SEWARD, William Henry, statesman, born in Florida, Orange County, New York, 16 May, 1801 ; died in Auburn, New York, 10 October, 1872. His father, Dr. Samuel S. Seward, descended from a Welsh emigrant to Connecticut, combined medical practice with a large mercantile business. His mother was of Irish extraction. The son was fond of study, and in 1816 entered Union, after due preparation at Farmers' Hall academy, Goshen, New York He withdrew from college in 1819, taught for six months in the south, and after a year's absence returned, and was graduated in 1820. After reading law with John Anthon in New York city, and John Duet' and Ogden Hoffman in Goshen, he was admitted to the bar at Utica in 1822, and in January, 1823, settled in Auburn, New York, as the partner of Elijah Miller, the first judge of Cayuga county, whose daughter, Frances Adeline, he married in the following year. His industry and his acumen and power of logical presentation soon gave him a place among the leaders of the bar. In 1824 he first met Thurlow Weed at Rochester, and a close friendship between them, personal and political, continued through life. In that year also he entered earnestly into the political contest as an advocate of the election of John Quincy Adams, and in October of that year drew up an address of the Republican convention of Cayuga county, in which he arraigned the " Albany regency " and denounced the methods of Martin Van Buren's supporters. He delivered an anniversary address at Auburn on 4 July, 1825. He was one of the committee to welcome Lafayette, and in February, 1827, delivered an oration expressive of sympathy for the Greek revolutionists. On 12 August, 1827, he presided at Utica over a great convention of young men of New York in support of the re-election of John Q. Adams. He declined the anti-Masonic nomination for congress in 1828, but joined that party on the dissolution of the National Republican party, with which he had previously acted, consequent upon the setting aside of its candidate for Andrew Jackson. In 1830 he was elected as the anti-Masonic candidate for the state senate, in which body he took the lead in the opposition to the dominant party, and labored in behalf of the common schools and of railroad and canal construction. He proposed the collection of documents in the archives of European governments for the "Colonial History of New York," advocated the election of the mayor of New York by the direct popular vote, and furthered the passage of the bill to abolish imprisonment for debt. At the close of the session he was chosen to draw up an address of the minority of the legislature to the people. On 4 July, 1831, he gave an address to the citizens of Syracuse on the "Prospects of the United States." On 31 January, 1832, he defended the United States bank in an elaborate speech in the state senate, and at the close of that session again prepared an address of the minority to their constituents. In 1833 he travelled through Europe, writing home letters, which were afterward published in the "Albany Evening Journal." In January, 1834, he denounced the removal of the United States bank deposits in a brilliant, and exhaustive speech. He drew up a third minority address at the close of this his last session in the legislature. On 16 July, 1834, he delivered a eulogy of Lafayette at Auburn.

The Whig party, which had originated in the opposition to the Jackson administration and the "Albany regency," nominated him for governor on 13 September, 1834, in the convention at Utica. He was defeated by William L. Marcy, and returned to the practice of law in the beginning of 1835. On 3 October of that year he made a speech at Auburn on education and internal improvements. In July, 1836, he quitted Auburn for a time in order to assume an agency at Westfield to settle the differences between the Holland land company and its tenants. While there he wrote some political essays, and in July, 1837, delivered an address in favor of universal education. He took an active part in the political canvass of 1837, which resulted in a triumph of the Whigs. He was again placed in nomination for governor in 1838, and after a warm canvass, in which he was charged with having oppressed settlers for the benefit of the land company, and was assailed by antislavery men, who had failed to draw from him an expression of abolitionist principles, he was elected by a majority of 10,421. The first Whig governor was hampered in his administration by rivalries and dissension within the party, tie secured more humane and liberal provisions for the treatment of the insane, a mitigation of the methods of discipline in the penitentiary, and the improvement of the common schools. His proposition to admit Roman Catholic and foreign-born teachers into the public schools, while it was applauded by the opposite party, drew upon him the reproaches of many of the Protestant clergy and laity, and subjected him to suspicion and abuse His recommendations to remove disabilities from foreigners and to encourage, rather than restrict, emigration, likewise provoked the hostility of native-born citizens. His proposition to abolish the court of chancery and make the judiciary elective was opposed by the bench and the bar, yet within a few years the reform was effected. At his suggestion, specimens of the natural history of the state were collected, and, when the geological survey was completed, he prepared an elaborate introduction to the report, reviewing the settlement, development, and condition of the state, which appeared in the work under the title of " Notes on New York." In the conflict between the proprietors and the tenants of Rensselaerwyck he advocated the claims of the latter, but firmly suppressed their violent outbreaks. He was re-elected, with a diminished majority, in 1840. A contest over the enlargement of the Erie canal and the completion of the lateral canals, which the Democrats prophesied would plunge the state into a debt of forty millions, grew sharper during Governor Seward's second term, and near its close the legislature stopped the public works. His projects for building railroads were in like manner opposed by that party.

In January, 1843, Seward retired to private life, resuming the practice of law at Auburn. He continued an active worker for his party during the period of its decline, and was a frequent speaker at political meetings. In 1843 he delivered an address before the Phi Beta Kapp a society at Union, college on the "Elements of Empire in America.' He entered largely into the practice of patent law, and in criminal cases his services were in constant demand. Frequently he not only defended accused persons gratuitously, but gave pecuniary assistance to his clients. Among his most masterly forensic efforts were an argument for freedom of tile press in a libel suit brought by J. Fenimore Cooper against Horace Greeley in 1845, and the defence of John Van Zandt, in 1847, against a criminal charge of aiding fugitive slaves to escape. At the risk of violence, and with a certainty of opprobrium, he defended the demented negro Freeman, who had committed a revolting murder, emboldened, many supposed, by Seward's eloquent presentation of the doctrine of moral insanity in another case. In September, 1847, Seward delivered a eulogy on Daniel O'Connell before the Irish citizens of New York, and in 1848 a eulogy on John Quincy Adams before the New York legislature. He took an active part in the presidential canvass, and in a speech at. Cleveland described the conflict between freedom and slavery, saying of the latter: "It must be abolished, and you and I must do it."

In February, 1849, Seward was elected United States senator. His proposal, while governor, to extend suffrage to the negroes of New York, and many public utterances, placed him in the position of the foremost opponent of slavery within the Whig party. President Taylor selected Seward as his most intimate counsellor among the senators, and the latter declined to be placed on any important committee, lest his pronounced views should compromise the administration. In a speech delivered on 11 March, 1850, in favor of the admission of California, he spoke of the exclusion of slavery as determined by "the higher law," a phrase that was denounced as treasonable by the southern Democrats. On 2 July, 1850, he delivered a great speech on the compromise bill. He supported the French spoliation bill, and in February, 1851, advocated the principles that were afterward embodied in the homestead law. His speeches covered a wide ground, ranging from a practical and statistical analysis of the questions affecting steam navigation, deep-sea exploration, the American fisheries, the duty on rails, and the Texas debt, to flights of passionate eloquence in favor of extending sympathy to the exiled Irish patriots, and moral support to struggles for liberty, like the Hungarian revolution, which he reviewed in a speech on "Freedom in Europe," delivered in March, 1852. After the death of Zachary Taylor many Whig senators and representatives accepted the pro-slavery policy of President Fillmore, but Seward resist@ it with all his energy. He approved the nomination of Winfield Scott for the presidency in 1852, but would not sanction the platform, which upheld the compromise of 1850. In 1853 he delivered an address at Columbus, Ohio, on "The Destiny of America," and one in New York city on "The True Basis of American Independence."' In 1854 he made an oration on "The Physical, Moral, and Intellectual Development of the American People" before the literary societies of Yale college, which gave him tile degree of LL.D. His speeches on the repeal of the Missouri compromise and on the admission of Kansas made a profound impression. He was re-elected to the senate in 1855, in spite of the vigorous opposition of both the Native American party and the Whigs of southern sympathies. In the presidential canvass of 1856 he zealously supported John C. Fremont, the Republican candidate. In 1857 he journeyed through Canada, and made a voyage to Labrador in a fishing-schooner, the "Log" of which was afterward published. In a speech at Rochester, New York, in October, 1858, he alluded to the "irrepressible conflict," which could only terminate in the United States becoming either entirely a slave-holding nation or entirely a free-labor nation. He travelled in Europe, Egypt, and Palestine in 1859.

In 1860, as in 1856, Seward's pre-eminent position in the Republican party made him the most conspicuous candidate for the presidential nomination. He received 1731/2 votes in the first ballot at the convention, against 102 given to Abraham Lincoln, who was eventually nominated, and in whose behalf he actively canvassed the western states. Lincoln appointed him secretary of state, and before leaving the senate to enter on the duties of this office he made a speech in which he disappointed some of his party by advising patience and moderation in debate, and harmony of action for the sake of maintaining the Union. He cherished hopes of a peaceful solution of the national troubles, and, while declining in March, 1861, to enter into negotiations with commissioners of the Confederate government, he was in favor of evacuating Fort Sumter as a military necessity and politic measure, while re-enforcing Fort Pickens, and holding every other post, then remaining in the hands of the National government. He issued a circular note to the ministers abroad on 9 March, 1861, deprecating foreign intervention, and another on 24 April, defining the position of the United States in regard to the rights of neutrals. Negotiations were carried on with European governments for conventions determining such rights. He protested against the unofficial intercourse between the British cabinet and agents of the Confederate states, and refused to receive despatches from the British and French governments in which they assumed the attitude of neutrals between belligerent powers. On 21 July he sent a despatch to Charles F. Adams, minister at London, defending the decision of congress to close the ports of the seceded states. When the Confederate commissioners were captured on board the British steamer " Trent" he argued that the seizure was in accordance with the British doctrine of the "right of search," which the United States had resisted by the war of 1812. The release of these prisoners, at the demand of the British government, would now commit both governments to the maintenance of the American doctrine; so they would be " cheerfully given up." He firmly rejected and opposed the proposal of the French emperor to unite with the English and Russian governments in mediating between the United States and the Confederate government. He made the Seward-Lyons treaty with Great Britain for the extinction of the African slave-trade. The diplomatic service was thoroughly reorganized by See. Seward; and by his lucid despatches and the unceasing presentation of his views and arguments, through able ministers, to the European cabinets, the respect of Europe was retained, and the efforts of the Confederates to secure recognition and support were frustrated. In the summer of 1862, the army having become greatly depleted, and public proclamation of the fact being deemed unwise, he went to the north with letters from the president and secretary of war, met and conferred with the governors of the loyal states, and arranged for their joint proffer of re-enforcements, to which the president responded by the call for 300,000 more troops. Mr. Seward firmly insisted on the right of American citizens to redress for the depredations of the "Alabama," and with equal determination asserted the Monroe doctrine in relation to the French invasion of Mexico, but, by avoiding a provocative attitude, which might haw involved his government in foreign war, was able to defer the decision of both questions till a more favorable time. Before the close of the civil war he intimated to the French government the irritation felt in the United States in regard to its armed intervention in Mexico. Many despatches on this subject were sent during 1865 and 1866, which gradually became more urgent, until the French forces were withdrawn and the Mexican empire fell. He supported President Lincoln's proclamation liberating the slaves in all localities in rebellion, and three years later announced by proclamation the abolition of slavery throughout the Union by constitutional amendment. In the spring of 1865 Mr. Seward was thrown from his carriage, and his arm and jaw were fractured. While he was confined to his couch with these injuries President Lincoln was murdered and on the same evening, 14 April, one of the conspirators gained access to the chamber of the secretary, inflicted severe wounds with a knife in his face and neck, and struck down his son, Frederick W., who came to his rescue. His recovery was slow and his sufferings were severe. He concluded a treaty with Russia for the cession of Alaska in 1867. He negotiated treaties for the purchase of the Danish West India islands and the Bay of Samana, which failed of approval by the senate, and made a treaty with Colombia to secure American control of the Isthmus of Panama, which had a similar fate Sec. Seward sustained the reconstruction policy of President Johnson, and thereby alienated the more powerful section of the Republican party and subjected himself to bitter censure and ungenerous imputations. He opposed the impeachment of President Johnson in 1868, and supported the election of General Grant in that year. He retired from office at the end of eight years of tenure in March, 1869. After a brief stay in Auburn, he journeyed across the continent to California, Oregon, British Columbia, and Alaska, returning through Mexico as the guest of its government and people. In August, 1870, he set out on a tour of the world, accompanied by several members of his family. He visited the principal countries of Asia, northern Africa, and Europe, being received everywhere with great honor. He studied their political institutions, their social and ethnological characteristics, and their commercial capabilities. Returning home on 9 October, 1871, he devoted himself to the preparation of a narrative of his journey, and after its completion to a history of his life and times, which was not half finished at the time of his death. The degree of LL.D. was given him by Union in 1866. He published, besides occasional addresses and numerous political speeches, a volume on the "Life and Public Services of John Quincy Adams " (Auburn, 1849). An edition of his "Works " was published, which contains many of his earlier essays, speeches, and addresses, with a memoir by George E. Baker, reaching down to 1853 (3 vols., New York, 1858). To this a fourth volume was added in 1862, and a fifth in 1884, containing his later speeches and extracts from his diplomatic correspondence. His official correspondence during the eight years was published by order of congress. The relation of his "Travels Around the World" was edited and published by his adopted daughter, Olive Risley Seward (New York, 1878). Charles F. Adams published an "Address on the Life, Character, and Services of Seward" (Albany, 1873), which was thought by some to have extolled him at the expense of President Lincoln's fame, and elicited replies from Gideon Welles and others. Mr. Seward's "Autobiography," which extends to 1834, has been continued to 1846 in a memoir by his son, Frederick W., with selections from his letters (New York, 1877). The vignette portrait represents Governor Seward in early life, and the other illustration is a view of his residence at Auburn. There is a bronze statue of Mr. Seward, by Randolph Rogers, in Madison square, New York.--His son, Augustus Henry, soldier, born in Auburn, New York, 1 October, 1826; died in Montrose, New York, 11 September, 1876, was graduated at the United States military academy in 1847, served through the Mexican war as lieutenant of infantry, afterward in Indian territory till 1851, and then on the coast survey till 1859, when he joined the Utah expedition. He was made a captain on 19 January, 1859, and on 27 March, 1861, a major on the staff. He served as paymaster during the civil war, receiving the brevets of lieutenant-colonel and colonel at its close.--Another son, Frederick William, lawyer, born in Auburn, New York, 8 July, 1830, was graduated at Union in 1849, and after he was admitted to the bar at Rochester, New York, in 1851, was associate editor of tile Albany "Evening Journal." In 1861, when he was appointed assistant secretary of state, which office he held for the eight years that his father was secretary. In 1867 he went on a special mission to Santo Domingo. He was a member of the New York legislature in 1875, and introduced the bill to incorporate the New York elevated railroad and the amendments to the constitution providing for a reorganization of the state canal and prison systems, placing each under responsible heads, and abolishing the old boards. He was assistant secretary of state again in 1877-'81, while William M. Evarts was secretary. Union conferred on him the degree of LL.D. in 1878. His principal publication is the "Life and Letters" of his father (New York, 1877), of which the second volume is now (1888) in preparation.--Another son, William Henry, soldier, born in Auburn, New York, 18 June, 1839, was educated by a private tutor, and in 1861 engaged in banking at Auburn. He entered the volunteer service as lieutenant-colonel of the 138th New York infantry, and was afterward made colonel of the 9th New York heavy artillery. In 1863 he was sent on a special mission to Louisiana. Colonel Seward was engaged at Cold Harbor and the other battles of the Wilderness campaign. He afterward commanded at Fort Foote, Maryland, and took part in the battle of Monocacy, where he was wounded, but retained his command. He was commissioned as brigadier-general on 13 September, 1864, was commandant for some time at Martinsburg, Virginia, and resigned his commission on 1 June, 1865, returning to the banking business at Auburn. He is president of the Auburn city hospital, and an officer in various financial and charitable associations.--William Henry's nephew, Clarence Armstrong, lawyer, born in New York city, 7 October, 1828, was brought up as a member of his uncle's family, his parents having died when he was a child. He was graduated at Hobart in 1848, studied law, and began practice in Auburn as a partner of Samuel Blatchford, whom he assisted in the compilation of the "New York Civil and Criminal Justice" (Auburn, 1850). In 1854 he established himself in New York city. He was judge-advocate-general of the state in 1856-'60. After the attempted assassination of Sec. Seward and his son, Frederick W., he was appointed acting assistant secretary of state. He was a delegate to the National Republican convention of 1878, and a presidential elector in 1880. His practice has especially related to railroads, express companies, patents, and extraditions. -Another nephew of William Henry, George Frederick, diplomatist, born in Florida, New York, 8 November, 1840, was prepared for college at Seward institute in his native village, and entered Union with the class of 1860, but was not graduated. In 1861 he was appointed United States consul at Shanghai, China. In the exercise of extra-territorial jurisdiction he had to pass judgment on river pirates claiming to be Americans, who infested the Yangtse-Kiang during the Taeping rebellion, and by his energy and determination checked the evil. in 1863 he was made consul-general, and introduced reforms in the consular service in China. He returned to the United States in 1866 to urge legislation for the correction of abuses in the American judicial establishment in China, which he was only able to effect on a second visit to the United States in 1869. He went to Siam in 1868 to arrange a difficulty that had arisen in regard to the interpretation of the treaty with that country. He was appointed United States minister to Corea in 1869, but at his suggestion the sending of a mission to that country was deferred, and he did not enter on the duties of the office. In 1873 he landed the crews of two American vessels-of-war, and, as dean of the consular corps, summoned a force of volunteers for the suppression of a riot which endangered the European quarter. On 7 January, 1876, he was commissioned as minister to China. During his mission he was called home to answer charges against his administration, in congress, and was completely exculpated after a long investigation. He declined to undertake the task of negotiating a treaty for the restriction of Chinese immigration, and, in order to carry out the views that prevailed in congress, he was recalled, and James B. Angell was appointed his successor on 9 April, 1880. After his return to the United States, Mr. Seward became a broker in New York city. He was president of the North China branch of the Royal Asiatic society in 1865-'6. Besides his official reports and diplomatic correspondence, he has written a book on " Chinese Immigration in its Social and Economical Aspects," containing arguments against anti-Chinese legislation (New York. 1881).