Robert Treat Paine Biography

Robert Treat Paine (March 11, 1731 – May 11, 1814) was a signer of the Declaration of Independence as a representative of Massachusetts.

Early life and ancestors

He was born at Boston, Massachusetts, on March 11, 1731. He was one of five children and a son of the Rev. Thomas Paine, Harvard College 1717, who was pastor of the Congreational church at Weymouth, Massachusetts and subsequently a merchant in Boston; and Eunice Treat, the daughter of Rev. Samuel Treat, Harvard College 1669, and Abigail Willard. Rev. Samuel Treat and his father Robert Treat, were the principle founders of Newark, New Jersey.

He was the great grandson of Reverend Samuel Willard, Harvard College 1659, pastor of the Old South Church, Boston, vice-president of Harvard College and the acting president of Harvard College; Robert Treat, the lieutenant-governor and governor of Connecticut for thirty years; prominent in the Charter Oak incident and as commander of the Connecticut forces in protecting the settlers of western Massachusetts during King Philip's War; and the great great grandson of Richard Treat (or Trott) an early New England settler and a Patentee of the Royal Charter of Connecticut, 1662 and Stephen Hopkins (settler), a tanner and merchant who was one of the passengers aboard the Mayflower on the voyage to North America landing at Plymouth, Massachusetts in 1620.

Education

Paine attended the Boston Latin School, and at the early age of fourteen, he became a member of Harvard College from which institution he graduated from in 1749 at age 18. He then was engaged in teaching school for several years at Lunenburg, Massachusetts before yielding to family tradition and entering the ministry. Previous to his commencing the study of law, he devoted some time to the subject of theology. He began the study of law in 1756 and he was admitted to the bar in 1757 being qualified for the practice of law. He first established his law practice at Portland (then part of Massachusetts but now in Maine), and later in Taunton, Massachusetts, where he resided for many years.

Career

In 1768 he was a delegate to the provincial convention which was called to meet in Boston and conducted the prosecution of Captain Thomas Preston and his British soldiers following the Boston Massacre of March 5, 1770; John Adams was opposing counsel. Although Paine was a great orator, Adam's "appeal for justice" won the judge's sway, and most of the troops were let off.

He served in the Massachusetts General Court from 1773 to 1774, in the Provincial Congress from 1774 to 1775, and represented Massachusetts at the Continental Congress from 1774 through 1778. In Congress, he signed the final appeal to the king (the Olive Branch Petition of 1775), and helped frame the rules of debate and acquire gunpowder for the coming war.

He was speaker of the Massachusetts House of Representatives in 1777, a member of the executive council in 1779, a member of the committee that drafted the constitution of 1780, Massachusetts Attorney General from 1777 to 1790 and a justice of the state supreme court from 1790 to 1804 when he retired. When he died at the age of 83 in 1814 he was buried in the Granary Burying Ground in Boston, Massachusetts. A statue to commemorate him was erected in the Church Green area of Taunton.

Robert Treat Paine was a Congregationalist and a devout Christian. He worked as a full-time Congregationalist clergyman, among other occupations, prior to signing the Declaration of Independence. Later he left Congregationalism and Calvinism and embraced Unitarianism, which during that era was an alternative denomination within Protestant Christianity.

Paine died on May 11, 1814 at Boston, Massachusetts. He is buried in the Granary Burying Ground on Tremont Street in Boston, Massachusetts.