Known as the father of New York State, George Clinton served as governor seven terms, and then as vice president of the United States for two terms. Clinton came from middling origins and grew up in Ulster County, New York. He served briefly on a privateer during the French and Indian War (1754-63) and was a junior officer in a British expedition against Fort Frontenac on Lake Ontario in that conflict. After the war he became a lawyer and was elected to the provincial assembly in 1768.

Clinton was an ambitious social and political climber. He gained a reputation as a defender of liberty by speaking out on behalf of Alexander McDougall in 1770 and strengthened his political position by marrying into a locally prominent family. During the intensification of the imperial crisis in 1774 and 1775, he emerged as an important spokesman for the resistance to Great Britain and was selected to be a member of the state's committee of correspondence. In December 1775 he was elected to the Second Continental Congress. He voted for independence in 1776 but did not sign the Declaration of Independence since he was busy with the defense of New York. (Having had some military experience in the French and Indian War, he had been appointed a brigadier general in the state's militia.) In 1776 and 1777 he organized the defenses of the Hudson Highlands campaign and recruited men into the militia and Continental army. He inspired confidence in his men and within the state, and as a result Congress appointed him a brigadier general in the Continental army in 1777. Because of his popularity, and much to the displeasure of the aristocratic leadership in New York, he was elected as governor in the same year.

Few men have confronted more desperate times than Clinton when he was inaugurated as governor of New York in July 1777. The British occupied New York City, Long Island, and the lower reaches of the Hudson River Valley. A powerful army under General John Burgoyne was working its way south from Canada, and a force of British soldiers and Indians threatened the state from the Great Lakes. The Green Mountain Boys of Vermont were declaring themselves an independent state, even though their territory technically belonged to New York, and much of the population under the control of the state government was neutral at best, if not outright loyal to King George III. In short, there was not much left of New York State to govern. In summer 1777 Clinton set out to prevent British troops from moving up the Hudson to join with Burgoyne's forces heading south from Canada. However, he was outmanned and outgunned, and the best he could do was slow the enemy down. He lost the forts guarding the Hudson Highlands, and the British were able to burn Kingston. Despite these defeats, he had delayed the invasion long enough to leave Burgoyne isolated at Saratoga, and the British general was forced to surrender on October 17, 1777. With the failure of their thrust from the Great Lakes at Fort Stanwix, and Burgoyne's surrender, the British were compelled to withdraw to New York City. New York State survived its most perilous moment.

As wartime governor, Clinton followed a policy of rigorous prosecution of Loyalists, confiscating their property to pay for the war and to relieve the state from an excessive tax burden. He also sought to regulate the economy and limit inflation. The popularity of these measures not  only secured the state for the Revolutionary cause, it also led to Clinton's repeated reelection. During the 1780s his policies put the state on such a sound financial base that he did not see the need for a stronger central government. He therefore opposed the U.S. Constitution of 1787, writing Anti-Federalist tracts and working to defeat its ratification. Despite his control of patronage as a political weapon, his political star began to fade as the Federalist Party gained in ascendancy in the 1790s. He declined a reelection bid in 1795, believing defeat likely, but after the victory of the Jeffersonian Democratic-Republican Party in 1800, he came out of retirement and was elected governor again in 1801.

In 1804 the Democratic-Republicans selected Clinton as Thomas Jefferson's running mate, replacing the tarnished Aaron Burr. The now aged and somewhat feeble Clinton became vice president, and though he considered a presidential bid in 1808, he instead became James Madison's running mate. Although he did not like Madison, Clinton remained vice president until his death on April 20, 1812.

Bibliography:

John P. Kaminski, George Clinton: Yeoman of the New Republic (Madison, Wis.: Madison House, 1993)

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