Page:Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography (1900, volume 4).djvu/394

358 is known as the patriarch of Missouri Methodism. His name has become historic in the annals of the Methodist Episcopal church, south.

MONROE, James, legislator, b. in Plainfield, Conn., 18 July, 1821. He was graduated at Oberlin in 1846, studied theology there, and from 1849 till 1852 taught in that institution. He was a member of the lower branch of the Ohio legisla- ture in 1856-9, and of the senate in 1860-'2, and was twice president of the latter body. He re- signed his seat in October, 1862, to accept the U. S. consulship at Rio Janeiro, which he held from 1863 till 1869, serving for several months during the latter year as charge d'affaires ad interim. On his return to Oberlin he was elected and re-elected to congi'ess as a Republican for five successive terms, serving from 4 March, 1871, till 4 March, 1881. He has since filled the chair of political science and modern history in Oberlin.

MONROE, James, fifth president of the United States, b. in Westmoreland county, Va., 28 April, 1758 ; d. in New York city, 4 July, 1831. Although the attempts to trace his pedigree have not been successful, it appears certain that the Monroe family came to Virginia as early as 1650, and that they were of Scottish origin. James Monroe's father was Spence Monroe, and his mother was Eliza, sister of Judge Joseph Jones, twice a dele- gate from Virginia to the Continental congress. The boyhood of the future president was passed in his native county, a neighborhood famous for early manifestations of patriotic fervor. His earliest recollections must have been associated with pub- lic remonstrances against the stamp-act (in 1766), and with the reception (in 1769) of a portrait of Lord Chatham, which was sent to the gentlemen of Westmoreland, from London, by one of their correspondents, Edmund Jennings, of Lincoln's Inn. To the College of William and Mary, then rich and prosperous, James Monroe was sent ; but soon after his student life began it was interrupted by the Revolutionary war. Three members of the faculty and twenty-five or thirty students, Monroe among them, entered the military service. He joined the army in 1776 at the headquarters of Washington in New York, as a lieutenant in the 3d Virginia regiment under Col. Hugh Mercer. He was with the troops at Harlem, at White Plains, and at Trenton, where, in leading the advance guard, he was wounded in the shoulder. During 1777-'8 he served as a volunteer aide, with the rank of major, on the staff of the Earl of Stirling, and took part in the battles of the Brandywine, Ger- mantown, and Monmouth. After these services he was commended by Washington for a commis- sion in the state troops of Virginia, but without success. He formed the acquaintance of Gov. Jef- ferson, and was sent by him as a military commis- sioner to collect information in regard to the con- dition and prospects of the southern army. He thus attained the rank of lieutenant-colonel ; but his services in the field were completely interrupted, to his disappointment 9,nd chagrin. His uncle. Judge Jones, at all times a trusted and intimate counsellor, then wrote to him : " You do well to cultivate the friendship of Mr. Jefferson . . . and while you continue to deserve his esteem, he will not withdraw his countenance." The future proved the sagacity of this advice, for Monroe's intimacy with Jefferson, which was then established, con- tinued through life, and was the key to his early advancement, and perhaps his ultimate success. The civil life of Monroe began on his election in 1782 to a seat in the assemlaly of Virginia, and his appointment as a member of the executive coun- cil. He was next a delegate to the 4th, 5th, and 6th congresses of the confederation, where, not- withstanding his youth, he was active and in- fiuential. Bancroft says of him that when Jeffer- son embarked for France, Monroe remained " not the ablest but the most conspicuous representative of Virginia on the floor of congress. He sought the friendship of nearly every leading statesman of his commonwealth, and every one seemed glad to call him a friend." On 1 March, 1784, the Vir- ginia delegates presented to congress a deed that ceded to the United States Virginia's claim to the northwest territory, and soon afterward Jefferson presented his memorable plan for the temporary government of all the western possessions of the United States from the southern boundary (lat. 31° N.) to the Lake of the Woods. From that time until its settlement by the ordinance of 13 July, 1787, this question was of paramount impor- ance. Twice within a few months Monroe crossed the AUeghanies for the purpose of becoming ac- quainted with the actual condition of the country. One of the fruits of his western observations was a memoir, written in 1786, to prove the rights of the people of the west to the free navigation of the Mis- sissippi. Toward the close of 1784 Monroe was selected as one of nine judges to decide the boun- dary dispute between Massachusetts and New York. He resigned this place in May, 1786, in consequence of an acrimonious controversy in which he became involved. Both the states that were at difference with each other were at variance with Monroe in respect to the right to navigate the Mississippi, and he thought himself thus debarred from being ac- ceptable as an umpire to either of the contending parties, to whom he owed his appointment.

In the congress of 1785 Monroe was interested in the regulation of commerce by the confederation, and he certainly desired to secure that result : but he was also jealous of the rights of the southern states, and afraid that their interests would be overbalanced by those of the north. His policy was therefore timid and dilatory. A report upon the subject by the committee, of which he was chairman, was presented to congress, 28 March, , and led to a long discussion, but nothing came of it. The weakness of the confederacy grew more and more obvious, and the country was drift- ing toward a stronger government. But the meas- ures proposed by Monroe were not entirely abor- tive. Says John Q. Adams : " They led first to the partial convention of delegates from five states at Annapolis in September, 1786, and then to the gen- eral convention at Philadelphia in 1787, which pre- pared and proposed the constitution of the United States. Whoever contributed to that event is justly entitled to the gratitude of the present age as a public benefactor, and among them the name of Monroe should be conspicuously enrolled."

According to the principle of rotation then in force, Monroe's congressional service expired in 1786, at the end of a three years' term. He then intended to make his home in Fredericksburg, and to practise law, though he said he should be happy to keep clear of the bar if possible. But it was not long before he was again called into public life. He was chosen at once a delegate to the assembly, and soon afterward became a member of the Vir- ginia convention to consider the ratification of the proposed constitution of the United States, which assembled at Richmond in 1788. In this conven- tion the friends of the new constitution were led by James Madison. John Marshall, and Edmund Ran- dolph. Patrick Henry was their chief opponent, and James Monroe was by his side, in company with