Page:The Biographical Dictionary of America, vol. 09.djvu/207

 RUSH

RUSH

of Pennsylvania, 1789-91 ; professor of clinical practice, 1797-1813, and professor of clinical prac- tice and the practice of physic, 1797-1813. He was treasurer of the U.S. mint, 1799-1813 ; succeeded Benjamin Franklin as president of the Pennsyl- vania Society for the Abolition of Slavery ; was president of the Philadelphia Medical society ; vice-president and founder of the Philadelphia Bible society, and an originator of the American Piiilosophical society, and vice-president, 1800. The honorary degree of LL.D. was conferred on him by Yale in 1812. He is the author of : Medi- cal Inquiries and Observatio)is (5 vols., 1789-98); Essays on the Mode of Education Proper to a Re- public ( 1786) ; Account of the Ph iladelphia Society for the Establishment of Charity Schools (1796) : Essays, Literary, Moral and Philosophical (1798, 2d ed., 1806); Sixteen Introductory Lectures (1811) ;Z)tseoses of the Mind (1812, 5th ed., 1835), and of many essays on slavery, temperance and medical topics. In the selection of names for the Hall of Fame for Great Americans, New York university, in October, 1900, his name, in Class L, Physicians and Surgeons, received forty-two votes, the highest number in the class, in which no name secured a place, fifty-one votes being necessary to place the name in the Hall. He died in Philadelphia. Pa., April 19, 1813.

RUSH, Christopher, A.M.E.Z. bishop, was born in Craven county, N.C., in 1777, a slave of pure African descent. He was taken to New York in 1798 ; was afterward emancipated, and licensed to preach by the M.E. church, 1815. He was one of the principalorganizersof the African Metliodist Episcopal Zion church in New York city in 1820, and was elected a bishop of that church in 1828, and each successive fourth year thereafter up to the time of his death. He pub- lished: History of the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church in the United States. He died in New York city, July 16, 1873.

RUSH, Jacob, jurist, was born near Philadel- phia, Pa., in December, 1746; son of John and Susan (Hall) Harvey Rush, and brother of Ben- jamin Rush, the signer. He was graduated from the College of New Jersey, A.B., 1765, A.M., 1768 ; practised law in Philadelphia ; was a justice of the supreme court ; judge of the court of errors and appeals, 1784-1806, and president of the city court of common pleas, 1806-20. He defended Benedict Arnold against the charges of Gov. Joseph Reed in 1779. The honorary degree of LL.D. was conferred on him by the College of New Jersey in 1804. He is the author of : Resolve in Committee Chamber, Dec. 6, 1774 (1774); Charges on Moral and Religious Subjects (1803) ; Character of Christ (1806), and Christian Baptism (1819). He was married to a Miss Rench. He died in Philadelphia, Pa., Jan. 5, 1820.

RUSH, James, physician, was born in Philadel • phia. Pa., March 1, 1786; son of Benjamin (q.v.) and Julia (Stockton) Rush. He was graduated from the College of New Jersey, A.B., 1805, A.M., 1808, and from the University of Pennsylvania, M.D., 1809. He studied in Edinburgh, and estab- lished himself in practice in Philadelphia. He was professor of the theory and practice of medicine at the Jefferson Medical college. Pa., and later engaged in scientific and literary pur- suits. He was married to Phoebe Ann Ridge way (1797-1857), an heiress of Philadelphia. He be- queathed $1,000,000 to the Philadelphia library company to erect the Riilgeway branch, on the unique condition that a reissue of his publications be sold at cost five times within the succeeding fifty years, and that the library should exclude all newspapers. He is the author of : Philosophy of the Human Voice (1827); Hamlet, a Dramatic Prelude in Five Acts (1834); Analysis of the Human Litellect (2 vols., 1865), and Rhymes of Contrast on Wisdom and Folly (1869). He died in Philadelphia, Pa., May 26, 1869.

RUSH, Richard, cabinet officer, was born in Philadelphia, Pa., Aug. 29, 1780; son of Ben- jamin (q.v.) and Julia (Stockton) Rusli, and grandson of Richard Stockton, the signer. He was graduated from the College of New Jersey, A.B.. 1797, A.M., 1800; studied law under Wil- liam Lewis; was admitted to the bar in December, 1800, and established himself in practice in Phil- adelphia. He was married in 1809, to Catherine Eliza, daughter of Dr. James Murray of Anna- polis, Md. He was solicitor of the guardians of the poor in 1810, and attorney-general of the state in 1811 ; comptroller of the treasury in November, 1811, and U.S. attorney-general, 1814- 17. He served as secretary of state in 1817 prior to the arrival of Secretary John Quincy Adams from England, and was appointed U.S. minister plenipotentiary to England in 1817, serving till 1825, and negotiating several important treaties. He was appointed secretary of the treasury by President Adams in 1825, and was a candidate for Vice-President in 1828. He was a commis- sioner to adjust the boundary between Ohio and Michigan in 1835 ; a commissioner sent to Eng- land to obtain the legacy left by James Smithson (q.v.) to found the Smithsonian Institution, and returned with the full amount $508,318.46 in August, 1838. He was U.S. minister plenipoten- tiary to France, 1847-51, and, acting under in- structions from the U.S. government, was the first of the foreign ministers to recognize the new republic in 1848. He was a fellow of the American Philosophical society ; a regent of the Smithsonian Institution, and is the author of : Codification of the Laws of the United States (5 vols., 1815); Narrative of a Residence at the