John Y. Mason

John Young Mason
United States Minister to France
In office October 10, 1853 – October 3, 1859
Appointed by	Franklin Pierce
Preceded by	William Cabell Rives
Succeeded by	John Bigelow
16th and 18th United States Secretary of the Navy
In office March 26, 1844 – March 4, 1845
President	John Tyler
Preceded by	Thomas W. Gilmer
Succeeded by	George Bancroft
In office September 10, 1846 – March 4, 1849
President	James K. Polk
Preceded by	George Bancroft
Succeeded by	William B. Preston
18th United States Attorney General
In office March 5, 1845 – October 16, 1846
President	James K. Polk
Preceded by	John Nelson
Succeeded by	Nathan Clifford
Judge of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia
In office March 3, 1841 – March 23, 1844
Appointed by	Martin van Buren
Preceded by	Peter Vivian Daniel
Succeeded by	James Dandridge Halyburton
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Virginia's 2nd district
In office March 4, 1831 – January 11, 1837
Preceded by	James Trezvant
Succeeded by	Francis E. Rives
Member of the Southampton, Surry and Sussex Counties
In office 1830
Preceded by	District established
Succeeded by	Francis E. Rives
Member of the Virginia Senate from Isle of Wight, Prince George, Southampton, Surry, Sussex and Greensville Counties
In office 1826 – 1829
Preceded by	Edmund Ruffin
Succeeded by	District abolished
Member of the Virginia House of Delegates from Southampton County
In office 1823 – 1825 Alongside Henry Briggs, Carr Bowers
Personal details
Born	(1799-04-18)April 18, 1799 Greensville County, Virginia
Died	October 3, 1859(1859-10-03) (aged 60) Paris France
Resting place	Hollywood Cemetery, Richmond, Virginia
Political party	Democrat (after 1833)
Other political affiliations	Jacksonian (before 1833)
Spouse(s)	Mary Ann Fort Mason
Alma mater	University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Tapping Reeve Law School
Profession	Politician, Lawyer, Judge, Planter

John Young Mason (April 18, 1799 – October 3, 1859) was an American politician, diplomat, and United States federal judge.

Early life, education, and career

Born in Hicksford, Greensville County, Virginia, Mason attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill where he was a member of Philanthropic Assembly. Mason graduated in 1816, and then read law at Tapping Reeve Law School in Litchfield, Connecticut to be admitted to the Southampton County, Virginia, bar in 1819. He had a private law practice in Southampton County from 1821 to 1831.

He married Mary Ann Fort, the daughter of a prominent land-owner, in 1821 and became a planter himself, as well as continuing as a lawyer. He owned Fortsville located near Grizzard, Sussex County, Virginia.^[1]

Political activities

He served in the U.S. Military Academy in 1836 on his recommendation. Mason later served as a delegate to the Virginia constitutional convention of 1850.

Federal judicial service

On February 26, 1841, Mason was nominated by President Martin Van Buren to a seat on the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia vacated by the elevation of Peter Vivian Daniel to the Supreme Court of the United States. Mason was confirmed by the United States Senate on March 2, 1841, and received his commission the following day. He resigned from the bench on March 23, 1844, to take a cabinet post.

Cabinet service

Mason was the James K. Polk.

The period of Mason's service as Navy Secretary was marked by intense Congressional pressure for economy, requiring the decommissioning of the Navy's ships of the line and making it difficult to maintain a continuous naval presence on foreign stations. The construction of floating drydocks for several Navy Yards, the simplification of the Navy's ordnance system, an expansion of the Navy's scientific endeavors and the formalization of status of the naval engineers also marked Mason's first term as Secretary.

His second term was marked by efforts to sustain the Navy's combat forces in the Gulf of Mexico and along the far-distant Pacific coast, the beginning of construction of new steamers and an effort to obtain potential warships thorough the subsidization of civilian mail steamships. The latter was an early, and ultimately unsuccessful, experiment in public-private partnership.

Electoral history

• 1831; Mason was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives with 57.88% of the vote, defeating Independent Richard Eppes.

• 1833; Mason was re-elected unopposed.

• 1835; Mason was re-elected with 72.13% of the vote, defeating Whig John Urquehart.

Later life

He was in private legal practice from 1849 to 1854 and served as President of the Virginia Constitutional Convention of 1851 and from 1853, until his death in Paris, France in 1859, the U.S. Minister Plenipotentiary to France. In this capacity he attracted attention by wearing at the court of Napoleon III a simple diplomatic uniform (for this he was rebuked by U.S. Secretary of State William L. Marcy, who had ordered American ministers to wear a plain civilian costume), and by joining with James Buchanan and Pierre Soulé, ministers to Great Britain and Spain respectively, in drawing up (October 1854) the famous Ostend Manifesto.

In politics he was a typical Virginian of the old school, a states rights Democrat, upholding slavery and hating abolitionism.

After his death in Paris, his remains were conveyed to the United States and interred in Hollywood Cemetery, Richmond, Virginia.

USS Mason (DD-191) from 1920 to 1940, was named in honor of Secretary of the Navy John Y. Mason.

John Y. Mason's Home historical marker

References

• John Y. Mason at the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress
• John Y. Mason at the Biographical Directory of Federal Judges, a public domain publication of the Federal Judicial Center.

Further reading

• Williams, Frances Leigh (1967). "The Heritage and Preparation of a Statesman, John Young Mason, 1799-1859". Virginia Magazine of History and Biography 75 (3): 305–330.  

External links

• John Y. Mason at the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress

United States Attorneys General Randolph Bradford Lee Lincoln Breckinridge Rodney Pinkney Rush Wirt Berrien Taney Butler Grundy Gilpin Crittenden Legaré Nelson Mason Clifford Toucey Johnson Crittenden Cushing Black Stanton Bates Speed Stanbery Evarts Hoar Akerman Williams Pierrepont Taft Devens MacVeagh Brewster Garland Miller Olney Harmon McKenna Griggs Knox Moody Bonaparte Wickersham McReynolds Gregory Palmer Daugherty Stone Sargent W D Mitchell Cummings Murphy Jackson Biddle T C Clark McGrath McGranery Brownell Rogers Kennedy Katzenbach W R Clark J N Mitchell Kleindienst Richardson Saxbe Levi Bell Civiletti Smith Meese Thornburgh Barr Reno Ashcroft Gonzales Mukasey Holder

Cabinet of President John Tyler (1841–1845) Vice President None (1841–1845) Secretary of State Daniel Webster (1841–1843) Abel P. Upshur (1843–1844) John C. Calhoun (1844–1845) Secretary of the Treasury Thomas Ewing (1841) Walter Forward (1841–1843) John C. Spencer (1843–1844) George M. Bibb (1844–1845) Secretary of War John Bell (1841) John C. Spencer (1841–1843) James M. Porter (1843–1844) William Wilkins (1844–1845) Attorney General John J. Crittenden (1841) Hugh S. Legaré (1841–1843) John Nelson (1843–1845) Postmaster General Francis Granger (1841) Charles A. Wickliffe (1841–1845) Secretary of the Navy George E. Badger (1841) Abel P. Upshur (1841–1843) David Henshaw (1843–1844) Thomas W. Gilmer (1844) John Y. Mason (1844–1845)

Cabinet of President James K. Polk (1845–1849) Vice President George M. Dallas (1845–1849) Secretary of State James Buchanan (1845–1849) Secretary of the Treasury Robert J. Walker (1845–1849) Secretary of War William Learned Marcy (1845–1849) Attorney General John Y. Mason (1845–1846) Nathan Clifford (1846–1848) Isaac Toucey (1848–1849) Postmaster General Cave Johnson (1845–1849) Secretary of the Navy George Bancroft (1845–1846) John Y. Mason (1846–1849)