An Address Delivered Before the American Whig and Cliosophic Societies of the College of New-Jersey, September 29, 1835
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Speech of Hon. William Gaston of North Carolina, on the bill to authorise a loan of twenty-five millions of dollars. Delivered in the House of representatives, February. 1814
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William Gaston was a jurist. He served four terms in North Carolina Senate and seven in the House of Commons.
Background
Gaston was born on September 19, 1778 in New Bern, North Carolina. His father, Alexander Gaston, a native of Ireland and a descendant of the French Huguenot, Jean Gaston, had been a surgeon in the British navy before settling in New Bern in 1765. There in 1775 he married Margaret Sharpe, an English woman of Catholic parentage. In 1781, Dr. Gaston, who was an ardent Whig, was murdered by a band of Tories, in the presence of his wife and two children, Jane and William. Thereafter the great object of Margaret Gaston's life was the education of her son. Her deep piety and rare intellectual and moral qualities made an indelible impression upon his mind and character.
Education
After the death of William's father, great object of Margaret Gaston's life was the education of her son. Her deep piety and rare intellectual and moral qualities made an indelible impression upon his mind and character.
In 1791, Gaston was enrolled as the first student of Georgetown College, in the District of Columbia ; two years later, because of ill health, he withdrew and in 1794, entered the College of New Jersey from which he was graduated in 1796, with the highest honors of his class.
Returning to New Bern, he studied law under François Xavier Martin, afterwards distinguished at the bar of North Carolina, Mississippi, and Louisiana.
Career
Admitted to the bar in 1798, Gaston took over the practice of his brother-in-law, John Louis Taylor, who had just been elevated to the bench. In politics Gaston was a Federalist. Between 1800 and 1832 he served four terms in the state Senate and seven in the House of Commons. He drafted many of the state's most important statutes, including that regulating descents of inheritances, and served as chairman of the joint legislative committee which in 1818 framed the act establishing the supreme court of North Carolina. He had also a brief but brilliant career in national politics. In 1808 he was a presidential elector, and from 1813 to 1817 served in Congress. His speeches in support of the Bank of the United States and in opposition to the Loan Bill, which proposed to entrust the president with $25, 000, 000 for the conquest of Canada, won for him a national reputation, while his speech in reply to Clay's "defense of the previous question" has been frequently reprinted as a masterpiece of parliamentary oratory. Gaston was a caustic critic of the administration's war policies, and was charged with a want of patriotism, to which he retorted with great indignation. In 1817 he voluntarily retired from Congress and never again entered national politics, declining in 1840 the offer of the United States senatorship and in 1841 the offer of a seat as attorney-general in Harrison's cabinet. There developed in North Carolina a strong popular opposition to the state supreme court, established by the act of 1818, and numerous efforts were made to abolish it. In 1832 the death of the chief justice raised the question anew, and the bar of the state, with great unanimity, urged the election of Gaston as the only means of gaining for it the public confidence. The thirty-second article of the state constitution, however, forbade any person who should "deny the Truth of the Protestant religion, " to hold a civil office in the state, and Gaston promptly raised the question of his eligibility. Many eminent lawyers, both within and without the state, including John Marshall, gave as their opinions that, whatever may have been the intention of the authors of the provision, it did not, as worded, disbar Catholics and since this view coincided with his own, Gaston agreed to accept the appointment. He was, accordingly, elected by the General Assembly in 1833 by a vote just short of unanimity. In 1835 Gaston was a delegate to a constitutional convention held to purge the constitution of its most glaringly undemocratic provisions. Among them was the thirty-second article. As a rule Gaston pursued a liberal course in the convention, especially on questions of representation and suffrage. He favored an amendment making population the basis of representation in the Commons, and unsuccessfully opposed an amendment which deprived free negroes of the vote. On the proposal to abolish the religious qualifications for office-holding, he made the greatest effort of his life, and won a notable personal triumph, for although the convention declined to follow him all the way, it agreed to substitute the word "Christian" for the word "Protestant" in the thirty-second article. This was Gaston's last service in a parliamentary body; he preferred the work of the bench to that of the forum. Gaston served on the supreme court from 1833 to 1844. His opinions display profound learning, clarity of reasoning, and vigor of expression; they are also distinguished for their broad humanitarian spirit. As a judge, he sought to mitigate as far as possible the harshness of the slave code. His two great opinions on this subject are State vs. Negro Will and State vs. William Manuel. He was a trustee of the University of North Carolina for forty-two years. Gaston died suddenly in Raleigh, and was buried in New Bern.
Trained in the Catholic creed as a child, “after arriving at mature age, ” William later declared, “I deliberately embraced, from conviction, the faith which had been instilled into my mind by maternal piety. ”
Politics
In politics, Gaston was a Federalist.
Gaston was a caustic critic of the administration’s war policies, and was charged with a want of patriotism.
Views
As a rule, Gaston pursued a liberal course in the convention, especially on questions of representation and suffrage. He favored an amendment making population the basis of representation in the Commons, and unsuccessfully opposed an amendment which deprived free negroes of the vote.
On the proposal to abolish the religious qualifications for office-holding, he made the greatest effort of his life, and won a notable personal triumph, for although the convention declined to follow him all the way, it agreed to substitute the word “Christian” for the word “Protestant” in the thirty-second article. This was Gaston’s last service in a parliamentary body; he preferred the work of the bench to that of the forum.
As a judge, he sought to mitigate as far as possible the harshness of the slave code. In the former, modifying a previous decision of the court, he held that malice was not to be presumed as a matter of law in the case of a slave who killed his master, or one standing in his master’s stead, in defense of his own life against an unlawful assault; in the latter, he held that a manumitted slave was a citizen of the state.
Justice Curtis, in his dissenting opinion in the Dred Scott Case, cited Gaston’s opinion in State vs. William Manuel as “sound law. ”
Quotations:
“I was baptised an American in the blood of a murdered father. ”
Membership
Gaston was a member of the Constitutional Convention.
Connections
Gaston was married three times.
By his first wife, Susan Hay, who died within a year of her marriage, he had no children.
To his second wife, Hannah McClure, were born two daughters and a son, Alexander.
His third wife was Eliza Worthington, by whom he had two daughters.