Elbridge Gerry, Massachusetts

Elbridge Gerry was an influential politician in the early days of the United States of America; from signing the Declaration of Independence he went on to help frame the federal Constitution and served as Minister to France, Governor of Massachusetts and Vice President of the United States.

He was born on July 17, 1744 in Marblehead, Massachusetts, to a family of merchants.1 After graduating from Harvard in 1762, he returned home to join in the family business. After the Boston Massacre in 1770, Gerry became highly involved in local politics. He was elected to the Massachusetts Legislature in 1772, where he was influenced by Samuel Adams and took part in the Massachusetts committee of correspondence. When Boston harbor was closed in 1774, Gerry played a central role in coordinating the relief effort for Boston, since Marblehead became a major port of entry.2

Gerry attended the first and second Massachusetts Provincial Congresses between 1774-1776, where he served on several important committees, including those for safety and for supply. In October of 1775, Gerry began to support American independence, and was elected to replace Thomas Cushing in the Massachusetts delegation to the second Continental Congress in order to resolve the delegation’s split in favor of independence.3 Drawing on his background, Gerry specialized in financial and military matters within Congress.4

After the revolution, Gerry continued to serve periodically in Congress, and attended to Constitutional Convention in 1787 as part of the Massachusetts delegation, where he played an important role. He became Massachusetts governor in 1810, and served as James Madison’s Vice President in 1813, dying while in office on Nov. 23, 1814.5

Brooke Saunders

Endnotes
1. George Bilias, Elbridge Gerry: founding Father and Republican Statesman (New York: McGraw-Hill Book Company, 1976), 5.
2.Ibid., 16.
3.Ibid., 65.
4.“The Founding Fathers: Massachusetts,” US National Archives and Records Administration, [www.archives.gov.]
5. The term “Gerrymandering” comes from a combination of “Gerry” and “salamander,” since while Elbridge Gerry was governor of Massachusetts his Republicans restructured districts in order to help elect more Republicans to the Senate. As a result, Essex County where Gerry was born was redrawn in a district that looked like a salamander (Bilias, 317).