[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 106 (Tuesday, June 27, 1995)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E1338-E1339]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


   A BRIEF HISTORY OF UNION COUNTY, NJ, RESIDENTS WHO HAVE SERVED IN 
                          CONGRESS, 1789-1808

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                            HON. BOB FRANKS

                             of new jersey

                    in the house of representatives

                         Tuesday, June 27, 1995
  Mr. FRANKS of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, as a Member of the House of 
Representatives from Union County, NJ, I recently became interested in 
my predecessors who represented my home county during Congress' early 
years. During the first two decades of our Nation's history, Union 
County sent five distinguished gentlemen to serve in Congress. For many 
of these men, like Abraham Clark, who signed the Declaration of 
Independence, and Jonathan Dayton, a signer of the U.S. Constitution, 
their service in Congress was but one of their many contributions to 
our Nation during its formative years. And although some of these men 
have been obscured by the passage of time, their accomplishments are 
remembered by many of my constituents, and still studied by scholars of 
this period.
  Before one can examine the Union County natives who served in the 
first 10 Congresses, a short primer on how Union County developed is 
appropriate. Although settlers from Europe had been living in Union 
County for nearly 200 years, Union County was not created by the State 
legislature until 1857. As New Jersey's youngest and second smallest 
county, Union County was originally part of its neighbor to the north, 
Essex County. In colonial times, what is now Union County was 
encompassed by the county's most populous community, Elizabethtown--now 
Elizabeth, and the county seat. Elizabeth, a port town, was founded in 
1665 by Sir George Carteret, who named the new settlement in honor of 
his wife, Lady Elizabeth.
  No sooner had the little village of Elizabeth been founded than 
settlers pushed outward onto the surrounding lands. As isolated farms 
were hewn from the forest, tiny hamlets developed, and new neighborhood 
names were born. Although these farms and small villages remained part 
of Elizabeth, they began to develop their own sense of identity and 
local concerns. By the end of the 18th century, division was 
inevitable. The first of the outlying areas to separate was 
Springfield, which was created by the State legislature in 1793. The 
next year Westfield incorporated, garnering its name because it was the 
``west field'' of Elizabeth. Then in close succession came Rahway in 
1804, Union in 1808, and my hometown of New Providence in 1809. The 
rest of Union County's 15 communities would grow out of these 6 towns. 
Elizabeth would continue to dominate the county politically, and would 
be home to most of the men Union County sent to the first Congresses.
  On March 4, 1789, amid much fanfare, the first session of the First 
Congress began. Unfortunately for the new government, a quorum to 
conduct business was not reached in the House until April 1, and in the 
Senate until April 4. One of the reasons for this absence of a quorum 
was the difficulty Members had in reaching New York City, the home of 
the new government. Travel was slow during this period, especially for 
Members from the Western States or those not near the coast or a river. 
The trip must have been an easy one for Elias Boudinot, however, Union
 County's first resident to serve in Congress. Representative Boudinot 
probably took a short ferry ride across Newark Bay, up the Kill van 
Kull, and finally across the Hudson River to reach Federal Hall, 
located on Manhattan's southern tip. It is interesting to note that 
prior to his trip to be sworn into the First Congress, Representative-
elect Boudinot entertained President-elect George Washington at Boxwood 
Hall, his two-story mansion in Elizabeth. President-elect Washington 
was also on his way to New York City, to be sworn in as our Nation's 
first chief executive.

  Although born in Philadelphia, Representative Boudinot lived and 
practiced law in Elizabeth when he was elected to the First Congress. A 
tall, dignified, and reportedly handsome man, Boudinot was both 
cautious in his temperament and conservative in his politics. His 
career before his congressional service was quite distinguished. He 
served in the Revolutionary Army, and was a Delegate to the Continental 
Congress in 1778. Delegate Boudinot would serve again in the 
Continental Congress from 1781 to 1783. During his tenure, Delegate 
Boudinot gained valuable experience by serving on over 30 committees. 
He also served as the Continental Congress' tenth president during 
1782-83, making him, in a de facto sense, New Jersey's first elected 
national leader. As my colleagues may be aware, under the Articles of 
Confederation, there was no executive branch, and hence, no chief 
executive. The Continental Congress, a unicameral legislature, ran the 
entire government. Furthermore, under the Articles, Delegate Boudinot's 
term was automatically abbreviated because the terms of Delegates to 
the Continental Congress were limited to 3 years.
  As a House member during the first three Congresses, Representative 
Boudinot fathered many essential measures and participated in 
practically all important debates. Boudinot led the defense of 
Hamilton's conduct of the Federal Treasury. He also was the first 
chairman of the Rules Committee, then a select committee that had the 
important task of formulating the first rules of the new body. During 
his tenure as chairman, Boudinot's leadership and experience from 
serving in the Continental Congress would prove invaluable to the First 
Congress.
  After the Third Congress, Representative Boudinot declined to run for 
reelection. In 1795, he accepted an appointment as director of the U.S. 
Mint. He moved to Philadelphia, and sold Boxwood Hall to his House 
colleague Jonathan Dayton. He served as director of the Mint until 
1805. Representative Boudinot died in 1821.
  In the Second Congress, Representative Boudinot was joined by another 
Elizabeth native, a slight, almost frail man named Abraham Clark. 
Representative Clark grew up on his family farm in a section of 
Elizabeth which is now present-day Roselle. Born in 1726, 
Representative Clark had a distinguished career and contributed much to 
the founding of our Nation. He hated aristocratic privilege in any form 
and was outspoken in his advocacy for independence from England, 
culminating in his signing the Declaration of Independence. Although 
not formally educated in the law, Representative Clark's zeal for 
giving free legal advice earned him the nickname of ``the Poor Man's 
Counsellor.''
  Because of his support for the American Revolution, he was chosen as 
a Delegate to the Continental Congress from 1776-78, and again from 
1780-83, and finally from 1786 until the Continental Congress largely 
disbanded in 1788. Delegate Clark was also chosen as a delegate to the 
Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia, but ill health--he suffered 
from poor health his entire life--prevented him from attending. He 
would go on to oppose adoption of the Federal Constitution until the 
Bill of Rights was added in 1791. Reelected to the Third Congress, 
Representative Clark's tenure in Congress was cut short by his death in 
1794 at age 69. In honor of his patriotism and many accomplishments, 
the future township of Clark, NJ, at the time a part of Rahway, was 
named for him.
  Also joining Representative Boudinot and Clark in the Second Congress 
was Jonathan Dayton of Elizabeth. Son of Elias Dayton, a Delegate to 
the Continental Congress, Representative Dayton was elected to the 
First Congress, but declined the office, preferring instead to become a 
member of the New Jersey council and later speaker of the New Jersey 
General Assembly. Born in 1760, he graduated from the College of New 
Jersey, now Princeton University, became a lawyer, and fought during 
the Revolutionary War, attaining the rank of captain. He was captured 
by the British in Elizabeth, but obtained his freedom in a prisoner 
exchange. In addition to his military service, he was also a delegate 
to the Federal Constitutional Convention, and had the honor of being 
the youngest signer, at 27, of the U.S. Constitution. interestingly, he 
was chosen to go to the Constitutional Convention after his father and 
Abraham Clark declined to travel to Philadelphia because of poor 
health.
  In the Third Congress, Representative Dayton became chairman of the 
House Committee on Elections, one of the first standing committees of 
the House. From that position, and because he was a loyal Federalist, 
Representative Dayton attained the Speakership during the Fourth and 
Fifth Congresses.
  As Speaker, Dayton has been described as being of ordinary ability, 
but of being personally popular, which helped temper the growing 
bellicose attitude of the House over the controversial Jay Treaty, 
which Dayton supported. He is also seen as an active Speaker compared 
with his predecessors, and as someone who used his position to 
influence other Members. He was also the first Speaker to speak out on 
issues before Congress when the House operated in the Committee of the 
Whole.
  During his time in the House, Representative Dayton argued in favor 
of having the secretaries of the Treasury and of War appear in the 
House, and for a larger regular army, rather than a militia. With 
Representative 

[[Page E 1339]]
Boudinot, he voted five times to uphold Hamilton financial policy. His 
first speech in the House was on his own motion to sequester British 
debts. He also took part in the debate supporting the Washington 
administration's position in the Whiskey Rebellion.
  As Speaker at the outset of the Adams administration in
   1797, Dayton increasingly found himself in the middle of 
Jeffersonian attacks on Hamilton's administration of the Treasury 
Department. This growing lack of comity reached a boiling point when 
Dayton had to break up a fight between Jeffersonian Republican Matthew 
Lyon of Vermont and stalwart Federalist Roger Griswold of Connecticut 
on the House floor after Lyon spit in Griswold's face over a political 
dispute.

  Dayton recognized that two noticeable factions in the Congress had 
developed. By 1800 these factions would be distinct political parties, 
called the Federalists and the Democrat-Republicans. In 1798, Speaker 
Dayton declined to run for the House again and instead ran and won a 
seat in the Senate as a Federalist candidate. Republican Dayton is 
still the only Speaker of the House ever from Union County.
  Although an active participant in the debates of the Senate, Dayton 
wielded considerably less influence than he had as Speaker. During his 
tenure in the upper body, Senator Dayton voted along Federalist party 
lines against the repeal of the Judiciary Act of 1801, and against the 
impeachment of Justice Samuel Chase. After a visit to New Orleans in 
1803, he favored the purchase of Louisiana, which was a Jefferson 
administration initiative. Dayton served one term in the Senate, from 
1799 to 1805.
  After leaving the Senate, Dayton was supposed to accompany President 
Jefferson's first Vice President and his childhood friend Aaron Burr on 
an expedition to the West, where Burr apparently intended to conquer 
Spanish land and create an empire. However, Senator Dayton became ill 
and was unable to make the arduous journey. Fortunately for Dayton, his 
absence from the trip may have saved him from a lengthy prison term as 
he was indicted for treason due to his perceived role in Burr's 
schemes. After spending a brief time in prison, he was released and 
spared the embarrassment of a public trial. However, the attendant 
publicity brought an end to his national political career. 
Nevertheless, the people of New Jersey still held him in high regard, 
and he went on to serve two terms in the New Jersey General Assembly 
beginning in 1814. He died in 1824 in the town of his birth, Elizabeth, 
soon after hosting a visit from Lafayette. The city of Dayton, OH was 
named for him--not for his political achievements, but because he was a 
member of a group of businessmen that invested in the area in 1796--and 
closer to my home, a regional high school in Springfield was named in 
his honor.
  Serving with Senator Dayton in the Sixth and Seventh Congresses was 
Aaron Ogden of Elizabeth. Senator Ogden, a Federalist, was elected to 
fill the vacancy caused by the resignation of James Schureman, who left 
the Senate to become the mayor of his hometown, New Brunswick. Born in 
1756, Senator Ogden was educated at Princeton University and served 
with great valor in the Revolutionary Army, attaining the rank of 
brigade major. After the Revolution, Senator Ogden became an 
outstanding lawyer and leader of the Federalist Party in New Jersey. 
His
 first political job was Essex County clerk, which he held from 1785-
1803, coinciding with his brief tenure in the Senate. He was also a 
presidential elector in 1796 for John Adams. In 1802, he ran for a full 
6-year Senate term, but was denied reelection. He went back to New 
Jersey and resumed his law practice, and capped his political career by 
serving as New Jersey's fifth governor.

  Before his death in 1839, Governor Ogden would make one more 
significant contribution to his Nation, not as a lawmaker, but as a 
defendant in a civil case. In the early 1820's, a dispute arose with 
Thomas Gibbons, his former partner in the steamship trade. This dispute 
resulted in the landmark Supreme Court case Gibbons versus Ogden 
(1824). In this case, which Ogden ultimately lost, Chief Justice John 
Marshall established important constitutional precedents concerning the 
Federal commerce clause and the supremacy clause's restraints on State 
power.
  In the Ninth Congress, with the retirement of Senator Dayton, Union 
County's only native in either body was freshman Congressman Erza Darby 
of Westfield. Born in 1768, Representative Darby was a farmer in what 
is now Scotch Plains. Unlike all of his predecessors from Union County, 
Representative Darby did not attend college, played either no or a 
minor role in the Revolutionary War--he was a young teenager when the 
War ended--and his highest office he ever achieved was his brief tenure 
in the House. Prior to his election as a Democrat-Republican to the 
House in 1804, he served as a freeholder, assessor, and justice of the 
peace, and a member of the New Jersey General Assembly for one term, 
1802-04. Re-elected to the Tenth Congress, Representative Darby died in 
office on January 28, 1808, and is interred at the Congressional 
Cemetery in Washington, DC.
  From the time of the First Congress to Erza Darby's death in 1808, 
the five men who Union County sent to Congress served an average of 6 
years. While unusual for this period, as turnover in Congress was 
usually 50 percent or more every election, this fact speaks to the 
stature and quality of these men. For the average House Member or 
Senator, however, this was an era when serving in Congress was 
generally done only for a short period of time. This was especially 
prevalent for southern members. One of the principal reasons for the 
relatively brief period of service during this time was the enormous 
burdens placed on Members of Congress. Depending on the occupation, a 
Member had to neglect his farm or his business to serve in Congress. 
Additionally, a Member's pay of $6 per day was paltry even by the 
standards of the day, the pay was not increased until 1860. 
Nevertheless, prominent men like Boudinot, Dayton, and Clark did choose 
to serve, probably out of a mix of devotion to their country, and the 
opportunity to enhance their reputation and stature back home.
  Mr. Speaker, Union County is extremely proud of its sons that it sent 
to Congress during this early period in our Nation's history. Union 
County is full of interesting history that can easily be relived by 
visiting the preserved homes of some of New Jersey's famous Congressman 
or Senators. For example, the public is welcome to visit Boxwood Hall 
in Elizabeth, home of Representative Boudinot and Senator Dayton, or 
the Abraham Clark House in Roselle, or the Belcher-Ogden Mansion home 
of Governors Ogden and Belcher in Elizabeth. These beautifully restored 
homes are for both the casual visitor or the serious historian. I urge 
my colleagues and all of my constituents, and especially my younger 
constituents, to discover Union County's proud heritage.


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