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Job Roberts Tyson

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Job Tyson
Member of the
U.S. House of Representatives
from Pennsylvania
In office
March 4, 1855 – March 3, 1857
Preceded byJoseph Ripley Chandler
Succeeded byEdward Joy Morris
Constituency2nd district
Member of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives
Personal details
Born(1803-02-08)February 8, 1803
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.
DiedJune 27, 1858(1858-06-27) (aged 55)
Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, U.S.
Resting placeLaurel Hill Cemetery, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.
Political partyWhig
ProfessionLawyer

Job Roberts Tyson (February 8, 1803 – June 27, 1858) was an American politician who served as a Whig member of the U.S. House of Representatives for Pennsylvania's 2nd congressional district from 1855 to 1857.

Early life and education

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Tyson was born on February 8, 1803, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania,[1] to Joseph Tyson and Ann Van Tromp. He was descended from a Quaker family that settled in the Pennsylvania colony in 1683.[2]

He worked as a clerk in a store and attended the common schools.[3] At the age of 17, he worked as a teacher in Hamburg, Pennsylvania, and taught English to German speaking students of the area. In doing so, he also learned to speak German himself.[4]

After returning to Philadelphia, Roberts Vaux, an early founder of the public school system, helped him obtain work as a teacher in the first public school in Philadelphia. He also devoted himself to study and learned Latin, Greek and Hebrew. After two years, he was appointed as the Director of Public Schools in Philadelphia.[5] He worked in the prison system, for the apprentice's library and helped organize the temperance movement in Pennsylvania.[6]

In 1825, he began the study of law under John Wurts. He was admitted to the bar in 1827 and practiced law in Philadelphia.[7] In 1851, he received a LL.D. degree from Dickinson College.[6]

Career

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Tyson often wrote and spoke about history and law. The Law Academy of Philadelphia published an essay he wrote about the penal system of Philadelphia. He delivered speeches on the trial of William Penn and the history of Pennsylvania.[8] He worked as a lawyer for the Pennsylvania Railroad.[6]

In 1833, he was commissioned by Philadelphians concerned about gambling to write about the problems of lotteries. Lotteries at the time were a common means of raising funds for public and private projects. Benjamin Franklin was involved in organizing the first public lottery in Philadelphia and used them for establishing fire companies and a militia.[9][10] Tyson wrote several works on the subject including A Brief Survey of the Great Extent and Evil Tendencies of the Lottery System, as Existing in the United States in 1833 and The Lottery System in the United States in 1837 that argued for the end of lotteries as a destructive human behavior. Although the movement against lotteries began with the Quakers, other denominations came out against lotteries with Tyson’s forceful argument against the practice. Nine states eventually banned lotteries by 1835 and new states barred lotteries in their constitutions.[11]

In 1836, he was elected a member of the American Philosophical Society.[12] He served as vice-president of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania and as vice-provost of the Law Academy of Philadelphia.[13]

In 1840,[14] He served in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives.[1] In 1846, Tyson began speaking about the need for a railroad connection between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh. He delivered an address on April 28, 1846 to a group of influential citizens and continued to press the issue. Tyson was elected to the Select Council, the upper house of the Philadelphia City Council and pushed the city towards the establishment of what became the Pennsylvania Railroad.[15]

In 1854, Tyson was elected as a Whig to the Thirty-fourth Congress.[16] As a member of Congress, he spoke forcefully in favor of the expulsion of Preston Brooks, who had assaulted Senator Charles Sumner.[17] He also passed a resolution for Congress to fund the publication of a book on Elisha Kent Kane's arctic exploration.[6]

In 1857, he delivered a speech on fugitive slaves laws in which he argued for a return to the principles of the Compromise of 1850. He noted that while he opposed slavery, Tyson argued that Africans, born free or as slaves, were better off, “elevated in character, and improved in condition and happiness, by his residence among a religious, an educated and a free people.” Further, he stated that “The natural inferiority of the negro is physically and metaphysically, a fact.”[18]

Personal life

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Tyson married Eleanor Cope on October 4, 1832. They had no children together and she died in 1847[19] He died on his estate, "Woodlawn," in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, on June 27, 1858,[20] and was interred in Laurel Hill Cemetery in Philadelphia.[1]

Publications

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References

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Citations

  1. ^ a b c "Tyson, Job Roberts 1803-1858". bioguide.congress.gov. Biographical Directory of the United States Congress. Retrieved 7 November 2024.
  2. ^ Tyson 1883, p. 226.
  3. ^ Tyson 1883, pp. 226–227.
  4. ^ Tyson 1883, p. 227.
  5. ^ Tyson 1883, p. 228.
  6. ^ a b c d Wilson, James Grant; Fiske, John (1889). Appletons' Cyclopaedia of American Biography Vol. VI Sunderland-Zurita. New York: D. Appleton and Company. p. 204. Retrieved 9 November 2024.
  7. ^ Tyson 1883, pp. 228–229.
  8. ^ Tyson 1883, pp. 232–233.
  9. ^ "Scheme of the First Philadelphia Lottery". National Archives. Retrieved 2020-05-27.
  10. ^ Robert Gamble. "Lotteries". Philadelphia Encyclopedia. Retrieved 2020-05-27.
  11. ^ Matthew Sweeney (2019-07-01). The Lottery Wars: Long Odds, Fast Money, and the Battle Over an American Institution. Bloomsbury Publishing USA. ISBN 9781608191079.
  12. ^ "APS Member History". search.amphilsoc.org. Retrieved 2021-04-08.
  13. ^ Tyson 1883, p. 237.
  14. ^ Kestenbaum, Lawrence. "The Political Graveyard". politicalgraveyard.com. The Political Graveyard. Retrieved 8 November 2024.
  15. ^ Tyson 1883, pp. 234–235.
  16. ^ Biographical Directory of the American Congress. 1774-1927. Washington, D.C.: US Government Printing Office. 1928. p. 1636. Retrieved 7 November 2024.
  17. ^ Tyson 1883, pp. 238–239.
  18. ^ Speech of Hon. J. R. Tyson, of Pennsylvania, on the fugitive slave laws and compromise measures of 1850; delivered in the House of representatives, February 28, 1857. Washington, D.C.: Washington Globe. 1857. pp. 12–13. Retrieved 9 November 2024.
  19. ^ Tyson 1883, pp. 230–231.
  20. ^ Tyson 1883, p. 241.

Sources

U.S. House of Representatives
Preceded by Member of the U.S. House of Representatives
from Pennsylvania's 2nd congressional district
1855–1857 		Succeeded by
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