Abraham Baldwin

For his nephew, see Abraham Dudley Baldwin.

Not to be confused with Adam Baldwin.

Abraham Baldwin
President pro tempore of the United States Senate
In office December 7, 1801 – December 13, 1802
Preceded by	James Hillhouse
Succeeded by	Stephen R. Bradley
United States Senator from Georgia
In office March 4, 1799 – March 4, 1807
Preceded by	Josiah Tattnall
Succeeded by	George Jones
Member of the United States House of Representatives		In office March 4, 1793 – March 3, 1799
Preceded by	district created
Succeeded by	James Jones
Member of the United States House of Representatives		In office March 4, 1789 – March 3, 1793
Preceded by	district created
Succeeded by	Converted to at-large districts
President of the University of Georgia
In office 1785–1801
Preceded by	none
Succeeded by	Josiah Meigs
Delegate from Georgia to the Congress of the Confederation
In office 1785 – 85, 1787–88
Personal details
Born	(1754-11-22)November 22, 1754 Guilford, Connecticut
Died	March 4, 1807(1807-03-04) (aged 52) Washington, D.C.
Resting place	Rock Creek Cemetery, Washington, DC
Alma mater	Yale College

Abraham Baldwin (November 22, 1754 – March 4, 1807) was an American minister, Patriot, politician, and Founding Father. Born and raised in Connecticut, he was a 1772 graduate of Yale College. After the Revolutionary War, Baldwin became a lawyer. He moved to the U.S. state of Georgia in the mid-1780s and founded the University of Georgia.

Early life, education and career

Abraham Baldwin was born in 1754 in Guilford, Connecticut into a large family, the son of Lucy (Dudley) and Michael Baldwin, a blacksmith. His half-brother, Henry Baldwin, was an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. After attending Guilford Grammar School, Abraham Baldwin attended Yale College in nearby New Haven, Connecticut, where he was a member of the Linonian Society. He graduated in 1772.

Three years later after theological study, he was licensed as a Congregationalist minister. He also served as a tutor at the college. He held that position until 1779. During the American Revolutionary War, he served as a chaplain in the Connecticut Contingent of the Continental Army. He did not see combat while with the Continental troops.

Two years later at the conclusion of the war, Baldwin declined an offer from Yale's new president, Ezra Stiles, to become Professor of Divinity. Instead, he turned to the study of law and in 1783 was admitted to the Connecticut bar.

Move to Georgia

Encouraged by his former commanding officer General Nathanael Greene, who had acquired the plantation at Mulberry Hill where Eli Whitney would later invent the cotton gin, Baldwin moved to Georgia. He was recruited by fellow Yale Alumnus Governor Lyman Hall, another transplanted New Englander, to develop a state education plan. Baldwin was named the first president of the University of Georgia and became active in politics to build support for the University, which had not yet enrolled its first student. He was soon appointed as a delegate to the Confederation Congress and then to the Constitutional Convention; in September of 1787 he was one of the state’s two signatories to the U.S. Constitution.

Abraham Baldwin remained president of the University of Georgia during its initial development phase until 1800. During this period, he also worked with the legislature on the college charter.

In 1801, Franklin College, UGA's initial college, opened to students. Josiah Meigs was hired to succeed Baldwin as first acting president and oversee the inaugural class of students. The first buildings of the college were architecturally modeled on Baldwin's and Miegs's alma mater of Yale where they both had taught . (Later the university sports team adopted as its mascot, the bulldog, also in tribute to Baldwin and Miegs, as it is the mascot of Yale.)

Politics

Baldwin's draft copy of the U.S. Constitution is held by the Georgia Historical Society. It is the second printed draft of the Constitution, printed by Dunlap and Claypoole on four folio leaves complete with Baldwin's signature and marginal notes. This second draft was produced by a Committee of Style and Arrangement, consisting of Alexander Hamilton of New York, William Samuel Johnson of Connecticut, Rufus King of Massachusetts, James Madison of Virginia, and Gouverneur Morris of Pennsylvania. It is one of only a handful still in existence. View the Georgia Historical Society’s finding aid for this item.

Baldwin was elected to the Georgia Assembly, where he became very active, working to develop support for the college. He was able to mediate between the rougher frontiersmen, perhaps because of his childhood as the son of a blacksmith, and the aristocratic planter elite who dominated the coastal Lowcountry. He became one of the most prominent legislators, pushing significant measures such as the education bill through the sometimes split Georgia Assembly.

He was elected as representative to the U.S. Congress in 1788. The Georgia legislature elected him as U.S. Senator in 1799 (this was the practice until popular election in 1913.) He served as President pro tempore of the United States Senate from December 1801 to December 1802. He was re-elected and served in office until his death.

Death and legacy

On March 4, 1807, at age 52, Baldwin died while serving as a U.S. senator from Georgia. Later that month the Savannah Republican and Savannah Evening Ledger reprinted an obituary that had first been published in a Washington, D.C., newspaper: "He originated the plan of The University of Georgia, drew up the charter, and with infinite labor and patience, in vanquishing all sorts of prejudices and removing every obstruction, he persuaded the assembly to adopt it."

His remains are interred at Rock Creek Cemetery in Washington, DC.

Honors

• The United States Postal Service made a 7¢ Great Americans series postage stamp in his honor;
• Places and institutions were named for him, including:
  • Baldwin County in Alabama and Georgia;
  • Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College in Tifton, Georgia;
  • Abraham Baldwin Middle School in Guilford, Connecticut;
  • Baldwin streets in Madison, Wisconsin and Athens, Georgia;
• The University of Georgia erected a statue of Baldwin on the historic North Campus quad in his honor as its founding father.

References

• Abraham Baldwin at the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress