Roland William Boyden was an American lawyer and statesman.
Background
Roland William Boyden was born on October 18, 1863, at Beverly, Massachusetts. He was the second son and second child of the seven children of William Cowper and Amy Lydia (Hoag) Boyden. He was descended from Thomas Boyden, who emigrated from England in 1634 and settled first in Scituate, Massachusetts.
His mother's ancestors were predominantly Quakers. His father, a manufacturer of paper boxes, had been denied a college education because of poor health, but his grandfather, a physician in Beverly, had been an honor student at Dartmouth.
Education
Roland William Boyden attended the Beverly public schools and spent a year at the Salem high school and two years at Phillips Exeter Academy. He received the degree of A. B. from Harvard University in 1885 and that of LL. B. from the law school of that institution in 1888, when he was admitted to the bar. Throughout his school days and to some extent throughout his life he was noted as an athlete.
Career
Boyden was chairman of the board of directors of the Harvard-Yenching Institute and maintained varied connections with Harvard University. Most of his mature life, he spent in the practice of law. In the later years of his life, he was a member of the firm of Ropes, Gray, Boyden & Perkins in Boston. It was a reputable firm with a miscellaneous practice emphasizing corporation law and the settlement of estates.
In November 1917, Herbert Hoover chose Boyden, a Republican, to head the legal enforcement division of the United States Food Administration, where he won the nickname of Hoover's Hangman. After the armistice, Boyden took charge of part of the work of the American Relief Administration, which sought to alleviate distress in impoverished areas in Europe.
In 1920, President Wilson chose him to represent the United States unofficially at the meetings of the Reparations Commission. He attended the World Financial Congress held in Brussels in 1920, where he took the position highly unpopular with many European representatives that Europe would not be a good risk for American capital until there was a decrease in international hostility and an advance toward economic union among European states.
At the end of the Wilson administration, he withdrew from his position with the Reparations Commission, but he resumed his work some weeks later at the request of President Harding, exerting an influence greatly beyond that indicated by his unofficial status.
In January 1923, Boyden startled the world by suggesting that German default in reparations payments had been virtually dictated by the impossibility of carrying out the reparations provisions of the Versailles Treaty. When information was circulated that Boyden had proposed to the commission a plan for revision of the scheme of collecting reparations payments, irreconcilables in the United States Senate and other Americans opposed to participation in the settlement of European disputes demanded Boyden's recall.
On his return to the United States he criticized French occupation of the Ruhr and the French reparations policy, declaring that the forcing of an impossible demand by military pressure would make it impossible for Germany to pay what she might otherwise pay and to keep her government really democratic.
He was not recalled, but his freedom of expression was restricted. He resigned a few months later to resume his practice of law.
In 1927, he was a delegate to the International Economic Conference at Geneva, and in 1929, he was a delegate to the Institute of Pacific Relations in Japan. In January 1930, he was appointed an umpire in the Mixed Claims Commission of the United States and Germany.
The following April, he was designated by President Hoover to be a member of the Permanent Court of Arbitration to succeed Charles E. Hughes, who had resigned from the Hague tribunal to become chief justice of the United States.
In August 1931, he was appointed the president of the arbitration tribunal set up the previous year to deal with German reparations. His career ended two months later.
He died of a heart attack while attending services at the Parish Unitarian Church at Beverly, Massachusetts.
Achievements
Boyden not only handled the numerous tasks of his profession successfully, but also held bank directorships, presided over the Boston Chamber of Commerce, aided in the management of various corporations, and performed various civic duties.
From 1924 until 1930, Boyden was a member of the Harvard Board of Overseers. Between 1927 and his death in 1931, he served on a number of international economic and political posts, including being a member of the Permanent Court of Arbitration at the Hague.
Religion
Boyden was active in religious and charitable organizations and for ten years was superintendent of a Unitarian Sunday school.
Politics
In his political affiliation Boyden was a Republican.
Views
He advocated the use of "ability to pay" as the measure of the reparations to be collected and suggested that the same principle might be used in the collection of debts due from Allied powers to the United States.
Personality
Boyden had an orderly mind, the poise that excluded worry, shrewdness in negotiation, and a fine capacity for the delegation of work. He lived simply, although he accumulated substantial means.
Interests
Sport & Clubs
Boyden engaged in baseball, football, tennis, and other sports and became a golf enthusiast in his later years.
Connections
Boyden was married on July 23, 1895, to Kate Foster Whitney. They had no children.
