Edward Rutledge

Edward Rutledge ( born November 23, 1749 Charleston, South Carolina; † January 23, 1800 ) was a British- American politician and one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence of the United States one of the American founding fathers.

Early years and political rise

Edward Rutledge was the younger brother of John Rutledge, the first Governor of South Carolina. After primary school, Edward studied in England at the Middle Temple Law School and was admitted to the bar in 1772 under British law. After his return in 1773 he was admitted as a lawyer in South Carolina. His political rise began in 1774 when he was a delegate to the First Continental Congress of the thirteen founding states of the later United States. In 1776 he was one of the signatories of the American Declaration of Independence. Rutledge was also a member of the first two regional congresses of South Carolina in 1775 and 1776 took place. In 1779 he was again elected to the Continental Congress. He had not begun, because he participated as an officer in the American Revolutionary War, this office. In 1780 he came to Charleston in British captivity. In July of the following year he was released as part of a prisoner exchange. Between 1782 and 1792, he was with a few interruptions, a deputy in the Parliament of South Carolina. In 1790 it belonged to the Committee on the revision of the Constitution of South Carolina. He was also the initiator of the law for the abolition of primogeniture in South Carolina. In 1794 he rejected an appeal by President George Washington to the judge on the United States Supreme Court ( Supreme Court ). His brother John was appointed to the Supreme Judge of this Court a year later, but not confirmed by the U.S. Senate.

Governor of South Carolina

End of 1798 Rutledge was elected by the Members of Parliament to the Governor of South Carolina. His term of office began on 18 December 1798. During this time, the question was discussed whether a U.S. state had the right to enforce federal laws on one side of his territory except force. Rutledge designed several resolutions in favor of such a possibility. But he was at that time in South Carolina no majority. This issue should still play an important role in the history of the country and the Union 30 years later during the so-called Nullifikationskrise. During his tenure, including the management of South Carolina was reformed. It created new administrative units such as districts and counties (districts ). The Court of Auditors ( Comptroller ) was then established in South Carolina as a separate office. Edward Rutledge could not finish his two-year term because he already passed away in January of 1800 in the office. Edward Rutledge was married twice and had three children.

Rutledge caused some excitement, because the original draft of the Declaration of Independence, stated and supported by Thomas Jefferson, the prohibition of slavery contained and the southern states caused them not to vote for it until it has been promised to remove this passage. As Rutledge returned to South Carolina, he released all his slaves.