Biography of EDWARD LIVINGSTON
LIVINGSTON, Edward, statesman, was born in Clermont, NY, 26 May 1764; son of
Robert R. and Margaret (Beekman) Livingston, and grandson of Col. Henry and
Janet (Livingston) Beckman. He was graduated at the College of New Jersey,
A.B., 1781, A.M., 1784; studied law with John Lansing in Albany, N.Y., and
with his brother, Robert R. Livingston, in New York city, and was admitted to
the bar in 1785. He was a representative from New York in the 4th, 5th and
6th Congresses, 1795-1801, when he opposed the administration of President
Washington, and instigated the investigation and proposed the resolution
calling upon the President for a copy of the instructions given to John Jay in
reference to the treaty with Great Britain. The resolution was adopted in the
House by a vote of 62 to 37, but the copy of the instructions was withheld by
the President on the advice of his cabinet. In the fourth presidential
election when the tie vote between Jefferson and Burr threw the election in
the House, he voted for Jefferson, and when his term expired as representative
in Congress, 3 March 1801, he was selected by President Jefferson as U.S.
Attorney for the district of New York, and Governor Clinton in August 1801,
made him Mayor of New York City. In 1803 he laid the corner stone of the city
hall and during the same year he rendered conspicuous service in the yellow
fever epidemic. In his visits to the sufferers he contracted the disease, and
after his recovery found that his affairs had been so badly conducted by his
business agent as to cause a deficit of $43,666.21, for which he was
responsible to the government. He resigned both his offices, confessed
judgment to the amount of $100,000 and gave up his property to cover the
loss. He left New York for New Orleans in December 1808, reaching that city
in February 1804, where he opened a law office and also engaged in land
speculation, his fees being mostly paid in land. He prepared a new code of
procedure that was adopted by the legislature in 1805 and remained in force
till 1825, when his revised code was adopted. He gained the ill-will of
President Madison by favoring the scheme of Burr and of General James
Wilkinson for the conquest of Mexico and by defending its projectors in the
courts. He became the legal adviser of the Lafittes, said to be connected
with smugglers, and when they gave timely notice of the designs of the British
against New Orleans, he was the first to give credence to their report and his
faith in their truthfulness was shown by his entrusting his wife and child to
the care of Pierre Lafitte during the battle of New Orleans. He was the
President of the Committee of Public Defense, drew up the resolutions, and
aroused the people of the state to a sense of their danger. He was the right
hand of General Jackson in his preparations for the attack by General
Pakenham; served on General Jackson's staff before and during the battle and
drew up the address to the army. He was elected a representative in the
Louisiana State Legislature in 1820, and was a representative from the New
Orleans district in the 18th, 19th and 20th Congresses, 1823-29; and a U.S.
Senator from Louisiana from 7 December 1829, till the close of the 21st
Congress, 3 March 1831, when he resigned to accept the portfolio of state in
the cabinet of President Jackson, made vacant by the resignation of Martin Van
Buren. The state papers of Jackson's administration and the nullification
proclamation of 10 December 1832, were credited to his pen. He resigned from
the cabinet in 1833 to accept the mission to France, and while there he
accomplished the settlement of the French spoilation claims. In 1835 he
returned to the United States, leaving his son-in-law, T. P. Barton, as
chargé d'affaires. In 1836 he appeared before the U.S. Supreme Court
at Washington, where he argued the claims of the city of New Orleans against
the U.S. government. He was bequeathed by his sister Janet, widow of General
Richard Montgomery, the "Montgomery Place," above Barrytown on the Hudson
river, N.Y., and on his return from France he made his home there. He was
married first, 10 April 1788, to Mary, oldest daughter of Charles McEvers, a
New York merchant; she died, 13 March 1801, and in 1805 he married Madame
Louisa (D'Avezac) Moreau, sister of Major D'Avezac, aide-de-camp to General
Jackson. At the time of this second marriage she was only nineteen years of
age, and unable to speak English. They had one daughter, Cora, who became the
wife of Thomas P. Barton, of Philadelphia, who accompanied his father-in-law
to Paris as Secretary of Legation. Edward Livingston received the honorary
degree of LL.D. from Columbia in 1823, from Transylvania University in 1824
and from Harvard in 1834. He was a corresponding member of the Institut de
France; a member of the American Philosophical Society, and a trustee of
Columbia College, 1793-1806. His name was one of the eleven in "Class J,
Judges and Lawyers," submitted, October, 1900, for a place in the Hall of Fame
for Great Americans, New York University, and received seventeen votes, the
class standing in order of preferment: Marshall, Kent, Story, Choate and
Livingston. He is the author of: Judicial Opinions, Mayor's Court, City of
New York, 1802 (1803); Report of the Plan of the Penal Code of Louisiana
(1822); System of Penal Law for the State of Louisiana (1826); System of Penal
Law for the United States (1828). These were published as Complete Works on
Criminal Jurisprudence (1873). See Life by Charles H. Hunt (1864), and
Recollections by Augusta D'Avezac in the Democratic Review (1840). He died at
Montgomery Place, Barrytown, Dutchess county, NY, 23 May 1836.
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