Gerry, Elbridge

Gerry, Elbridge, American statesman, was born in Marblehead, Massachusetts, 17th July 1744, graduated at Harvard in 1765, and was elected to the Massachusetts Assembly in 1773. He was a member of the Continental Congress of 1776, and served on several important committees; and in 1789 the Republican party elected him to the first National Congress. He was one of the envoys sent in 1797 to establish diplomatic relations with France. His colleagues, Marshall and Pinckney, being Federalists, were ordered to quit France, but Gerry was permitted to remain; and he did remain, to the indignation of Americans, until his recall was ordered. Elected governor of Massachusetts in 1810, Gerry, who was a keen partisan, removed the holders of civil offices and replaced them with Republicans; and he unfairly rearranged the districts of the state so as to secure the advantage to his own party—a manoeuvre for which his opponents coined the word gerrymander. He was defeated in 1812, but his party rewarded his zeal by electing him to the vice-presidency of the United States, in which office he died, 23d November 1814, at Washington. There is a Life by James T. Austin (2 vols. Boston, 1828-29).