Page:The Biographical Dictionary of America, vol. 04.djvu/302

 GIDDINGS

GIDDINGS

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science at Bryn Mawr college, Pa., where be became associate in political science in 18S9, associate professor in 1891, and professor in 1892. He was also lecturer on sociology in Columbia, 1893-94, and in the latter year was ad- vanced to tbe full chair. He was for three years chairman of the publication committee of the American economic association and later first vice-president of the association, and was a vice-president of the American acad- emy of political and social science from its foundation. He was

' V the first American member of the Institut International de Sociol- ogie (Paris). Union univei'sity conferred upon him the degree of Ph.D. in 1897, and Oberlin that of LL.I). in 1900. He is the author of; T\ie Modern Distribution Process (with J. B. Clark 18S8); The Principles of Sociology (1896, 3d ed., 1897), which was translated into several lan- guages; llie Elements of Sociology {\8'JS); an in- troduction to Proal's Political Crime (1898), and Democracy mxl Empire (1900).

QIDDINQS, Joshua Reed, representative, was born at Tii.ga Point, Pa., Oct. 6, 177.J. His ancestors were English and emigrated to America in 16.50, locating in Connecticut. In 1725 his gi-eat-grandfather Giddings settled in Canau- daigua, N.Y., then a wilderness, and in 1806 his father re- moved thence to tbe Connecticut western reserve, built a home in Ashtabula county, Ohio, and cleared a farm. Here Joshua was brought up and in 1812 be served in Colonel Ha}-es"s regi- ment in the defence of the northern bor- der.s. He was one of a party of twenty-two soldiers attacked by the Indians, Sept. 29, 1812, north of Sandusky bay, when six of the party were killed and six wounded. He afterward caused a monument to be erected on the spot in memory of his fallen comrades. After the retreat of Proctor bis regiment was sent home. He then taught school, studied law, and was

admitted to the bar in 1824, practising in Jeffer- son. He served as a representative in the state legislature of Ohio, 1826; was defeated as a can- didate for the state senate in 1828, and in 1836 was elected as a Whig a representative in the 2.>th congress. He was returned to the succeed- ing congresses up to and including the 3.5th, retir- ing, March 3, 1859. In congress he protested against the free states, or the general govern- ment, taking any part in the return of fugitive slaves to their owners, and contended for the abolition of slavery in territory governed by the United States and for the suppression of coast- wise slave trade. During a speech delivered by him in the house, Feb. 11, 1838, his progress was interrupted by the application of a rule of the house, known as the "gag-rule." This action led to a bitter controversy with the slaveholding members and on Feb. 9, 1841, in discussing the .Seminole war, which he opposed, he charged the slaveholdei-s with a design to enslave the Maroons and thus break up the asylum for fugitives, then existing in Florida. On March 21, 1842, he offered in the house resolutions declaring slavery to be an abridgment of a natural right and therefore inoperative outside the territorial juris- diction that created it; and applied the principle to the slaves, who, while in course of transporta- tion from Virginia to Louisiana on the Creole, captured the vessel and claimed the protection of the British government by putting into the harbor of Nas.sau, N.P., in the fall of 1841. The secretary of state, Mr. Webster, had instructed Mr. Everett, U.S. minister to London, to demand from England indemnification for the owners of the slaves. Mr. Giddings's resolutions created intense excitement and his friends advised him to withdraw them, which he did under protest. The house thereupon passed a resolutionof censure by a vote of 125 to 69, and when Mr. Giddings undertook to speak in his own defence, the houfe refused him the privilege by carrying a motion for the previous question. He resigned his seat, went before his constituents for their approval of his course, and was re-elecrted by an increafed majority. In 1843, when the question of tl e annexation of Texas was before congress, I'.e joined John Quincy Adams and others in an ad- dress to the people, declaring tbe consun-.mation of that purpose to be identical with dissolution. He favored the claim to the whole territory of Oregon, as expressed in the motto, " Fifty-four forty, or fight." When the W^hig party natle Robert C. Winthrop of Massachusetts its candi- date for speaker, he refused to support him on the ground that Winthrop did not represent the party on the slavery question. He refused to support General Taylor for President in 1848 on tbe same ground, and gave his allegiance to Van