Houston was, however, interested in the possibilities of western land speculations, for his biographer relates that he “joined with others in procuring for John Fitch, the steamboat inventor, the office of Deputy Surveyor. After the treaty of peace with England, the question of how the lands northwest of the Ohio should be disposed of was mooted in Congress. It was thought that they would be sold to pay the debts of the confederacy. Fitch was a land jobber and supposed that a good operation might be made by a presurvey of the country, so that when the Land Offices were opened, warrants might be taken out immediately for choice tracts. He found no difficulty in forming a company to forward such an enterprise. It was composed of Dr. John Ewing, Rev. Nathaniel Irwin, Wm. C. Houston.... These gentlemen put £20 each in a fund to pay expenses.”[[249]] How far this venture was carried and whether Houston acquired lands through it is not related. As a member of the Congress under the Articles of Confederation, he doubtless learned of the advantages to be gained in the West.
William Houstoun, of Georgia, took some part in the proceedings of the Convention, but he was of little weight. He was the son of a royal officer in the government of Georgia; and he received his education in England and studied law at the Inner Temple. His colleague Pierce records that “Mr. Houstoun is an Attorney at Law, and has been a member of Congress for the state of Georgia. He is a gentleman of family, and was educated in England. As to his legal or political knowledge, he has little to boast of.”[[250]] The meagre biographical details available do not permit a statement of his economic interests; and the paucity of the records of the Georgia loan office in the Treasury Department makes it impossible to say whether he was among the beneficiaries through the appreciation of public securities. An index to a volume of Treasury Records not found (Vol. XXVI, folio 44) contains the name of William Houstown, but whether this holder of public debt and the member of the Convention were identical cannot be determined.
Jared Ingersoll, of Pennsylvania, was the son of Jared Ingersoll of Connecticut, sometime agent of that colony as commissioner in England and later admiralty judge in Pennsylvania. He graduated at Yale and studied in the Middle Temple. At the bar in Philadelphia he “soon rose to first rank. His practice was larger than any others. His opinions were taken on all important controversies, his services engaged in every great litigation.”[[251]] Ingersoll was a man of considerable wealth, but he does not seem to be involved in the large transactions in public securities which engaged the attention of his intimate friends in the Convention.[[252]] He does not appear on the Pennsylvania books as a holder of securities. If he held any, his transactions must have been with the Treasury direct, and this would have been very convenient as it was located in Philadelphia during the funding process. Ingersoll was a son-in-law of Charles Pettit, one of the security operators in Philadelphia.[[253]]
Daniel of St. Thomas Jenifer, of Maryland, is reported by Pierce to have been “a gentleman of fortune” in his state.[[254]] He was a planter and a slave-holder; the census of 1790 records his holding twenty slaves on one plantation under an overseer, but the number on his own plantation is illegible.[[255]] It is probable also that he held a small amount of public securities at the establishment of the new government. He died in the latter part of the year 1790, but his son,[[256]] Daniel Jenifer, Jr., appears on the loan office records as the holder of nearly six thousand dollars’ worth of paper in December, 1790,[[257]] which he disposed of the following year.[[258]]
William Samuel Johnson, of Connecticut, was a son of Samuel Johnson, a clergyman of Stratford, Connecticut, and a gentleman of some means. He was a graduate of Yale, and entered the practice of law. He refused to aid in the Revolutionary cause, because he could not “conscientiously” take up arms against England, and he lived in retirement until the War was over. After the establishment of independence he resumed the prominent position in public life which he had enjoyed before the struggle; and according to his biographer he took “the highest rank in his profession and became the renowned and high-minded advocate who was always crowded with cases and had his clients in New York as well as in every part of Connecticut.”[[259]] He added to his own patrimony by marrying the daughter of a “wealthy gentleman” of Stratford.
Johnson was a member of the first Senate under the new Constitution, and he was included by Jefferson in the list of men “operating in securities.”[[260]] It is highly probable that he did not aid the Revolutionary cause by investing his money in the original paper; and he does not appear on the Treasury Books for large amounts of stock,[[261]] but there is every reason for believing that he carried on extensive operations through his son Robert Charles Johnson. The latter was speculating extensively in New York and Connecticut immediately after the establishment of the new government, and two entries show a credit to the father through the son.[[262]] The loan office books under the date of December 13, 1791, credit Robert Charles Johnson, of Stratford, Gentleman, with nearly fifty thousand dollars’ worth of sixes and threes.[[263]] Connecticut loan office receipts confirm this evidence of his extensive holdings. The New York loan office also shows large transactions in the name of Robert Charles Johnson.[[264]]
Rufus King, of Massachusetts, was born in Scarborough, Maine, then in the province of Massachusetts, March 24, 1755. His father, in 1740, was “in prosperous business as a trader and factor for Ebenezer Thornton, one of the principal merchants in Boston for whom he purchased and prepared large quantities of timber.” On settling at Scarborough, his father became “both a farmer and a merchant, and in each capacity was so successful as to become the owner of three thousand acres of land divided into several valuable farms and to be the largest exporter of lumber from Maine.” Rufus was educated at Harvard. When his father died in 1775 he left a good estate which was divided among several children. Rufus King was also fortunate in his marriage; his wife was Mary Alsop. Her father at first sympathized with the movement against Great Britain, but, “taking umbrage at the manner in which the New York convention had conveyed their adhesion to the Declaration of Independence to the Congress, and besides unwilling to close the door of reconciliation with Great Britain,”—he retired to Middletown, Connecticut, and stayed until after the War was over, when he returned to New York, resumed business, and became president of the Chamber of Commerce. According to King himself, his wife “was the only child of Mr. John Alsop, a very respectable and eminent merchant in this city [New York]. Mr. Alsop declined business in 1775 with a very handsome fortune.”[[265]] King thus had extensive mercantile and other business interests which were largely managed for him by others, so that he was able to devote most of his time to politics.
Nevertheless, he did not neglect matters of private economy. Robert and Gouverneur Morris were engaged in 1788 in a plan to associate a number of Americans in a project to purchase up the debt (or portions thereof) of the United States due to France. Wadsworth, General Knox, Osgood, and Colonel Duer were involved in it. It was first proposed to send Gouverneur Morris as minister to Holland to further the scheme. The originators of the plan finally hit upon the appointment of Rufus King. King replied to the overture: “I told Col. Duer that I was not indisposed to a foreign appointment—that the honor and duties of such an office wd. be my sovereign rule of Cond. and that if in perfect consistence with the duties and dignity of the office, I cd. promote the interest of my friends, it wd. be a great satisfaction to me. But that I desired not to be considered as giving an answer any way at present, that ... the opinions of Mr. Jay and Col. Hamilton were of consequence in my mind. That previous to any decision on my part I must be ascertained of their opinions.”[[266]]
Whether King engaged in this ambitious project or not, there is evidence to show that he was a considerable holder of government paper shortly after its establishment. It may be that a part of his fortune had been invested originally in public securities, although this is not apparent from the early loan office books in the Treasury Department. Jefferson puts King down among the holders of bank stock and public securities;[[267]] and he is correct in his statement. King was director in the first United States bank.[[268]] He was also a large holder of government securities—one entry records more than $10,000 worth to his credit.[[269]] King thought that speculations should be reserved to the experienced, and rejoiced in the hope that one of the crashes would teach the ordinary industrious citizens “contentment in their proper avocations.”[[270]]
John Langdon, of New Hampshire, was born on the family farm near Portsmouth in 1740, and “after a mercantile education in the counting room of Daniel Rindge, he entered upon a sea-faring life, but was driven from it by the revolutionary troubles.” He must have prospered, however, before the War blighted his trade, for when the news of the fall of Ticonderoga reached Exeter, he rose in the legislature of which he was the speaker and said: “I have a thousand dollars in hard money; I will pledge my plate for three thousand more. I have seventy hogsheads of Tobago rum which will be sold for the most they will bring. They are at the service of the state. If we succeed ... I will be remunerated; if we do not then the property will be of no value to me.”[[271]]