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FINLEY, Robert, clergyman, born in Princeton, New Jersey, in 1772; died in Athens, Georgia, 3 October 1817. His father, James Finley, came to this country from Scotland in 1769. Robert was graduated at Princeton in 1787, and taught until 1793, when he became a tutor in the College, studying theology at the same time. He was licensed to preach on 16 September 1794, and on 16 June 1795, was ordained pastor of the Presbyterian Church at Baskingridge, New Jersey, where he also conducted a successful school. In 1815 he suggested the formation of Bible classes throughout the church, and his plan was recommended by the general assembly, He had been for some time interested in plans for improving the condition of the free Negroes, and, having conversed and corresponded with ninny prominent men in regard to the colonization scheme, went to Washington in 1816 to secure for it government sanction. The result of his efforts was the formation, on 28 December 1816, of the American colonization society, and in January 1817, he established an auxiliary society in New Jersey.
In July 1817, he became president of Franklin College, Athens, Georgia He was a trustee of Princeton from 1806 till he resigned, in 1817, on his departure for Georgia, and, in accepting his resignation, the College gave him the degree of D.D. Dr. Finley was a man of decision and energy, and held high rank as a preacher. Besides several sermons, he published "Thoughts on the Colonization of the Free Blacks," a pamphlet that had much to do with awakening public attention to his enterprise (1816).
His son, Robert Smith Finley, clergyman, born in Baskingridge, New Jersey, 9 May 1804; died in Talladega, Ala., 2 July 1860, was graduated at Princeton in 1821, studied law, and was admitted to the bar in Cincinnati, but abandoned his profession for the ministry, and was ordained as a Presbyterian clergyman in 1842. He was for some time a missionary among the slaves near Natchez, Miss., and edited for six years, in St. Louis, the "Liberian Advocate," a journal devoted to his father's scheme of colonization. He was pastor at Metuchen, New Jersey, in 1850'8, and in the latter year became principal of the Presbyterian female institute at Talladega, Ala.
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