Richard Henry Lee (January 20, 1732June 19, 1794) was an American statesman and Founding Father from

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern and Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States between the East Coast of the United States ...

, best known for the June 1776 Lee Resolution, the motion in the Second Continental Congress calling for the colonies' independence from

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leading to the United States Declaration of Independence, which he signed. Lee also served a one-year term as the president of the Continental Congress, proposed and was a signatory to the

Continental Association The Continental Association, also known as the Articles of Association or simply the Association, was an agreement among the Thirteen Colonies, American colonies, adopted by the First Continental Congress, which met inside Carpenters' Hall in Phi ...

, signed the Articles of Confederation, and was a United States Senator from Virginia from 1789 to 1792, serving part of that time as the second president ''pro tempore'' of the upper house. He was a member of the Lee family, a historically influential family in Virginia politics.

Early life and education

Lee was born in

Westmoreland County, Virginia Westmoreland County is a County (United States), county located in the Northern Neck of the Virginia, Commonwealth of Virginia. As of the 2020 United States census, the population sits at 18,477. Its county seat is Montross, Virginia, Montross ...

, to Colonel Thomas Lee and Hannah Harrison Ludwell Lee on January 20, 1732. He came from a line of military officers, diplomats, and legislators. His father served on the Governor's council and briefly as an interim governor of Virginia before his death in 1750. Lee spent most of his early life in Stratford, Virginia, at Stratford Hall. Here he was tutored and taught a variety of skills. To develop his political career, his father sent him around to neighboring planters with the intention for Lee to become associated with neighboring men of like prominence. In 1748, at 16, Lee left Virginia for Yorkshire, England, to complete his formal education at Queen Elizabeth Grammar School, Wakefield. Both of his parents died in 1750. In 1753, after touring Europe, he returned to Virginia to help his brothers settle the estate his parents had left behind.

Career

In 1757, Lee was appointed justice of the peace of Westmoreland County. In 1758, he was elected to the Virginia House of Burgesses, where he met Patrick Henry. Lee remained a "valuable ally of ... Henry and Samuel Adams" throughout the

American Revolutionary War The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was the armed conflict that comprised the final eight years of the broader American Revolution, in which Am ...

. An early advocate of independence, Lee became one of the first to create a Committees of Correspondence among the many independence-minded Americans in the various colonies. In 1766, almost ten years before the American Revolutionary War, Lee is credited with having authored the Westmoreland Resolution against enforcement of the British Stamp Act 1765, which was publicly signed by prominent landowners who met at Leedstown, Virginia, on February 27, 1766. Among the signers were three brothers and one close cousin of

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American Revolution

In August 1774, Lee was chosen as a delegate to the First Continental Congress in

Philadelphia Philadelphia ( ), colloquially referred to as Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania, most populous city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the List of United States cities by population, sixth-most populous city in the Unit ...

. In Lee's Resolution on June 7, 1776, during the Second Continental Congress, Lee put forth the motion to the Continental Congress to declare Independence from Great Britain, which read (in part):

Resolved: That these united colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States, that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British crown, and that all political connection between them and the state of great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved.

Lee had returned to Virginia by the time Congress voted on and adopted the Declaration of Independence, but he signed the document when he returned to Congress. Coat of Arms of the Lee Family

President of Congress

Lee was elected the sixth president of Congress under the Articles of Confederation on November 30, 1784, in the French Arms Tavern,

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. Congress convened on January 11, 1785, in the old New York City Hall, with Lee presiding until November 23, 1785. Although he was not paid a salary, his household expenses were covered in the amount of $12,203.13. Lee abhorred the notion of imposing federal taxes and believed that continuing to borrow foreign money was imprudent. Throughout his term, he maintained that the states should relinquish their claims in the

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, enabling the federal government to fund its obligations through land sales. He wrote to friend and colleague Samuel Adams:

I hope we shall shortly finish our plan for disposing of the western Lands to discharge the oppressive public debt created by the war & I think that if this source of revenue be rightly managed, that these republics may soon be discharged from that state of oppression and distress that an indebted people must invariably feel.

Debate began on the expansion of the Land Ordinance of 1784 and

Thomas Jefferson Thomas Jefferson (, 1743July 4, 1826) was an American Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the third president of the United States from 1801 to 1809. He was the primary author of the United States Declaration of Indepe ...

's survey method; namely, "hundreds of ten geographical miles square, each mile containing 6086 and 4-10ths of a foot" and "sub-divided into lots of one mile square each, or 850 and 4-10ths of an acre" on April 14. On May 3, 1785, William Grayson of Virginia made a motion, seconded by James Monroe, to change "seven miles square" to "six miles square." The Land Ordinance of 1785 passed on May 20, 1785, yet the federal government lacked the resources to manage the newly surveyed lands. Not only did Native Americans refuse to relinquish their hold on the

plat In the United States, a plat ( or ) (plan) is a cadastral map, drawn to scale, showing the divisions of a piece of land. United States General Land Office surveyors drafted township plats of Public Lands Survey System, Public Lands Surveys to ...

ted territory, but much of the remaining land was occupied by

squatter Squatting is the action of occupying an abandoned or unoccupied area of land or a building (usually residential) that the squatter does not Land ownership and tenure, own, rent or otherwise have lawful permission to use. The United Nations estima ...

s. With Congress unable to muster magistrates or troops to enforce the dollar-per-acre title fee, Lee's plan ultimately failed, although the survey system developed under the Land Ordinance of 1785 has endured.

US Senate

Lee served in the United States Senate in the First and Second Congresses from 1789 to 1792. In 1792 he became the second president ''pro tempore'', but later that year he was obliged to resign due to his failing health, and he retired from public life.richardhenrylee.org
(retrieved March 9, 2024)

Political offices

* Justice of the Peace for Westmoreland County, Virginia (1757) * Virginia House of Burgesses (1758–1775) * Member of the Continental Congress (1774–1779, 1784–1785, 1787) *

Virginia House of Delegates The Virginia House of Delegates is one of the two houses of the Virginia General Assembly, the other being the Senate of Virginia. It has 100 members elected for terms of two years; unlike most states, these elections take place during odd-numbe ...

(1777, 1780, 1785) * President of the Confederation Congress (November 30, 1784 – November 4, 1785) * United States Senator from

(March 4, 1789 – October 8, 1792) * President pro tempore during the Second Congress (April 18 – October 8, 1792)

Personal life and family

Lee's mother Hannah Harrison Ludwell died in 1750. On December 5, 1757, he married Anne Aylett, daughter of William Aylett. Anne died on December 12, 1768. The couple had six children, four of whom survived infancy, including Thomas Jesse Lee and Ludwell Lee. Lee remarried in June or July 1769 to Anne (Gaskins) Pinckard. The couple had seven children, five of whom survived infancy. Lee honored his brother, Francis Lightfoot Lee (another signer of the Articles of Confederation and the Declaration of Independence), by naming one of his sons after him.

Death and legacy

Lee died on June 19, 1794, at the age of 62. Schools in Rossmoor, California, and Glen Burnie, Maryland, are named after him, and Richard Henry Lee School in Chicago is named in his honor. The

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

Liberty Ship was named in his honor. The Chantilly Archaeological Site was listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

in 1971. He is portrayed in Sherman Edwards' 1969 musical '' 1776''.

References

External links

*
President Richard Henry Lee

Biography by Rev. Charles A. Goodrich, 1856

Richard Henry Lee papers
in the Manuscripts and Archives Division at The New York Public Library.
Richard Henry Lee Bio
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Lee, Richard Henry 1732 births 1794 deaths Richard Henry Lee American people of English descent Anti-Federalists Continental Congressmen from Virginia House of Burgesses members People educated at Queen Elizabeth Grammar School, Wakefield Presidents pro tempore of the United States Senate Signers of the Articles of Confederation Signers of the Continental Association Signers of the United States Declaration of Independence United States senators from Virginia Richard People from Westmoreland County, Virginia People from colonial Virginia Founding Fathers of the United States United States senators who owned slaves 18th-century United States senators