John James Beckley (August 4, 1757 – April 8, 1807) was an American politician who served as the first and fourth clerk of the United States House of Representatives and the first librarian of Congress. Prior to this, he served as the mayor of Richmond, Virginia, in 1783–1784 and 1788–1789.
Born to a family in or around London that fell into poverty during the late 1760s, Beckley was sent by his family to the Colony of Virginia as an indentured servant, serving under the botanist and court official John Clayton. He became prolific in scribal and clerkship duties, and was hired by the clerk of Henrico County after Clayton's death. He was then appointed as the clerk of the county's Committee of Safety in 1775 and served as an assistant clerk for various state bodies. He followed Virginia's government as it moved from Williamsburg to Richmond, and then to the western portion of the state when it was evacuated due to the American Revolutionary War.
After the war, Beckley was elected mayor of Richmond, Virginia. He failed to become the secretary of the Constitutional Convention, but was secretary of the Virginia Ratifying Convention. He was elected the first Clerk of the House of Representatives after receiving endorsements from Edmund Randolph and James Madison. Seen as a competent and diligent clerk, he sought to maintain impartiality but secretly passed political intelligence to his Democratic-Republican allies. Infuriated by the Jay Treaty due to his support for the French Revolution, he became increasingly open in his politics. Strongly supportive of political campaigning (unlike his classical republican allies), he managed Thomas Jefferson's campaign in Pennsylvania during the 1796 presidential election. Jefferson lost the election to John Adams, and Beckley was replaced as clerk.
Unemployed and in dire financial straits, in part due to vast land holdings in the Appalachians that he was unable to sell, Beckley returned to practicing law. Seeking revenge against the Federalist Party leader Alexander Hamilton (who he saw as behind his ousting), he leaked his confession to an extramarital affair in 1797, initiating a scandal and disrupting Hamilton's career. With the income from municipal clerkship positions he was appointed to in Philadelphia, he campaigned vigorously for Jefferson in the 1800 presidential election, which saw Jefferson's victory over Adams. Jefferson restored his position as clerk and made him the inaugural Librarian of Congress. Beckley oversaw the library's early acquisitions and encouraged authors to send copies of their work to the institution. He died in office and was succeeded in both his clerkship and librarian positions by Patrick Magruder. Beckley's son Alfred secured his land holdings after a 28-year legal dispute; on this land, he founded the town of Beckley, West Virginia, named for his father.
Early life
John James Beckley was said to have been born to John and Mary Beckley () in or around London on August 4, 1757. Little is known of his early life, family, or education. He had at least two siblings, both of whom later immigrated to the Thirteen Colonies. His family, possibly hailing from Exeter, had been in a relatively well-to-do position, but fell into poverty during the late 1760s.
Around the end of 1768, Virginian court official and botanist John Clayton requested that the London-based John Norton & Sons mercantile firm send him a young boy to serve as a scribe in his duties as the clerk of Gloucester County, Virginia. Clayton had served as clerk for almost fifty years, but required a scribe as his own writing abilities were declining from old age and failing eyesight. James Withers, a longtime employee of the firm, sent over his 11-year old nephew Beckley, whom his parents sold as an indentured servant. Norton, writing to a relative in Virginia, described Beckley as having good writing abilities and an understanding of arithmetic. Beckley departed from England aboard the Brilliant in March 1769, arriving at the York River of Virginia in mid-May. He was delivered to Clayton's home in Gloucester Courthouse by fleet manager Ephraim Goosley.
Clayton reported favorably to Norton of the "clever, lively boy", writing that he was very skilled in arithmetic and well-behaved, noting that he "eats & drinks at my table with me like family". Beckley worked diligently as a scribe at the courthouse, with Clayton sternly supervising and ensuring that Beckley improved his handwriting. He slowly took on more of Clayton's roles, performing most of his master's duties by his teenage years. Beckley witnessed Clayton's will in late October 1773, and Clayton died on December 23. Shortly afterwards, Beckley was hired by Thomas Adams, the clerk of Henrico County, Virginia.
Early political career
By 1775, the authority of the royal government was collapsing in the colony. In February 1775, a 17-year old Beckley was appointed as the clerk of the Committee of Safety (a local committee of Patriot revolutionaries) for Henrico County. He was reelected to the position by a meeting of freeholders that November. On August 24, 1775, a general Committee of Safety over the whole of the Colony of Virginia was established at its capital city of Williamsburg, with Edmund Pendleton serving as president. Beckley began assisting the Virginia committee's clerk soon afterwards, and was officially appointed assistant clerk on February 7, 1776.
State government
alt=A sketch of the second Williamsburg capitol, a two story building|thumb|Sketch of Virginia's [[Capitol (Williamsburg, Virginia)|second Williamsburg Capitol ]]
Beckley became the assistant clerk of the Council of Virginia on December 23, 1776, and was reelected in July 1777. He replaced John Pendleton Jr. as Clerk of the Virginia Senate by November. He began studying law, possibly utilizing Clayton's library and likely studying in Williamsburg alongside attorney general Edmund Randolph. In June 1779, Randolph was elected to the Continental Congress, and Beckley succeeded him as cerk of the Virginia House of Delegates. He was also appointed clerk of the High Court of Chancery (a position he held until 1785), the state's Court of Appeals, and took over the operations of Randolph's law firm. This added significantly to Beckley's already-busy workload for only a modest amount of pay. That April, Beckley produced a catalogue of the library's holdings—964 volumes, alongside 9 maps and charts. Two months later, after documenting how much of the library's appropriation had been spent, Beckley wrote to Jefferson, a strong supporter of the library, and suggested titles to purchase. Jefferson replied and notified that the purchase of 700 additional volumes had been approved by the committee.
Beckley's health declined in the summer of 1802, and he spent much of the congressional recess at Berkeley Springs (now in West Virginia) to recuperate, returning home in much better condition. He wrote to Rush to encourage him to send copies of his completed works to the library, establishing what would become a common practice with the library. Issues with financial records were common. In one instance, Jefferson ordered books from a bookseller in Paris and included a separate order for a personal encyclopedia. The two orders had been bundled into one purchase and further conflated by an order of wine made by Jefferson, so the library had been charged for the shipping and handling of the whole lot. Jefferson wrote a check to Beckley to resolve this issue. Another debacle emerged in December 1805, after Beckley fired Josiah King, a house clerk who had been initially hired by Condy. King accused Beckley of hiring him as an assistant librarian and then failing to pay him. A house committee investigating the matter found no proof to support King's charges.
In 1805, the House moved back to the room which had since been occupied by the library, so the library was forced to move to a provided committee room. In addition to poor maintenance and a leaky roof, the room was cramped and struggled to accommodate the library's growing collections. Despite these smaller quarters, the library continued to make acquisitions. A congressional committee headed by professor-turned-politician Samuel L. Mitchill recommended that the library acquire more maps and books on history and politics. The Senate passed an appropriation of $1,000 per year to fund this expansion; this bill also allowed other senior officials such as cabinet members to use the library, and authorized the purchase of books published within the United States.
Beckley served as Clerk of the House of Representatives and Librarian of Congress until his death on April 8, 1807. He was succeeded in both positions by Patrick Magruder, a Democratic-Republican official from Maryland who had previously served a term as a member of the House.
Works and views
Beckley assisted in the creation of Jefferson's 1801 Manual of Parliamentary Practice. In 1798, he reviewed and annotated Jefferson's notes on parliamentary procedure, and sent him excerpts from his 1791 work entitled Books of Minutes on Parliamentary Proceedings. Beckley wrote political tracts, editorials, and essays under pen names such as "Americanus", "Senex", or "A Calm Observer". He wrote for papers such as the Philadelphia Aurora, National Gazette and the New York Greenleaf's New Daily Advertiser.
thumb|upright=0.8|[[Thomas Paine formed a major influence on Beckley's thought.|alt=A painting of Thomas Paine]]
Like Jefferson and Madison, Beckley was generally aligned with classical republicanism. His policy and rhetoric generally mirrored that of the two founding fathers, although in Philadelphia and New York he was influenced by Thomas Paine's writings and urban American intellectuals such as Coxe. Beckley was more critical of the agrarian outlook of prominent Virginia republicans, seeing urban citizens as equally virtuous as yeoman farmers. He was supportive of organized political campaigning, a practice often shunned by classical republicans in the south. He was sharply critical of the Federalists and "gentleman-officeholders", and saw them as seeking to supplant themselves as the new ruling class through titles and a lack of humility. Beckley saw suffrage and participation within the electoral process as the most important activity in protecting the republic, praising the "inestimable right of suffrage" as the "first constitutional privilege, panacea, of freemen, the peaceful exercise of which has induced blessings so momentous".
Beckley was an enthusiastic supporter of democratic revolution, extolling the French Revolution and advocating for "cordial union and good understanding" between France and the United States. He was one of the first Americans to obtain a copy of Paine's Rights of Man, a defense of the French Revolution, and arranged for its domestic printing. Beckley lent his copy to Jefferson in April 1791, and asked him to forward it to Samuel Harrison Smith when he finished. This created a significant scandal between Jefferson and Adams, as Smith had included a note from Jefferson praising the book for its attack on "political heresy" in his republication of the work.
Personal life
On April 10, 1779, Beckley was elected as the 32nd member of the Phi Beta Kappa society at the College of William & Mary, following a rule change which allowed non-students such as Beckley to join. Through the society, Beckley became friends with John Brown and John Page, with whom he would design the society's seal. Less than a month after joining, he was elected as the society's clerk. Beckley wrote the charters of its first two branch chapters, Harvard and Yale. He was also elected to the Williamsburg Lodge of Freemasons in 1779. In June 1791, he was elected to the American Philosophical Society. His former master Clayton had been one of its earliest members. Beckley was a hobbyist calligrapher and presented two samples of his writing to the society.
During his early political career in postwar Virginia, Beckley frequently attempted to boost his wealth and prestige through investments. These include his acquisition of worth of land warrants in 1783, which he used to purchase extensive territory in Greenbrier County, now part of West Virginia. His land investments were rendered unprofitable after the collapse of the land speculation scheme of financiers Robert Morris and John Nicholson in 1797. His efforts to become affiliated with the Virginia gentry, whether through wealth or a favorable marriage, were ultimately unsuccessful. He spent much of his time in Richmond at various taverns, where he became drinking companions with future Supreme Court justice John Marshall.
Beckley married Maria Prince, the daughter of a New York merchant, on October 16, 1790. They had four children—three sons and one daughter—but only one, Alfred Beckley, survived to adulthood.
alt=A black and white photo of a painting of Alfred Beckley, a man wearing a suit and sitting in a chair|thumb|Beckley's son [[Alfred Beckley|Alfred named the town of Beckley, West Virginia, for his father.]]
Death and legacy
Long in poor health, Beckley died in Washington, D.C., on April 8, 1807, and was buried at a public cemetery in Georgetown. His obituary was published in the National Intelligencer two days later.
A legal dispute emerged over his estate, resulting in a protracted lawsuit which would not take 28 years to resolve. His widow Maria and his son Alfred were left in an uncomfortable financial situation, worsened by outstanding debts to various colleagues who had lent him money to avoid debtor's prison, including Jefferson and Rush. Maria stayed with friends in Washington and Philadelphia, and later with the family of Kentucky congressman John Fowler. She died in Lexington in 1833. Alfred Beckley was admitted to West Point on recommendation from General William Henry Harrison, graduating in 1823. After serving in various military postings, he was able to secure his father's estate, including a very large tract of unsettled land in western Virginia. Alfred Beckley resigned from the army and built his homestead on this plot; this later emerged into the town of Beckley, Virginia, which he named for his father.
Beckley was an obscure figure to many later historians; he was not given an entry within the 1928–1936 Dictionary of American Biography. He has no surviving portrait; the only known painting of him was destroyed by fire. It was initially uncertain if the John James Beckley who became Clayton's scribe in 1769 was the same individual that later became the first librarian of Congress. Beginning in the late 1940s, a series of scholars published articles about him and his activities, highlighting his role within the early American political system and Jefferson's presidential campaigns. The scholars Edmund Berkeley and Dorothy Smith Berkeley published a biography entitled John Beckley: Zealous Partisan in a Nation Divided in 1973. In 1995, historian Gerard W. Gawalt published a volume of his collected works, Justifying Jefferson: The Political Writings of John James Beckley.