Roger Sherman

American politician

• Born: April 19, 1721
• Birthplace: Newton, Massachusetts
• Died: July 23, 1793
• Place of death: New Haven, Connecticut

Sherman’s political wisdom and facility for compromise helped create the U.S. Constitution. His idea for a Congress of two houses led to the formation of the House of Representatives and the Senate, and he was instrumental in the establishment of the electoral college. He also served ably as a colonial leader in Connecticut during the American Revolution.

Early Life

Roger Sherman was the second son born to William Sherman and Mehetabel Wellington Sherman; their family later grew to include seven children. The infant Roger was named for Roger Wellington, his maternal great-grandfather. The Sherman family had first arrived in America in 1636 when their ancestor, Captain John Sherman, migrated from Essex, England, to Watertown, Massachusetts.

In 1723, William Sherman moved his young family to a section of Dorchester, Massachusetts, that was incorporated as Stoughton in 1726. It was there that Roger Sherman was reared. He was taught by his father to be a cobbler, or shoemaker, and they also farmed the family land together. The latter work required Roger’s full attention in the spring and summer months. When winter approached, he attended a one-room school located a mile and a quarter from his home. The education the boy received there was rudimentary, but he improved on it himself. When he traveled from house to house with his cobbler’s tools, he also took along books to read while he made or repaired shoes. One of his earliest interests was mathematics; he also read widely in law, astronomy, history, philosophy, and theology. The last of these subjects probably became of interest to young Sherman from his association with the Reverend Samuel Dunbar, an influential Congregationalist preacher in Stoughton. Despite his curiosity about theological matters, Sherman did not officially join Dunbar’s congregation until he was twenty-one, on March 14, 1742. This delayed declaration of faith was rather unusual in colonial America, where a person’s religious affiliation was highly important in the community.

Sherman met his first wife, Elizabeth Hartwell, the daughter of a local church deacon, while he still resided in Stoughton, though Sherman did not marry her until a few years had passed. The death of his father intervened in 1741; Roger Sherman found himself suddenly responsible for the support and education of the younger children in his family. To facilitate family matters, Roger moved to New Milford, Connecticut, in 1742; he accomplished this by walking more than 100 miles from his Massachusetts home. Once in New Milford, he helped his older brother William manage the general store he had already established in that farming community. On November 17, 1749, Roger Sherman married Elizabeth Hartwell. They would have seven children, but only four survived infancy. Elizabeth herself died at age thirty-five in October of 1760.

Sherman had varied interests in his first years in Connecticut. He produced an almanac (modeled after that of Benjamin Franklin) that predicted weather, gave advice to farmers, and quoted proverbs and poetry. Sherman continued this enterprise until 1761. He had found his most lucrative employment in 1745, when he was appointed as land surveyor for New Haven County, receiving this position for his superb mathematical ability. At this time, surveyors were at a premium in the colonies, and so, when Litchfield County was formed in northwestern Connecticut in 1752, Sherman became its surveyor as well. Because of these jobs, he was able to speculate in real estate dealings, much to his success. Also, his work in court to defend the land boundaries of plaintiffs drew Sherman more into an interest in law. He read more intensely in the law during these years, and in February of 1754, he was admitted to the bar. Because of his growing popularity and reputation for fairness, New Milford’s citizens began electing Sherman to a series of political offices. He served on their grand jury, as selectman, as justice of the peace, and finally, as their delegate to the Connecticut General Assembly.

Life’s Work

Roger Sherman’s life in New Milford, however, despite his popularity, became increasingly difficult after the death of his wife in 1760. The following year, he decided to move to New Haven, where he established a general store next to Yale College. Because of his proximity to the college and local churches, Sherman sold many books; some of his best customers were students and ministers. Sherman’s devotion to reading increased at this time, and he also began to take more of an interest in colonial politics. Sherman was still serving as a delegate to the Connecticut General Assembly, a position he first held in 1755 and (except for the years of 1756-1757) would continue to hold until 1761. In 1759, he had also been named a justice of the County Court of Litchfield. In 1766, he was appointed a judge in the State Superior Court of Connecticut. Connecticut’s original charter from England had granted the colony the most carefully structured and autonomous government enjoyed by any colony. This is a fact that Sherman cherished and that he put to work in his later dealings in the congresses of the emerging nation.

Although Sherman’s record as an officeholder in Connecticut’s distinct government seems impressive in itself, his most valuable contributions to American society were yet to be made. With his selection to the First Continental Congress in August of 1774, his work as one of the Founding Fathers of the United States truly began. He served diligently in this congress, even though he was one of the oldest delegates. Sherman was also sent to represent Connecticut in the Second Continental Congress, which convened in May of 1775. It was becoming evident by the time of this second congress that a war for independence from England was inevitable for the thirteen colonies. Shots had been fired in Massachusetts between British redcoats and colonial patriots in April of 1775.

In this second congress, Sherman served on a committee of five men who drafted the Declaration of Independence, although most of the actual writing of the document was done by Thomas Jefferson. Once war had been declared, Sherman labored long hours on vital committees managing the revolution. He headed efforts to raise $10 million to fund the war, and he organized the purchase of the colonial army’s supplies.

In his home state of Connecticut, Sherman also served on the Council of Safety during these years, and he stockpiled munitions at his New Haven store for the army. While at home in New Haven, he founded the New Haven Foot Guards, a unit of militiamen drawn together to defend the city and its residents. Despite these efforts, Sherman’s house, as well as his son’s, was raided by the British in an attack on New Haven in 1779.

Yet Sherman was not too weighed down by the burdens of his war work. He also enjoyed a happy family life. On May 12, 1763, he had married a beautiful young woman, Rebecca Prescott of Danvers, Massachusetts. Together they had eight children who kept Sherman’s home life joyful and lively. One pretty young daughter’s quick wit was commented on by a guest at their home: General George Washington.

Sherman, in the area of law and political compromise (an art he perfected), was to play an important role in the founding of the nation that Washington’s army had fought to achieve. At the war’s end, the thirteen colonies were rather loosely bound together by the Articles of Confederation, which Sherman had also worked to establish in the Grand Committee of the Continental Congress of 1776. It became evident, especially after Shays’s Rebellion in Massachusetts in 1786-1787, that a stronger central government was needed; powers the government had to have, such as taxation and the making of treaties, were lacking. Sherman had served as a delegate to the Congress of the Confederation beginning in 1781. Then, he was also elected to represent Connecticut in the Constitutional Convention held in Philadelphia in the summer of 1787. It was there that Sherman made vital political compromises that helped establish the U.S. Constitution. Sherman, representing a middle-sized state, effected a successful compromise over an issue that had deadlocked this convention. He sought to establish a manner of legislative voting that would guarantee large states (such as New York and Virginia) and small states (such as Delaware and Rhode Island) an equal and fair voice in making laws. Sherman suggested the establishment of the two houses of the U.S. Congress as they now exist. The Senate has equal representation for each state, and the House of Representatives has representation proportionate to a state’s population. Sherman’s compromise was accepted on June 11, 1787; it is known by his name as the Great Compromise, or as the Connecticut Compromise.

Sherman made other contributions to the founding of the American government. He favored the election of the president by the state legislatures, but he did not win this point. When the popular election of the president is held, however, the decisive recorded vote still comes in the electoral college, which Sherman was instrumental in establishing. He was also responsible for the concept of the congressional override on legislative bills vetoed by the president. Sherman also proposed that the trial for a president’s impeachment be held in the House and the Senate (instead of in the Supreme Court, as other delegates had suggested).

From records of his service in the various colonial congresses, particularly the Constitutional Convention, one may draw a physical picture and character study of Sherman. His fellow delegates wrote in high praise of his conscientious work but also detailed his awkward physical and vocal mannerisms. From these colonial leaders, one learns that Sherman was a tall man with broad shoulders; he was rugged-looking with a jutting jaw, wide mouth, and deep-socketed, piercing blue eyes, all set in a large head. He wore his brown hair cut close to his head in a conservative style and did not wear a powdered wig as did the men of the colonial aristocracy. Sherman was one of the poorest delegates to the Constitutional Convention; he barely had enough money to feed his children during the difficult inflationary period caused by the war. His poverty and lack of a formal education were always evident in his speech, which contained slang terms and was delivered in a rustic accent.

Nevertheless, no one writing of Sherman for posterity denied his effectiveness as a statesman. He knew how to make his points in debates, and while he spoke very frequently, he was always concise. In committee work and in informal discussions among delegates, Sherman often saw the issues more clearly than anyone else. He had foresight as to what the U.S. Constitution had to include and what it had to avoid; here, he was a great advocate of states’ rights. For all of his levelheadedness, earnestness in debate, dedication in his service, and honesty in his dealings, Sherman won the sincere praise of his peers.

Connecticut’s citizens returned Sherman to serve as a Congress member in the fall of 1789. He was also appointed to a seat in the Senate in 1791, an office that he held until his death. Sherman died from typhoid fever on the evening of July 23, 1793, in New Haven, Connecticut.

Significance

Roger Sherman’s distinguished career as a colonial political leader and statesman afforded him the title the Great Signer. Because of his almost continual service in the various American congresses, Sherman was the only man to sign all the following major documents: the Articles of Association of 1774, the Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederation, the Federal Constitution, the Declaration of Rights, and the Treaty of Paris (with Great Britain).

Sherman also enjoyed a prestigious career as a founding father of New Haven, Connecticut. He was the treasurer of Yale College from 1765 to 1776; in its early years, he often paid the school’s bills with his own money to prevent its closing. He was elected the first mayor of New Haven, and while in office (from 1784 until his death), he built new schools and renamed the city streets for American patriots rather than British monarchs. He also built up the city’s business and shipping enterprises by offering special loans to new merchants moving into New Haven.

The people of Connecticut expressed their gratitude to Roger Sherman for leading their state out of the struggles of a war for independence into the security of a new nation with a sound and wisely planned government—they named a city after him in 1802 called Sherman, Connecticut.

Bibliography

Beals, Carleton. Our Yankee Heritage: New England’s Contribution to America’s Civilization. New York: David McKay, 1955. Beals’s chapter on Sherman, “Shoemaker Statesman,” emphasizes the patriot’s early life as well as his political career, and provides an analysis of Sherman’s character traits. Contains many details of Sherman’s personal life not found in other sources.

Berkin, Carol. A Brilliant Solution: Inventing the American Constitution. New York: Harcourt, 2002. A brief recounting of the Constitutional Convention, including Sherman’s role. The appendix features brief biographies of convention delegates.

Boardman, Roger S. Roger Sherman: Signer and Statesman. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1938. A readable, carefully researched study of Sherman’s life and career, with much documentation—such as a full listing of the committees on which he served. Focuses on Sherman’s public career rather than his personal life.

Bowen, Catherine D. Miracle at Philadelphia: The Story of the Constitutional Convention, May to September, 1787. Boston: Little, Brown, 1966. Bowen describes the daily workings of the Constitutional Convention in great detail. The text is readable and enlightening, and the Founding Fathers are portrayed as having distinct personalities and interests.

Collier, Christopher. Roger Sherman’s Connecticut: Yankee Politics and the American Revolution. Middletown, Conn.: Wesleyan University Press, 1971. The book’s title accurately reflects its dual subjects—Roger Sherman and the Connecticut of his era. Collier notes the lack of personal materials available on Sherman; only his public life is recorded in any detail. Thus, Collier’s well-documented study covers the broader range of the statesman in his native state.

Rommel, John G. Connecticut’s Yankee Patriot: Roger Sherman. Hartford, Conn.: American Bicentennial Commission of Connecticut, 1979. This is a slender but useful volume, prepared as one in a series of historical works on Connecticut topics for the two-hundredth anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. It re-creates Sherman’s political career accurately and concisely, concentrating on his work during and after the Revolutionary War.

Rossiter, Clinton. 1787: The Grand Convention. New York: Macmillan, 1966. A comprehensive, factual account of the 1787 Constitutional Convention, focusing on the delegates and their work. Rossiter also details the later lives of the convention delegates, and he idealizes, to some extent, the Founding Founders.

Van Doren, Carl. The Great Rehearsal: The Story of the Making and Ratifying of the Constitution of the United States. New York: Viking Press, 1948. A classic book on the founding of the U.S. government. Since no formal record was kept for much of the 1787 convention, the author works from the diaries and notes of the delegates. Accurate, lively, and interesting narrative, describing the delegates’ personalities as well as their contributions to the final document.