George Wythe was an American lawyer, a judge, a prominent law professor and "
VirginiaThe Commonwealth of Virginia , is a U.S. state on the Atlantic Coast of the Southern United States. Virginia is nicknamed the "Old Dominion" and sometimes the "Mother of Presidents" after the eight U.S. presidents born there...
's foremost classical scholar." He was a teacher and mentor of
Thomas JeffersonThomas Jefferson was the principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence and the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom , the third President of the United States and founder of the University of Virginia...
. Wythe's signature is positioned at the head of the list of seven Virginia signatories on the
United States Declaration of IndependenceThe Declaration of Independence was a statement adopted by the Continental Congress on July 4, 1776, which announced that the thirteen American colonies then at war with Great Britain regarded themselves as independent states, and no longer a part of the British Empire. John Adams put forth a...
. Wythe served as a representative of Virginia and a delegate to the
Constitutional ConventionThe Constitutional Convention took place from May 14 to September 17, 1787, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to address problems in governing the United States of America, which had been operating under the Articles of Confederation following independence from...
—though he left the Convention early and did not sign the final version of the Constitution.
Wythe is believed to have been murdered in June 1806 by
arsenicArsenic is a chemical element with the symbol As, atomic number 33 and relative atomic mass 74.92. Arsenic occurs in many minerals, usually in conjunction with sulfur and metals, and also as a pure elemental crystal. It was first documented by Albertus Magnus in 1250.Arsenic is a metalloid...
poisoning by his grandnephew
George Wythe SweeneyThe George Sweeney Trial in 1806 in Richmond, Virginia was a trial in which George Sweeney, the grand-nephew of George Wythe, one of the founding fathers of the United States, was acquitted of murdering Wythe. Wythe was a distinguished attorney who attended the Philadelphia Convention in 1775 and...
. He was likely targeting Lydia Broadnax, Wythe's housekeeper, and Michael Brown, a 16-year-old mixed-race boy who lived in the household, to whom Wythe had made bequests in his will. Brown died a week before Wythe but Broadnax survived. As blacks were prevented by law from testifying at trials against whites, Broadnax and other servants could not tell about having seen Sweeney's suspicious actions, and he was acquitted.
Some historians have suggested that Broadnax was Wythe's concubine, or common-law wife, and Brown their son, but
Philip D. MorganPhilip D. Morgan is a British-American historian. He has specialized in Early Modern colonial British America, and slavery in the Americas...
disagrees and suggests Brown was not related to either Broadnax or Wythe.
Early life and education
Wythe was born in 1726 in
Hampton, VirginiaHampton is an independent city that is not part of any county in Southeast Virginia. Its population is 137,436. As one of the seven major cities that compose the Hampton Roads metropolitan area, it is on the southeastern end of the Virginia Peninsula. Located on the Hampton Roads Beltway, it hosts...
. His mother, a learned woman, had taught him at home, and started Wythe on extensive study. After the early deaths of both his parents, Wythe lost his way for a while, but had the benefit of a patrimony from his father.
Career
At about age 30, Wythe started "reading the law" with John Lewis, and was admitted to the bar. He made law and learning his life.
In turn, Wythe later had numerous students assist in his law office, including
Thomas JeffersonThomas Jefferson was the principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence and the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom , the third President of the United States and founder of the University of Virginia...
, his law clerk for five years;
Henry ClayHenry Clay, Sr. , was a lawyer, politician and skilled orator who represented Kentucky separately in both the Senate and in the House of Representatives...
, and John Breckinridge. Of these men, Wythe was closest to
Thomas JeffersonThomas Jefferson was the principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence and the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom , the third President of the United States and founder of the University of Virginia...
, whom he first met as his student at William and Mary College. In their friendship, together the two men read all sorts of other material, from English literary works, to
political philosophyPolitical philosophy is the study of such topics as liberty, justice, property, rights, law, and the enforcement of a legal code by authority: what they are, why they are needed, what, if anything, makes a government legitimate, what rights and freedoms it should protect and why, what form it...
, to the ancient
classicsClassics is the branch of the Humanities comprising the languages, literature, philosophy, history, art, archaeology and other culture of the ancient Mediterranean world ; especially Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome during Classical Antiquity Classics (sometimes encompassing Classical Studies or...
.
Wythe served as
mayorIn many countries, a Mayor is the highest ranking officer in the municipal government of a town or a large urban city....
of
Williamsburg, VirginiaWilliamsburg is an independent city located on the Virginia Peninsula in the Hampton Roads metropolitan area of Virginia, USA. As of the 2010 Census, the city had an estimated population of 14,068. It is bordered by James City County and York County, and is an independent city...
, from 1768 to 1769. He was elected to the
Continental CongressThe Continental Congress was a convention of delegates called together from the Thirteen Colonies that became the governing body of the United States during the American Revolution....
in 1775, voting in favor of the resolution for independence and signing the Declaration of Independence. He helped form the new government of Virginia, and was elected Speaker of the
Virginia House of DelegatesThe Virginia House of Delegates is the lower house of the Virginia General Assembly. It has 100 members elected for terms of two years; unlike most states, these elections take place during odd-numbered years. The House is presided over by the Speaker of the House, who is elected from among the...
in 1777. As part of a committee, he designed the
Seal of VirginiaThe seals of the Commonwealth of Virginia are the official symbols of the United States Commonwealth of Virginia.-History:In May 1776 the Virginia colony declared its independence from Great Britain. On July 1, 1776, a committee of four was appointed to make a proper seal for the Commonwealth of...
, inscribed with the motto "
Sic Semper TyrannisSic semper tyrannis is a Latin phrase meaning "thus always to tyrants." It is sometimes mistranslated as "down with the tyrant." The phrase is said to have originated with Marcus Junius Brutus during the assassination of Julius Caesar....
", which is still in use today.
In 1779 he was appointed to the newly created Chair of Law at William and Mary, becoming the first law professor in the United States. During his decade there, Wythe taught many students, including the future presidents Thomas Jefferson and
James MonroeJames Monroe was the fifth President of the United States . Monroe was the last president who was a Founding Father of the United States, and the last president from the Virginia dynasty and the Republican Generation...
, and future Chief Justice of the US Supreme Court,
John MarshallJohn Marshall was the Chief Justice of the United States whose court opinions helped lay the basis for American constitutional law and made the Supreme Court of the United States a coequal branch of government along with the legislative and executive branches...
.
In 1787, George Washington appointed Wythe, along with
Alexander HamiltonAlexander Hamilton was a Founding Father, soldier, economist, political philosopher, one of America's first constitutional lawyers and the first United States Secretary of the Treasury...
and
Charles PinckneyCharles Pinckney was an American politician who was a signer of the United States Constitution, the 37th Governor of South Carolina, a Senator and a member of the House of Representatives...
, to draw up rules and procedures for the
Constitutional ConventionThe Constitutional Convention took place from May 14 to September 17, 1787, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to address problems in governing the United States of America, which had been operating under the Articles of Confederation following independence from...
. In 1789 Wythe was appointed a Judge of the
Chancery CourtThe Chancery Court of York is an ecclesiastical court for the Province of York of the Church of England.The presiding officer, the Official Principal and Auditor, has been the same person as the Dean of the Arches since the nineteenth century . The Court comprises the Auditor, two clergy and two...
of Virginia.
Marriage and family
Wythe married Elizabeth Taliaferro. They had 1 child. Her father, Richard Taliaferro, built the Wythe home in Williamsburg, Virginia.
After her death, he married again and was widowed again. He had no children with his second wife.
Move to Richmond
After the death of his second wife in 1787, Wythe moved to
RichmondRichmond is the capital of the Commonwealth of Virginia, in the United States. It is an independent city and not part of any county. Richmond is the center of the Richmond Metropolitan Statistical Area and the Greater Richmond area...
from Williamsburg in 1791. He took with him his housemaid and cook Lydia Broadnax (1740-after 1806), whom he had freed on 15 September 1787, a month after the death of his second wife. She was about 45 at the time. A young mixed-race son Michael Brown, born free in 1790, lived with her in Wythe's household in Richmond. Wythe took an interest in Brown's education. He had freed another adult slave, Benjamin, on 29 January 1797, as well as others after that. Benjamin worked as Wythe's servant in Richmond and was named in his will.
By 1805, Wythes' grandnephew George Wythe Sweeney had come to live with him, but the judge found the young man had trouble with alcohol and gambling, even at age 17. He stole some of his uncle's books for sales and tried to cash a forged check to get funds.
Manumission of slaves
A
planterPlanter may refer to:*A flower pot or box for plants**Jardinière, one such type of pot*A person or object engaged in sowing seeds**Planter , implement towed behind a tractor, used for sowing crops through a field*A coloniser...
and slaveholder, Wythe became an abolitionist after the Revolutionary War. After his second wife's death, he divested himself of most of his slaves. He freed his housemaid Lydia Broadnax, as well as Benjamin, a house servant, and other slaves. He also provided them with support for their transitions to freedom. During the first two decades after the war, so many Virginians freed slaves that the percentage of free blacks in the state rose from less than 1 percent to nearly 10 percent by 1810. As noted, Broadnax accompanied Wythe and continued to work for him, but by 1797 Broadnax owned her own home in Richmond and took in boarders. The historian Philip D. Morgan suggests Brown may have been the son of another woman, whom, Broadnax took in.
Wythe provided a settlement in his will for Broadnax and Michael Brown, by then 16 years old. Broadnax had worked for decades as his cook. Wythe also provided in his will money for the boy Brown's education. He had taken interest in Michael, taught him
GreekGreek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the majority of its history;...
and shared his library with him.
The Jefferson biographer
Fawn M. BrodieFawn McKay Brodie was a biographer and professor of history at UCLA, best known for Thomas Jefferson: An Intimate History, a work of psychobiography, and No Man Knows My History, an early and still influential non-hagiographic biography of Joseph Smith, Jr., the founder of the Latter Day Saint...
and others have suggested that Broadnax was Wythe's concubine and Brown was their son. In her book of 1973, she was the first to write seriously that Thomas Jefferson likely had a relationship with Sally Hemings, 25 years before much historiography was reevaluated, and a DNA study showed a match between the Jefferson male line and a Hemings descendant. The historian
Philip D. MorganPhilip D. Morgan is a British-American historian. He has specialized in Early Modern colonial British America, and slavery in the Americas...
believes that the fact that Wythe fathered no children with his two wives, and his and Broadnax's ages at the time of Brown's birth, suggest that he was not the son of either person. He also noted in his 1999 essay on interracial relations in the Chesapeake Bay area, that there had been no gossip about them at the time.
Murder and trial
On May 25, Wythe, Broadnax and Brown all became violently ill. Two days later, Wythe's other heir, his 18-year-old grand-nephew, George Wythe Sweeney, tried to cash a $100 check drawn on his great-uncle's account. Although gravely ill, Wythe contended that Sweeney had tried to murder him, but doctors at first diagnosed the three with
choleraCholera is an infection of the small intestine that is caused by the bacterium Vibrio cholerae. The main symptoms are profuse watery diarrhea and vomiting. Transmission occurs primarily by drinking or eating water or food that has been contaminated by the diarrhea of an infected person or the feces...
. Broadnax said she had seen Sweeney put a powder in their morning coffee.
Sweeney was charged with poisoning Wythe, Broadnax and Brown with
arsenicArsenic is a chemical element with the symbol As, atomic number 33 and relative atomic mass 74.92. Arsenic occurs in many minerals, usually in conjunction with sulfur and metals, and also as a pure elemental crystal. It was first documented by Albertus Magnus in 1250.Arsenic is a metalloid...
. The judge at age 80 lingered long enough to change his will and eliminate his bequest to Sweeney. Brown died on June 1, 1806, and Wythe on June 8, but Broadnax survived the poisoning. The Virginia race laws prohibited her as a black from testifying at the trial.
At trial in Virginia,
SweeneyThe George Sweeney Trial in 1806 in Richmond, Virginia was a trial in which George Sweeney, the grand-nephew of George Wythe, one of the founding fathers of the United States, was acquitted of murdering Wythe. Wythe was a distinguished attorney who attended the Philadelphia Convention in 1775 and...
was acquitted of murder. Historians believe this was primarily because of a law forbidding testimony by black witnesses, whether free or enslaved.
Sweeney was tried for forgery of the check and convicted. With his conviction overruled on appeal, Sweeney was said to have gone to Tennessee. There he reportedly stole a horse, was convicted and served a term in a penitentiary. Afterward he was lost to history.
In his will, Wythe left his extraordinary book collection to
Thomas JeffersonThomas Jefferson was the principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence and the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom , the third President of the United States and founder of the University of Virginia...
. This became part of Jefferson's own sale to create the
Library of CongressThe Library of Congress is the research library of the United States Congress, de facto national library of the United States, and the oldest federal cultural institution in the United States. Located in three buildings in Washington, D.C., it is the largest library in the world by shelf space and...
. He described Wythe as "... my ancient master, my earliest and best friend, and to him I am indebted for first impressions which have [been] the most salutary on the course of my life."
Wythe's funeral was the largest in state history until that time. Richmond businesses closed for the day, and thousands lined the funeral route. The service was conducted at the state capitol. Wythe was buried at St. John's Church in Richmond. This is where
Patrick HenryPatrick Henry was an orator and politician who led the movement for independence in Virginia in the 1770s. A Founding Father, he served as the first and sixth post-colonial Governor of Virginia from 1776 to 1779 and subsequently, from 1784 to 1786...
gave his "
Give me Liberty, or give me Death!"Give me Liberty, or Give me Death!" is a quotation attributed to Patrick Henry from a speech he made to the Virginia Convention. It was given on March 23, 1775, at St. John's Church in Richmond, Virginia, and is credited with having swung the balance in convincing the Virginia House of Burgesses...
" speech.
Legacy and honors
- Wythe's home in Williamsburg, Virginia
Williamsburg is an independent city located on the Virginia Peninsula in the Hampton Roads metropolitan area of Virginia, USA. As of the 2010 Census, the city had an estimated population of 14,068. It is bordered by James City County and York County, and is an independent city...
stands next to Bruton Parish ChurchBruton Parish Church is located in the restored area of Colonial Williamsburg in Williamsburg, Virginia, USA. It was established in 1674 in the Virginia Colony, and remains an active Episcopal parish.-History of Bruton Parish Church:...
, of which Wythe was a vestrymanA vestryman is a member of his local church's vestry, or leading body. He is not a member of the clergy.In England especially, but also in other parts of The United Kingdom, Parish Councils have long been a level of local government rather than being solely ecclesiastical in nature...
. It was acquired by the Colonial Williamsburg FoundationColonial Williamsburg is the private foundation representing the historic district of the city of Williamsburg, Virginia, USA. The district includes buildings dating from 1699 to 1780 which made colonial Virginia's capital. The capital straddled the boundary of the original shires of Virginia —...
in 1938. Today it serves as a museumA museum is an institution that cares for a collection of artifacts and other objects of scientific, artistic, cultural, or historical importance and makes them available for public viewing through exhibits that may be permanent or temporary. Most large museums are located in major cities...
, the Wythe HouseWythe House was the Williamsburg, Virginia home of George Wythe, signer of the Declaration of Independence and father of American jurisprudence. It is located in what is now Colonial Williamsburg, on Palace Green, adjacent to Bruton Parish Church...
.
- Several places in Virginia were named for him: Wythe County, Virginia
As of the census of 2000, there were 27,599 people, 11,511 households, and 8,103 families residing in the county. The population density was 60 people per square mile . There were 12,744 housing units at an average density of 28 per square mile...
, its county seat WythevilleWytheville is a town in Wythe County, Virginia, United States. The population was 8,211 at the 2010 census. It is the county seat of Wythe County. The town is home to a Chautauqua Festival, held the third weekend in June every year since 1985...
; high schools in Wytheville and Richmond; an elementary school in HamptonHampton is an independent city that is not part of any county in Southeast Virginia. Its population is 137,436. As one of the seven major cities that compose the Hampton Roads metropolitan area, it is on the southeastern end of the Virginia Peninsula. Located on the Hampton Roads Beltway, it hosts...
; a section of US-301 named Wythe Street in PetersburgPetersburg is an independent city in Virginia, United States located on the Appomattox River and south of the state capital city of Richmond. The city's population was 32,420 as of 2010, predominantly of African-American ethnicity...
; and the Olde Wythe Neighborhood in Hampton.
- The Marshall-Wythe School of Law
William & Mary Law School, located in Williamsburg, Virginia, is the oldest law school in the United States. William & Mary Law School is a part of the College of William & Mary, the second oldest college in the United States. The Law School maintains an enrollment of about six hundred students...
at the College of William and MaryThe College of William & Mary in Virginia is a public research university located in Williamsburg, Virginia, United States...
in Virginia.
- George Wythe College
George Wythe University is a non-profit classical liberal arts school in Cedar City, Utah which offers undergraduate and graduate degrees in the liberal arts, education and political philosophy. GWU's curriculum is centered on the Great Books of the Western World published in 1952 by Britannica...
of Cedar City, UtahAs of the census of 2000, there were 20,527 people, 6,486 households, and 4,682 families residing in the city. The population density was 1,021.8 people per square mile . There were 7,109 housing units at an average density of 353.9 per square mile...
was named for him.
- George Wythe Randolph, the Secretary of War of the Confederate States of America
The Confederate States of America was a government set up from 1861 to 1865 by 11 Southern slave states of the United States of America that had declared their secession from the U.S...
was named after him.
See also
- George Wythe House
- Founding Fathers of the United States
The Founding Fathers of the United States of America were political leaders and statesmen who participated in the American Revolution by signing the United States Declaration of Independence, taking part in the American Revolutionary War, establishing the United States Constitution, or by some...
- U.S. Constitution, nationalist organizer in Convention.
External links