Robert Treat Paine, Massachusetts

1731-1814

Representing Massachusetts at the Continental Congress

Robert Treat Paine was a native of Massachusetts, born in 1731. He was expected, by family tradition, to become a Minister. He got high marks at the Boston Latin School and was admitted to Harvard College, where he graduated in 1749. He taught school for a while and then began the study of theology. Because of his frail health, Paine set out to build up his strength by working on the sea. He spent some years as a merchant marine visiting the southern colonies, Spain, the Azores, and England. When he returned home he decided to pursue the law. He was admitted to the bar of Massachusetts in 1757. He first set up office in Portland, Maine (then part of Massachusetts) and later relocated to Taunton, Massachusetts. In the trials of British soldiers following the Boston Massacre, Paine served as associate prosecuting attorney.

He was elected to the Provincial Assembly in 1770 and that body selected him in 1774 to attend the first Continenetal Congress. Paine served on committees which formed the rules of debate, and later served as chairman of the committee charged with acquiring gunpowder for the Continental Army. He also signed the final appeal to the king, known as the Olive Branch Petition, in 1775. Paine was reelected to represent Massachusetts at the Continental Congress of 1776. He participated in the debates leading to the resolution for Independence and his signature appears on the Declaration. According to comments made by Benjamin Rush, Paine was known in Congress as the "Objection Maker," because of his habit of frequent objections to the proposals of others. These objections were eventually taken lightly, for as Rush commented, "He seldom proposed anything, but opposed nearly every measure that was proposed by other people..."

In 1777 Paine was elected attorney general of the state of Massachusetts. He was then serving on the legislative committee to draft the first constitution of the state under the new federation. He moved back to Boston in 1780 where he helped found the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Governor Hancock offered him an appointment to the bench of the Supreme Court in 1783 but he declined. That offer was made again in 1796 and he accepted. He retired after some 14 years, in failing health, then died at the age of 83.

From: US History.org

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A clergyman turned lawyer-jurist, Robert Treat Paine spent only a short time in Congress but enjoyed considerable political prestige in Massachusetts. His second son (1773-1811) and great-grandson (1835-1910), both bearing exactly the same names as he, gained fame respectively as poet and businessman-philanthropist.

Among the ancestors of Paine, who was born at Boston in 1731, were many New England religious and political leaders. His father was a merchant who had once been a clergyman. Young Paine led his class at Boston Latin School and graduated from Harvard in 1749. He then taught school for a time before yielding to family tradition and entering the ministry.

In 1755, during the French and Indian War, he served as chaplain on a military expedition to Crown Point, N.Y. To improve his health, he made a voyage to the Carolinas, England, Spain, and Greenland. About this time, he decided to forsake the ministry for the law, in which he had become interested during his theological studies. Admitted to the Massachusetts bar in 1757, he opened an office in Portland but in 1761 moved to Taunton.

Paine, a friend of John Adams and John Hancock, early became involved in the patriot movement. As a result, he was chosen in 1770 as one of the prosecuting attorneys in the Boston Massacre trial and thus gained recognition throughout the Colonies. That same year, he married, siring eight children. Between 1773 and 1778, except in 1776, he served in the Massachusetts legislature, in 1777 being speaker of the lower house. He was one of the first five Delegates sent by Massachusetts to the Continental Congress (1774-76), where he specialized in military and Indian affairs. He gained the nickname "Objection Maker" because he argued against so many proposals.

Although reelected to Congress in 1777, Paine chose to stay in Massachusetts. In addition to his legislative speakership, he was elected as the first attorney general, a position he held until 1790. Between 1778 and 1780 he played a prominent role in drafting the Massachusetts constitution. From 1790 until 1804, appointed by his old friend Hancock, he sat as an associate justice of the Superior Court.

Meantime, in 1780, Paine had moved from Taunton to Boston and become active in civic affairs. Indicative of his lifelong interest in science, that same year he was one of the founders of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In religion, he broke away from Calvinism and embraced Unitarianism. Politically, he alined himself with the Federalists. In 1804 increasing deafness brought about his retirement from the Superior Court, and he died a decade later at the age of 83 in Boston. He was buried in the Old Granary Burying Ground.

From: National Park Service