Randolph, Edmund

Randolph, Edmund,

1753–1813, American statesman, b. Williamsburg, Va.; nephew of Peyton Randolph. He studied law under his father, John Randolph, a Loyalist who went to England at the outbreak of the American Revolution. He served briefly in the Continental army as aide-de-camp to George Washington. He was a member of the Virginia constitutional convention of 1776, state attorney general (1776–86), a delegate to the Continental Congress (1779–82), and governor of Virginia (1786–88). Randolph was prominent at the Constitutional ConventionConstitutional Convention,

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See M. D. Conway, Omitted Chapters of History Disclosed in the Life and Papers of Edmund Randolph (1888, repr. 1971); H. J. Eckenrode, The Randolphs (1946).

Randolph, Edmund (Jenings or Jennings)

(1753–1813) lawyer, cabinet officer; born in Williamsburg, Va. (grandson of Sir John Randolph and descendant of Pocahontas). A lawyer and briefly an aide to Gen. George Washington (1775), he served in the Continental Congress (1779–82). As a delegate to the Constitutional Convention (1787), he proposed the Virginia (or Randolph) Plan (basing representation solely on population) and then refused to sign the final version of the Constitution because it was not "republican" enough; later, however, he advocated that Virginia ratify it. Washington named him the first attorney general (1789–94) and then the second secretary of state (1794–95). As the latter, he tried to hold to a neutral path but found himself challenged when Alexander Hamilton got John Jay to negotiate a treaty with the British (1794); intercepted letters from the French ambassador, Fauchet, intimated that Randolph was receptive to bribery; although both Fauchet and Randolph denied this, Randolph was forced to resign. He returned to his law practice and was Aaron Burr's chief counsel when he was tried for treason (1807).