In 1801, he was appointed a delegate from the city and county of New York to the State Convention of that year, which assembled at Albany, October thirteenth (ending October twentyseventh), and altered the Constitution of the State relative to the Senate and Assembly, so as to fix the number of the former at thirty-two and the latter at one hundred, to be increased after each census, at the rate of two yearly, till it equaled one hundred and fifty. The members of the Council of Appointment were also declared to have equal powers of nomination to office with the Governor.

In 1803, Mr. Tompkins was a Member of the Assembly (26th session) from New York city and county.

In 1804, he was elected a Representative to the ninth Congress (1805-7) from the second and third Congressional districts, but did not take his seat, in consequence of his appointment, on the second of July in the above year, as Justice of the Supreme Court of the State of New York. He was then but thirty years

of age.

In the April election of 1807, he was elected to the Governorship of the State, over Morgan Lewis, and (resigning his Justiceship) on the first of July following was inducted into the office.

In 1807, Albany became the seat of the State Government.

On the 3d of February, 1808, Governor Tompkins was chosen Chancellor of the Regents of the University, he being a member of the board by virtue of his office.

In his annual speech to the Legislature, at the commencement of the session, 30th January, 1810, he recommended encouragement, by legal enactments, to domestic manufactures, now springing up all over the Union, consequent upon the restrictive system adopted by Jefferson, and continued by Madison. He also called the legislative attention to the Common School Fund, and suggested carrying into immediate effect the law of 1805, establishing that fund.

In April, 1810, he was reëlected Governor over Jonas Platt. In his speech to the Legislature, at its commencement, on the 29th of January, 1811, he again urged encouragement of domestic manufactures, and attention to the Common School Fund. There

had been no distribution of revenue, nor organization of any system with regard to this fund since the passage of the act of 1805, but the subject being thus a second time called to their attention by the Governor, the Legislature, at this session, took steps to the above effect. A law was passed authorizing the Governor to appoint five commissioners to report to the Legislature a system for the establishment of common schools, and the distribution of the interest of the School Fund. The commissioners made their report on the 14th of February, 1812, and on the nineteenth of the following June, the last day of the prorogued session, an act was passed providing for the appointment of a superintendent,' and the organization of a system the same in substance as the one now in existence.

On the 27th of March, 1812, Governor Tompkins prorogued the Legislature till the twenty-first of May ensuing. This act grew out of the excitement consequent on the application for the charter of the Bank of America, and the reason for it, assigned by the Governor, was that he had been furnished with sufficient proof to show corruption, or an attempt at it, on the part of the applicants, of members of the Legislature."

1 Gideon Hawley, of Albany, was appointed by the Council of Appointment, and continued in the office until the 22d of February, 1821, when he was superseded by the said Council, and Welcome Esleek appointed in his place. Through the distinguished agency of Mr. Hawley, our present common school system was substantially created. In pursuance of his plan, the several enactments, with the amendments, relating to common schools, were, on the 12th of April, 1819, consolidated into one act. During the discussion of the bill in the Assembly, Mr. Hawley, according to the request of the members, took a seat on the floor of the House, and made verbal explanations of his objects in the details of his bill.

The removal of this able champion in the cause of common school education in this State, in 1821, was the direct cause of the abolishment of the office of superintendent, on the third of April of the above year, its duties being transferred to the Secretary of State (then J. V. N. Yates). The duties continued to be discharged by the Secretary of State until the 30th of March, 1854, when the office of State Superintendent of Public Instruction was created by an act of the Legislature and the common school system placed under his control.

2 A large amount of capital having been rendered useless by the failure of the old United States Bank to obtain a recharter from the Congress of 1810-11, a scheme was proposed in this State to charter the said Bank of America, to be established in the city of New York.

On the 18th of June, 1812, Congress passed the act declaring war with Great Britain. Immediately after President Madison's proclamation, on the nineteenth, Governor Tompkins ordered out the militia of the State, and accepted the offers of volunteers. Where he had not power sufficient by law to protect the State and render assistance to the nation, he assumed it on his own responsibility, prudently though firmly. He collected, through his exertions, a large militia force on the Niagara frontiers, under General Van Rensselaer, in the summer of 1812, and at other points troops were stationed.

At the legislative session of 1813, Governor Tompkins recommended in his speech that a loan should be made, by the State to the Federal Government, for the prosecution of the war. The Senate passed a resolution to that effect, but the Assembly refused.

In the April election of 1813, Governor Tompkins was again elected Governor, this time over Stephen Van Rensselaer.

He still continued his exertions to carry on the war, and keep the State in an attitude of defense.

Governor Tompkins had, before the session of 1812, been informed of the scheme, and had, in his annual speech, on the twenty-eighth of January, to the Legislature, although in implied terms, denounced it.

Shortly after the commencement of the session an application was made to the Assembly for the charter. As an inducement for granting it, the petitioners offered the payment of a bonus to the State of $600,000; $400,000 of which were to be added to the Common School Fund; $100,000 to the Literature Fund, and the remaining sum was to be paid into the Treasury at the expiration of twenty years from the date of the incorporating act, provided no other bank charter should in the meanwhile be granted.

It was proposed further to loan $1,000,000 to the State, at five per cent, for canal construction, and the same amount at the usual rate of six per cent to the farmers.

The bill passed the Assembly; a vote in the Senate showed to a certainty it would pass that body, and hence the prorogation.

When the Legislature reconvened, on the twenty-first of May, the bill passed the Senate, the Council of Revision sanctioned it and the incorporation was thus granted.

At the legislative session of 1813, an application of the bank to be relieved from the bonus to the State, and reduce the amount of their capital, was granted in both particulars, with the exception of $100,000, which was to be paid to the Common School Fund.

He recommended in his speech, to the Legislature, on the 25th of January, 1814 (with a detail of the events of the war), that the State should assume its quota of the direct tax Congress had authorized to be levied. This also was approved by the Senate but not concurred in by the Assembly. Other measures, likewise intended to aid the National Government, were passed by the Senate but lost in the House.

Still the Governor continued his exertions. The militia were directed by him to meet frequently for inspection and drill, and the officers to perfect as rapidly as possible the discipline of the men. He directed the State troops to be so disposed as to render aid at any point threatened by the enemy. Many of them at Chippewa and Niagara, under General Porter, rendered good service, and others were the foremost to join General Macomb.

The city of New York, in the summer of 1814, although defenses for it were in progress under General Morgan Lewis, was as yet insecure; and after the attack upon the city of Washington by the British troops, the apprehension throughout the summer was, that the first mentioned city would be the next point of attack. Federalists and Republicans, from the city and its neighborhood, appealed to Governor Tompkins, to exert his authority, and pledged themselves to sustain him if the public safety required him to transgress it. Colonel Willett, Colonel Rutgers, Governor Wolcott and Rufus King, among others, animated him, according to his statement in a letter to Archibald McIntyre, to the greatest efforts.'

1 Mr. King, Governor Tompkins narrates, said that "the time had arrived when every good citizen was bound to put his all at the requisition of the government; that he was ready to do this; that the people of the State of New York would and must hold him (the Governor) personally responsible for its safety." "What," added he in answer to the statement of the Governor, acquainting him with the difficulties under which he had struggled for the two preceding years, the instances in which he had been compelled to act without law or legislative indemnity, and that if he should once more exert himself to meet all the emergencies and pecuniary difficulties which were pressing, he would ruin himself. "What," said Mr. King, "is the ruin of an individual compared with the safety of the Republic. If you are ruined, you will have the consolation of enjoying the gratitude of your fellow-citizens; but you must trust to the magnanimity and justice of your country, you must transcend the law, you must save this city and State from the danger with which they are menaced, you must ruin yourself if it becomes necessary, and I pledge you my honor that I will support you in whatever you do."

Governor Tompkins had issued his proclamation for an extra session of the Legislature on the twenty-sixth of September, but he did not delay his own exertions. On his personal responsibility, he raised a considerable amount of money and expended it in supplies for the troops, and completing the defenses of New York. Militia in large bodies, from the counties along the Hudson, were ordered to the city until an army of between ten and fifteen thousand men were there concentrated. The Governor, by virtue of a temporary appointment as a Major-General in the United States army, assumed the command of this force; but the enemy, after the capture of Washington, was repulsed at Baltimore, the threatened attack passed away, and the alarm at New York ceased.

In the meantime, Governor Tompkins had been offered by President Madison the post of Secretary of State of the United States, but he declined it.

On the twenty-sixth of September the Legislature convened in extra session, according to the proclamation.

In his speech, the Governor chiefly confined himself to the war, recommending various measures for prosecuting it. Laws were passed increasing the pay of the militia while in the United States service, for the encouragement of privateering, for classifying the militia so as to place at the disposal of the national government a force of twelve thousand men, enlisted for two years, for a corps of sea fencibles to defend the city of New York, for reimbursement to the Governor of expenditures made on his own responsi bility, and for completing the Staten Island fortifications.

In January, 1815, at the annual legislative session, Governor Tompkins, in his speech, proposed further measures for the prosecution of the war; but early in the month of February tidings were received that peace had been concluded between the two countries by the treaty at Ghent, December 24th, 1814.

During the war, internal improvement was suspended in the State. In April, 1816, the law authorizing the commissioners for the improvement of the internal navigation of the State (passed June 19, 1812), to borrow $5,000,000 was repealed; but at the conclusion of the war, the friends of the canal enterprise, to connect the Hudson with the western lakes and Lake Champlain, renewed their efforts.