Six primary documents from the most controversial act of his career to his death at eighty-three. The treaty that nearly split the republic. The governorship he neither sought nor wanted. The refusal to return to a Court he had already left.
By 1793, the United States was in a dangerous position. Britain and France were at war. Britain was seizing American merchant ships trading with France, impressing American sailors into the Royal Navy, and still occupying military posts in the Northwest Territory that it had agreed to evacuate under the 1783 Treaty of Paris. War hawks in Congress wanted military action. Washington wanted to avoid war at almost any cost, the young republic could not survive another conflict with Britain.
Washington chose Jay, the first Chief Justice, the man who had negotiated the 1783 peace, the most experienced diplomat in the country, to go to London and negotiate a settlement. Jay accepted reluctantly. He knew the mission was politically dangerous. Before departing, he wrote to his wife that he expected to be abused whatever the outcome.
That justice should be done to our injured citizens; that the posts should be surrendered; that compensation for spoliations should be made; that the Treaty of 1783 should be faithfully executed; that there should be no impressment of our seamen; and that our neutral rights should be respected — these were the objects I had in view.
Jay negotiated the treaty in London through the summer and fall of 1794. It was signed on November 19, 1794. The treaty secured British evacuation of the Northwest posts, established a commission to adjudicate British seizures of American ships, and set up a framework for commercial relations. It did not address impressment of American sailors. It did not secure compensation for enslaved people taken by British forces during the Revolution. It granted Britain most-favored-nation trading status.
When the text became public in 1795, the reaction was immediate and violent. Jay was burned in effigy across the country. Someone chalked on a wall in Philadelphia: "Damn John Jay! Damn everyone who won't damn John Jay!" Hamilton was stoned while trying to speak in defense of the treaty in New York City. Jefferson called it "an infamous act." The Senate ratified it on June 24, 1795, by exactly twenty votes to ten, the precise two-thirds majority required, not one vote to spare.
His Majesty will withdraw all His Troops and Garrisons from all Posts and Places within the Boundary Lines assigned by the Treaty of Peace to the United States. This Evacuation shall take place on or before the first Day of June One thousand seven hundred and ninety six.
While the treaty was being debated, Jay was in New York, he had been elected Governor while still in London, without campaigning, and learned of it on his return. He could not publicly defend the treaty while it was before the Senate without violating diplomatic protocol, but he wrote privately to his correspondents explaining his reasoning. The correspondence is at Founders Online and in the Correspondence and Public Papers.
I have no reason to believe or suspect that a better Treaty was attainable... We did not permit the perfect to be the enemy of the good, and our Country will receive more substantial advantages from this Treaty than is generally imagined... I shall continue to think that it was wise and proper to make it, and that it promises much good to our Country.
Jay was elected Governor of New York in 1795 while negotiating the treaty in London, he did not know he was a candidate until he returned. He resigned as Chief Justice to accept the governorship, served two terms (1795–1801), and declined a third. During his governorship he signed into law a gradual emancipation act for New York in 1799, legislation he had been working toward for decades.
Jay had been a founding member of the New York Manumission Society in 1785 and had twice attempted as a New York legislator to pass gradual emancipation legislation in the 1770s. The 1799 act, which freed children born of enslaved mothers after July 4, 1799 (males at age 28, females at 25), was the culmination of that effort. New York's complete abolition of slavery followed in 1827.
I purchase the freedom of as many [slaves] as I can afford, and I am not without hopes that... the number of citizens who are really satisfied with slavery will be found to be smaller than is generally supposed. Till America comes to this it will not deserve the character she assumes among the nations.
When Chief Justice Oliver Ellsworth resigned in December 1800, President Adams offered the position back to Jay, who had held it first. Jay declined in a letter dated January 2, 1801. His reason was specific: the Supreme Court lacked the energy, weight, and dignity it needed to support the national government. He did not believe the institution could be fixed, and he was not willing to spend his remaining energy trying.
Adams then nominated John Marshall. The rest is constitutional history.
I left the Bench perfectly convinced that under a System so defective, it would not obtain the Energy, weight, and Dignity which are essential to its affording due support to the national Government, nor acquire the public Confidence and Respect which, as the last Resort of the Justice of the Nation, it should possess. Hence I am induced to doubt both the Propriety and Expediency of my returning to the Bench under the present System.
Jay retired to his farm at Bedford, New York in 1801 and never held public office again. He was fifty-five. He lived another twenty-eight years, dying on May 17, 1829, at age eighty-three, the longest-lived of the major founders after John Adams (ninety) and James Madison (eighty-five).
In retirement he corresponded with former colleagues, managed his farm, and devoted himself to religious and charitable work. He was president of the American Bible Society from 1821 to 1827. He lived to see New York fully abolish slavery in 1827, the cause he had worked toward since the 1770s. The memorial published by the New York State Bar upon his death in 1829 is at Founders Online.
Blessed by thy great Author of all Good with many signal Mercies and Favours I have much Reason for Gratitude & Thankfulness. They who look for the Things of this World will not find me an acceptable Companion... I am sensible that I cannot add to my stock of Days by being solicitous about them.