this meeting produced only a report calling for next year’s Convention in Philadelphia.
Following the adoption of the US Constitution, the Delaware General Assembly elected Read as one of its two US Senators. His term began on March 4, 1789, and he was re-elected in 1791 but resigned on September 18, 1793. Read served with the Pro Administration Party majority in the 1st and 2nd Congress, under President Washington. He supported the assumption of state debts, establishment of a national bank, and the imposition of excise taxes. He resigned to accept an appointment as Chief Justice of the Delaware Supreme Court and served in that capacity until his death.
His manners were dignified, bordering upon austerity, but courteous, and at times captivating. He commanded entire confidence, not only from his profound legal knowledge, sound judgment, and impartial decisions, but from his severe integrity and the purity of his private character.” However, a fellow delegate to the Constitutional Convention of 1787 noted that “his legal abilities are said to be very great, but his powers of oratory are fatiguing and tiresome to the last degree; his voice is feeble and his articulation so bad that few can have patience to attend him.” Historians like John Monroe have generally recognized that all in all, Read was the dominating figure in Delaware politics during his career, directly or indirectly providing consistent and reliable leadership to the new state.
The General Assembly chose the U.S. Senators, who took office March 4 for a six year term. However, Read’s first term was only two years to establish a rotation.
His home, Stonum, is a historic landmark. On The Strand in New Castle is the house built by his son, George Read, II. It is owned by the Delaware Historical Society, restored and opened to the public. There is a school named for him in New Castle and a dorm at the University of Delaware.
It was said that tall, slightly and gracefully formed, with pleasing features and lustrous brown eyes. In 1779 he suffered a bout of poor health and had to retire from official duties. Read’s resignation from the Senate was before the first session of the 3rd Congress assembled, but it was not until February 7, 1795, four weeks before it adjourned, that Henry Latimer was elected to replace him. One of Delaware’s Senate seats was, therefore, vacant from September 18, 1793 until February 7, 1795. He recovered, however, and was appointed Judge in Court of Appeals in admiralty cases three years later. Read went on to be twice elected State Senator under the new constitution, and later still was appointed Chief Justice of the State of Delaware. He served in that office until his death in 1798.
Sites:
http://www.ushistory.org/declaration/signers/read.html
http://www.let.rug.nl/usa/biographies/george-read/
http://teachingamericanhistory.org/static/convention/delegates/read.html