George Washington was the first president of the United States, Well, kind of…
"What if… the story of America… was not the one you knew…"
The first president of the Continental Congress — Peyton Randolph of Virginia — was elected in
1774. Randolph was connected. He was a good friend of George Washington
and a first cousin once removed of Thomas Jefferson. Interestingly,
Jefferson didn't consider Randolph fit for leadership, saying,
"He was indeed a most excellent man [but] heavy and inert in body,
he was rather too indolent and careless for business."
Randolph was an important addition to the congress because of his reputation
as a political moderate. Randolph served in the Continental Congress three times between
1774 and 1775 and was president twice. He died in Philadelphia the night after
a congressional meeting. Congress paused their proceedings to show their respect at his funeral.
Like Randolph, the Continental Congress' second president wasn't particularly
radical. South Carolina's Henry Middleton was a planter with vast land holdings and
around 800 slaves. He was rich enough to pay for an entire revolutionary regiment.
Middleton married three times, gaining land and political connections with each marriage.
Middleton was president of the Continental Congress for less than a month in 1774.
Most importantly, he signed Congress' Declaration of Rights and Grievances
formalizing the idea that American colonists were equal to any other
British citizen and shouldn't be taxed without parliamentary representation.
"Does the government of King George have the right to tax the citizens of Boston
when they are denied representation in the parliament of Westminster?"
Afterward, Middleton resigned from Congress because he opposed American independence,
and when the British captured Charleston,
he invoked their protection. But Middleton wasn't punished by the U.S. government after
the war, probably because of his financial contributions to the revolutionary movement.
John Hancock is better known for his famous signature than for being
president of the Continental Congress, but the two things are related. Hancock
was president when the Declaration of Independence was written and signed.
The earliest copy includes only his name and that of the congressional
secretary. Signing it was Hancock's duty as president and a dangerous, treasonous act.
"Signing this thing, you could end up being hung. Signing this thing is treasonous."
Hancock is widely recognized as the first signer of the more famous copy of the Declaration,
which includes 56 signatures. Supposedly, when he signed, he said,
"There, John Bull can read my name without spectacles,
he may double his reward, and I put his at defiance."
John Bull was a fictional representation of England. In other versions of the story,
a defiant Hancock wanted the king to be able to read his signature.
Henry Laurens may be better known these days as the father of Hamilton hero John Laurens,
but he was just as prominent a member of the revolution as his son. Like Henry Middleton,
he was from Charleston, South Carolina, a planter, and a slave owner. His import-export
business became so successful that he expanded into slave trading.
Initially he was a moderate and encouraged passive resistance.
But this attitude didn't stop him from being critical of British interference
in the colonial economy when, as a merchant, he stood to lose.
Laurens was president of the Continental Congress in 1777 and later became ambassador to Holland.
On his way there to negotiate an alliance, he was captured by the British and documents
in his possession were seized. One of these provoked England to declare war on
Holland. Laurens was held in the infamous Tower of London for more than a year,
under severe conditions, until the U.S. traded British general Lord Cornwallis for his release.
While in the Tower, the British offered Laurens a pardon if he
would admit fighting for the rebels was wrong. Laurens declined, saying,
"I am afraid of no consequences but such as would flow from Dishonorable Acts."
John Jay has other claims to fame besides his Continental Congress presidency,
including being the first chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. In fact,
George Washington reportedly offered Jay first pick of cabinet positions. He held an impressive
array of offices during his political career. He helped negotiate two major treaties — the Treaty
of Paris that expanded American territory and the Jay Treaty, which established peace with Great
Britain. Jay wrote some of the Federalist Papers, explaining and defending the U.S.
Constitution. In them, he warned against foreign influence and lack of national unity, writing,
"A band of brethren, united to each other by the strongest ties,
should never be split into a number of unsocial, jealous, and alien sovereignties."
John Adams declared Jay the most important of the founding fathers,
but he's less well known than many. This may be because of his quiet nature, or because he
was absent at the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Despite his retiring personality,
in 1776, Jay established the first American counterintelligence agency.
"The origins of U.S. intelligence dates to the founding of the republic. In a sense,
espionage is as American as cherry pie."
It was a combination of politicians and military men, and its activities were
top-secret. They did, however, foil an assassination plot against Washington.
Samuel Huntington is sometimes called the first U.S. president. He was president of
the Continental Congress in 1781, when the Articles of Confederation were established.
Since the Articles contain the first written reference to the United States,
some believe Huntington deserves the title over George Washington.
Huntington was a member of the revolutionary congresses for eight years and president for
two. He held multiple political positions before the war and afterward was Connecticut's first
governor and chief justice. One of the tensest moments of his governorship was Shays' Rebellion,
a Massachusetts uprising over the post-Revolutionary war economy. When
the governor of Massachusetts wrote Huntington asking for help suppressing the insurgents,
Huntington sent soldiers and pledged Connecticut's support.
Thomas McKean held office in two states at once. He was one of the new state of
Delaware's delegates to the Continental Congress while serving as chief justice
in Pennsylvania. McKean went back and forth in many aspects of life,
including switching political parties multiple times. Nonetheless, he later became governor
of Pennsylvania and briefly served as president of Delaware — the equivalent of governor — when
its president was captured during the war. McKean signed the Declaration of Independence,
although, apparently, he couldn't actually remember when he signed the document.
In the midst of all this, McKean served in the war
and wrote letters to his wife about the harrowing experience, saying,
"[I] really wish to be rid of all public employments."
Nonetheless, he returned to the Continental Congress and was
president when the British surrendered at Yorktown, ending the American Revolution.
John Hanson is also sometimes considered the first president of the United States because,
as first president of the Confederation Congress, he was the first to act under
the laws of the Articles of Confederation, a precursor to the U.S. Constitution. However,
at this point, the president was still part of the legislature,
not an independent position. The two roles wouldn't be separate until the Constitution
was ratified in 1789, about nine years after Hanson's tenure as president ended.
Hanson was part of Maryland's revolutionary government, which wrested state control
from the British. In 1776, Maryland was the last state to consent to independence,
holding out until Hanson gave an impassioned speech to the Maryland Convention, saying,
"These resolutions ought to be passed and it is high time."
Hanson's speech turned the tide. The resolutions were passed a week later.
Elias Boudinot, ninth president of the American congresses, was from
Philadelphia, but, in the Continental Congress, he represented New Jersey.
Boudinot was an ardent Christian. He wrote and published The Age of Revelation in opposition
to the writings of Thomas Paine, whom he called an "infidel author." Interestingly,
in this work, Boudinot declared that laws should evolve, writing,
"There is no other instance than that of the [Ten Commandments] of a
body of laws being produced at once, and remaining without addition afterwards."
Late in life, Boudinot was president of the American Bible Society, which brought him
into contact with the young Cherokee leader Gallegina. Highly impressed with Boudinot,
Gallegina took his name. From then on, he was known as Elias Boudinot.
Thomas Mifflin's early career was marked by a scandal. In 1775, he became one of George
Washington's aides and was quickly promoted to quartermaster general. In this position,
he made sure soldiers received their uniforms and equipment.
Mifflin mismanaged the Quartermaster Department finances. Worse still,
he plotted to replace Washington with Horatio Gates as commander
of the troops. He was investigated for misconduct and had to resign in 1779.
But that didn't prevent Mifflin from serving in the Confederation Congress or being elected
president in late 1783. Ironically, in this role, he accepted Washington's resignation
as commander at the war's end. Mifflin oversaw the ratification of the Treaty of Paris, which
established peace between the U.S. and Britain. He would go on to be Pennsylvania's first governor.
Richard Henry Lee belonged to one of Virginia's most powerful families. He
and his brother Francis Lee held many different political positions in the state. Before the war,
they made waves — and enemies — in the House of Burgesses.
Later, they did the same in the Continental Congress. Allied with John and Samuel Adams,
the Lees clashed with Silas Deane of Connecticut,
whom they accused of using political clout to advance his business interests. Richard
Lee wrote to then-president Henry Laurens, asking that Deane be investigated, saying,
"There is so much rottenness at the bottom and in every part of their System."
The resulting feud led to both Laurens' and Lee's resignations.
Before all that, though,
it was Richard who proposed the historic resolution to the Continental Congress:
"Resolved. That these united colonies are and of a right ought to be free and independent states."
Years later, he joined the Confederation Congress
and became its president from November 1784 to November 1785.
Nathaniel Gorham started turning heads during the revolution because of his
work on Massachusetts' Board of War, helping defend the state's coast and
supporting military expeditions into Canada. This earned him a place as a
delegate to the Confederation Congress, where he eventually became president.
Having contributed to the writing of Massachusetts' constitution, he was appointed
to the national Constitutional Convention where he advocated for a strong central government.
Gorham was congressional president during Shays' Rebellion and had seen how helpless
the national government was, relying on state militias to crush it. He thought
things would only get worse without a strong executive. That's why he proposed making the
king of Prussia king of the Americas as well — unsurprisingly, not a popular or successful
plan. He was nonetheless optimistic about George Washington as a leader, writing to him that:
"The unanimous call you have received from your country [...] may be an event
conducive to the wellfare of the People and of happiness and honor to yourself."
Like Thomas Mifflin, Arthur St. Clair was one of George Washington's aides during
the Revolutionary War. Washington became a fan after St. Clair's advice helped him
win a battle at Princeton, New Jersey. But St. Clair made plenty of military blunders
later and ended up on trial several times, including when he lost Fort Ticonderoga,
a strategic location American forces had captured in the early days of the war. St. Clair
was court-martialed for abandoning the fort, but Washington still defended him.
St. Clair was the Confederation Congress president in 1787,
after which the congress named him governor of the Northwest Territory. In that capacity, he
tried to remove Native Americans from the region. This led to a major military defeat where he lost
more than 900 men. St. Clair lost Washington's support at that point, with Washington saying,
"He's worse than a murderer. [...] The blood of the slain is upon him."
St. Clair defended his actions and was ultimately exonerated but resigned from
Congress at Washington's request. Surprisingly though, he stayed governor of the territory.
Cyrus Griffin was the last president of the Confederation Congress before
the Articles of Confederation were replaced by the U.S. Constitution,
but he wasn't originally in favor of American independence. In 1775,
he wrote a "plan of reconciliation" for Britain and the colonies, saying,
"I am convinced that a plan of this sort is the
only way to bring about a happy and permanent accommodation."
By 1778, Griffin was a member of the Continental Congress. He left it in
1780 to become a judge but returned and became president about eight years later.
One of the most interesting episodes of Griffin's life had nothing to do with
politics. While studying law at the University of Edinburgh, he met the daughter of a Scottish earl
and they eloped. When he returned to England a few years later, it wasn't to deliver his
reconciliation proposal. It was to make sure he got his fair share of the earl's inheritance.