John Jay becomes Continental Congress president, Dec. 10, 1778
On this day in 1778, the Third Continental Congress elected John Jay, the former chief justice of the New York Supreme Court, as its president. Jay’s fellow delegates turned to him only three days after he himself also became a delegate.
Eight states voted for Jay, a prominent lawyer who had joined the New York Committee of Correspondence, a group that was instrumental in organizing opposition to British rule. Four states voted for Henry Laurens of South Carolina, a wealthy slaveholder who has served as the Congress’s previous president.Continue Reading
Jay served as president of the Continental Congress until Sept. 28, 1779, in a largely ceremonial position without real power.
He had been elected to the First Continental Congress in 1774 as a representative from New York. He promptly published a paper entitled Address to the People of Great Britain. The article promoted a peaceful resolution of differences with Great Britain short of independence. On the pre-Revolutionary political spectrum, Jay aligned himself within a conservative camp that, fearing mob rule, sought to protect property rights and maintain the rule of law while resisting British violations of colonial rights.
Jay was reelected to the Second Continental Congress in 1775 but was not a signer of the Declaration of Independence the next year because he was recalled to New York to serve as a member of its Provincial Congress.
He had helped draft New York’s constitution before being elected as the state’s first chief justice in 1777. Despite his early misgivings about seeking full independence, Jay went on in 1782 to help negotiate the Treaty of Paris, which ended the Revolutionary War.
Along with Alexander Hamilton and James Madison, he also contributed to the Federalist Papers, which laid the groundwork for the adoption of the Constitution in 1789. Soon afterward, President George Washington appointed Jay the first chief justice of the United States.