Trumbull, The Declaration of Independence, 1786-87

Image ID: 7827

Collection: Karen Halttunen

Topic(s): Eighteenth Century, Pre-Revolution, Politics & Government

Region(s): United States

CA Standard(s): 8.1 - Major events preceding the founding of the nation and the development of American constitutional democracy

National Standard(s): Revolution and the New Nation (1754-1820s)

Card Text: John Trumbull, "The Declaration of Independence," July 4, 1776, 1818 (placed 1826), the US Capitol Rotunda. Like many artists of the early-Federal period (c. 1789-1801), Trumbull's name is not immediately recognized by most Americans. Yet most Americans are well aware of many of Trumbull’s most famous paintings. Trumbull’s portrait of the first Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton, has long graced the ten-dollar bill. Although Trumbull made a career as a portraitist, his real ambition lay in the painting of larger, more ambitious historical compositions. The one most frequently reproduced in history textbooks is "The Declaration of Independence." Trumbull was the sixth and youngest child of Jonathan Trumbull and Faith Robinson. If there was an aristocracy in colonial New England, Trumbull was born into it. His Harvard-educated father was a representative to the Connecticut General Assembly, the Governor of Connecticut Colony (1769-76), and after the Revolution, the Governor of the state of Connecticut (1776- 84). The artist’s mother was a direct descendant of John Robinson, the so-called “Pastor to the Pilgrim-Fathers” before they sailed on the Mayflower for the New World. Given his prestigious family legacy, Trumbull the Elder had little interest in allowing Trumbull the Younger to pursue a career as a painter. He sent his son to Harvard College to find a more useful vocation in either the law or the ministry. However, in 1772, Trumbull visited the artist John Singleton Copley who was then still in Boston, near Cambridge. When writing his autobiography almost half a century later in 1841 Trumbull still remembered this meeting with great clarity: "We found Mr. Copley dressed to receive a party of friends at dinner. I remember his dress and appearance—an elegant looking man, dressed in a fine maroon cloth, with gilt buttons—this was dazzling to my unpracticed eye!—but his paintings, the first I had ever seen deserving the name, riveted, absorbed my attention, and renewed all my desire to enter upon such a pursuit. But my destiny was fixed, and the next day I went to Cambridge, passed my examination in fro, and was readily admitted to the Junior class. There was no art major at Harvard in the 18th century, so Trumbull studied art in his free time, copying and sketching works of art that hung on the college’s walls. He also learned from books he was able to borrow from the college’s library. He graduated in 1773 and became one of the few artists in the history of early American art to complete a college education. Trumbull graduated from Harvard during a tumultuous period in American history, and he wanted a commission as an officer in the Continental Army. He drew a plan of the British army’s position at Boston Neck for General Washington as a way of introduction. Soon, Washington appointed him as an aide-de-camp (a confidential assistant to a senior officer). The following year, in 1776, Major General Horatio Gates appointed Trumbull deputy adjutant-general (military chief administrative officer) at the rank of Colonel. Trumbull resigned his commission because of a minor squabble with Congress, but he carried the honorific title of Colonel for the remainder of his life. Because of his military experience, Trumbull believed that he was uniquely qualified to depict the major events of the American Revolutionary War. His first step was to seek artistic training, and in 1780 sailed for London and Benjamin West’s studio; West was an American artist with a successful career in London. Trumbull was decidedly anti-British, and in November 1780 he was arrested and charged with treason. He was imprisoned for more than 8 months and released only after powerful friends—Benjamin West and the statesman Edmund Burke among others—appealed to the Privy Council for the artist’s release. Trumbull was given 30 days to leave Great Britain. Trumbull returned to Connecticut for two years, and during that time his father again attempted to convince him to pursue another more profitable vocation. Undeterred, Trumbull returned to London and West’s studio in 1784. Trumbull studied with West and at the Royal Academy of Art. The aspiring artist made quick progress. Growing in confidence, Trumbull was determined to return to the newly formed United States with paintings that would commemorate the recent victory over Great Britain. Writing to his father—whose approval, it seems, he still sought—Trumbull explained in March of 1785, the great object of my wishes…is to take up the History of Our Country, and paint the principal Events particular of the late War. By the end of the year, Trumbull had already begun work on two paintings of the series, The Death of General Warren at the Battle of Bunker’s Hill, and The Death of General Montgomery in the Attack on Quebec. In 1786, Trumbull began to plan three other Revolutionary War paintings: The Death of General Mercer at the Battle of Princeton, The Capture of the Hessians at Trenton, and The Surrender of Lord Cornwallis at Yorktown. All five of these compositions are scenes of battlefields. In July 1786, Trumbull accepted Thomas Jefferson’s invitation to visit Paris, and he brought Bunker’s Hill and the Attack on Quebec with him. Jefferson, then the United States Ambassador to France, and a bit of artist himself, managed to convince Trumbull that he should turn his artistic talents towards a scene involving the Declaration of Independence. While in Paris, Trumbull began to sketch out the composition, taking into account Jefferson’s memory of the event and the [diplomat’s own sketch](http://artgallery.yale.edu/collections/objects/2805) of the Assembly Room in the Pennsylvania State House in Philadelphia where the Declaration of Independence was first presented to Congress and subsequently signed. John Trumbull, The Declaration of Independence, oil on canvas, 12' x 18' (Rotunda, U.S. Capitol) John Trumbull, The Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776, 1818 (placed 1826), oil on canvas, 12′ x 18′ (Rotunda, U.S. Capitol) The painting that resulted from this collaboration between artist and politician has become one of the most famous images in the history of American art. It can be found on the back of the (seldom used) $2 bill, and has graced American postage stamps. And yet, what the painting depicts is often misunderstood. Trumbull himself called this painting The Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776. However, this is inaccurate; this painting depicts not the signing of the document, but instead the presentation of a draft of it to Congress on 28 June 1776. Our attention begins with the five men standing in the middle of the painting, the so-called Committee of Five that was primarily responsible for the written document. They are—from left to right—John Adams of Massachusetts, Roger Sherman of Connecticut, Robert R. Livingston of New York, Thomas Jefferson of Virginia, and Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania. Clearly, the red-headed Jefferson is the most important, for he alone holds the document that he presents to John Hancock, the President of the Continental Congress, who sits behind the desk. The so-called Committee of Five, from left to right—John Adams of Massachusetts, Roger Sherman of Connecticut, Robert R. Livingston of New York, Thomas Jefferson of Virginia, and Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania (detail), John Trumbull, The Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776, 1786–1820, oil on canvas, 20 7/8 x 31 inches / 53 x 78.7 cm (Yale University Art Gallery) The so-called Committee of Five, from left to right—John Adams of Massachusetts, Roger Sherman of Connecticut, Robert R. Livingston of New York, Thomas Jefferson of Virginia, and Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania (detail), John Trumbull, The Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776, 1786–1820, oil on canvas, 20 7/8 x 31 inches / 53 x 78.7 cm (Yale University Art Gallery) Of the five men standing, Trumbull was able to paint three of them—Adams, Jefferson, and Franklin—from life and directly onto the canvas prior to departing from Europe. When the artist returned to the United States in 1789, he spent several years traveling up and down the eastern seaboard so that he could paint portraits from life. This was not always possible, however, and in 1817—some 27 years later, Trumbull was still at work on what would become his most famous image. He wrote to Jefferson that year to inform the former president as to the progress he had made on this relatively small—21” x 31”—image: The picture will contain Portraits of at least Forty Seven Members:—for the faithful resemblance of Thirty Six I am responsible, as they were done by myself from the Life, being all who survived in the year 1791. Of the Remainder, Nine are from Pictures done by others:—one Gen[era]l Whipple of New Hampshire is from Memory: and one Mr. Ben. Harrison of Virginia is from description, aided by memory. To compare this image to those Trumbull began at the same time—the battle paintings of the Revolutionary War Series—is interesting, for while some of those are dynamic and filled with drama, The Declaration of Independence is, at its essence, a static—some might claim pictorially boring—image of a group of seated men looking at a group of standing men. Indeed, other artists—Jacques-Louis David comes to mind—were able to conceive a way to depict a similar event in a visually engaging way. David’s sketch for the Oath of the Tennis Court (below, depicting one of the first events of the French Revolution), for example, is far more dynamic and dramatic than is Trumbull’s painting. Jacques Louis David, The Oath of the Tennis Court, 1791, pen and brown ink, brown wash with white highlights, 66 x 101 cm (Palace of Versailles) Jacques Louis David, The Oath of the Tennis Court, 1791, pen and brown ink, brown wash with white highlights, 66 x 101 cm (Palace of Versailles) But this seemed not to matter to Trumbull, nor did it bother many members of Congress, for on 17 January 1817 they approved—by an overwhelming 150-50 majority—a proposal to commission Trumbull to complete four paintings for the Great Rotunda of the as yet uncompleted Capitol Building. Increasing the size of The Declaration of Independence to 12’x18’ did little to enhance its dynamism. In 1828, for example, John Randolph of Virginia wrote, the Declaration of Independence [ought] to be called the Shin-piece, for surely never was there before such a collection of legs submitted to the eyes of man. Still others criticized the lack of accuracy in the room and furnishings, and, as importantly, as to who was actually present when the document was presented. But these concerns were of little bother to Trumbull, who had become one of the most powerful voices—if not one of the more skilled paintbrushes—in American art during the first half of the nineteenth century. Indeed, Trumbull served as the President of the conservative American Academy of Fine Arts from 1817 until 1836. Without doubt, this position helped him receive the prestigious congressional commission in 1817 and allowed him to exert considerable influence over the direction of American art during the end of his career. Moreover, his autobiography—written just two years prior to his death—provided the opportunity to explain his (perhaps exaggerated) importance within American art. While the Declaration of Independence might not be the most interesting work within the history of American painting, it certainly is one of the most recognizable. Trumbull, no doubt, would approve of this.

Citation: Image: Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division, Horydczak Collection, Washington, DC 20540. LC-H8-CT-C01-062-A. Text: Dr. Bryan Zygmont, "John Trumbull, The Declaration of Independence," in Smarthistory, Feb 25, 2016. https://smarthistory.org/trumbull-declaration/. May 19, 2020.

'Apotheosis of George Washington'

Image ID: 4595

Collection: Roland Marchand

Topic(s): National Politics, Early National Period, Politics & Government

Region(s): United States

CA Standard(s): 8.4 - The aspirations and ideals of the people of the new nation

National Standard(s): Revolution and the New Nation (1754-1820s)

Card Text: "Apotheosis of George Washington," 19th century, watercolor on glass.

Citation: Copyright holder unknown. Winterthur Museum, Winterthur, DE 19735. Morristown National Historical Park, MORR 941. In Francis Russell and the Eds. of American Heritage, The American Heritage History of the Making of the Nation, 1783-1860, 1968, p. 66. 8.4.2

'George Washington Giving the Laws'

Image ID: 7913

Collection: Karen Halttunen

Topic(s): Eighteenth Century, Washington, Politics & Government

Region(s): United States

CA Standard(s): 8.6 - The divergent paths of the American people from 1800 to the mid-1800s...with emphasis on the Northeast. , 8.1 - Major events preceding the founding of the nation and the development of American constitutional democracy

National Standard(s): Revolution and the New Nation (1754-1820s)

Card Text: Unidentified artist, "George Washington Giving the Laws"

Citation: Location unknown

George Caleb Bingham, 'Stump Speaking' 1853-54

Image ID: 8667

Collection: Karen Halttunen

Topic(s): Nineteenth Century, Genre Painting, Politics & Government

Region(s): United States

CA Standard(s): 8.2 - The political principles underlying the U.S. Constitution and compare the enumerated and implied powers of the federal government

National Standard(s): Revolution and the New Nation (1754-1820s)

Card Text: George Caleb Bingham, "Stump Speaking," 1853-54, detail, oil on canvas, 108 x 147.3 cm.

Citation: Courtesy of The St. Louis Art Museum, 1 Fine Arts Dr, Forest Park, St. Louis, MO 63110. All rights reserved. We are grateful for the generosity of the St. Louis Art Museum.

George Caleb Bingham, 'The Verdict of the People' 1854-5

Image ID: 8737

Collection: Karen Halttunen

Topic(s): Nineteenth Century, Working Class Culture, Politics & Government

Region(s): South America

CA Standard(s): 8.2 - The political principles underlying the U.S. Constitution and compare the enumerated and implied powers of the federal government

National Standard(s): Revolution and the New Nation (1754-1820s)

Card Text: George Caleb Bingham, "The Verdict of the People," 1854-5, oil on canvas, 42 ½ x 58 in.

Citation: Courtesy of The St. Louis Art Museum, 1 Fine Arts Dr, St. Louis, MO 63110. All rights reserved. Our thanks to the Museum.

A. Wighe, 'Trial by Jury' 1849

Image ID: 11341

Collection: Louis Warren

Topic(s): Politics & Government

Region(s): United States

CA Standard(s): 8.2 - The political principles underlying the U.S. Constitution and compare the enumerated and implied powers of the federal government

National Standard(s): Expansion and Reform (1801-1861)

Card Text: Courtroom scene of early America, 1849, an informal, "frolicking time." A. Wighe, "Trial by Jury," painting.

Citation: ASK Copyright © Museum of Art, Rhode Island School of Design, 224 Benefit St, Providence, RI 02903. Gift of Edith Jackson Green and Ellis Jackson. All rights reserved.

Theophilus Adam Wylie, 'Political Scene [Meeting] in Early Bloomington' 1837

Image ID: 4065

Collection: Roland Marchand

Topic(s): Social Disorder, Social disorder and order to 1865, Politics & Government

Region(s): United States

CA Standard(s): 8.3 - The foundation of the American political system and the ways in which citizens participate in it

National Standard(s): Expansion and Reform (1801-1861)

Card Text: Theophilus Adam Wylie, "Political Scene [Meeting] in Early Bloomington," 1837.

Citation: Copyright holder and location unknown. Indiana University? 8.3.1

Cartoon: 'Congressional pugilists' 1798

Image ID: 11739

Collection: Louis Warren

Topic(s): Politics & Government

Region(s): United States

CA Standard(s): 8.2 - The political principles underlying the U.S. Constitution and compare the enumerated and implied powers of the federal government, 8.3 - The foundation of the American political system and the ways in which citizens participate in it

National Standard(s): Revolution and the New Nation (1754-1820s)

Card Text: "Congressional pugilists," a heated partisan debate, cartoon, 1798. A fight on the floor of Congress between Vermont Representative Matthew Lyon, a Jeffersonian Republican, and Roger Griswold of Connecticut, a Federalist. "Griswold had accused Lyon of cowardice during the American Revolution and Lyon responded by spitting tobacco juice in Griswold's face." The interior of Congress Hall is shown. Several others look on as Griswold, armed with a cane, kicks Lyon, who grasps his arm and raises a pair of fireplace tongs to strike him. Below are the verses: "He in a trice struck Lyon thrice / Upon his head, enrag'd sir, / Who seiz'd the tongs to ease his wrongs, / And Griswold thus engag'd, sir." Print, 1798, Philadelphia.

Citation: Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division, Washington, DC 20540. LC-DIG-ppmsca-15707.

Photo: Lyndon Johnson taking the oath of office

Image ID: 4339

Collection: Roland Marchand

Topic(s): National Politics, Kennedy, Politics & Government

Region(s): United States

CA Standard(s): 11.11 - Major social problems and domestic policy issues in contemporary American society

National Standard(s): Postwar United States (1945 to early 1970s)

Card Text: Lyndon Johnson taking the oath of office in the airplane, flanked by Lady Bird and Jacqueline Kennedy. The swearing in was performed by Federal District Judge Sarah T. Hughes of Dallas. Johnson was President of the U.S. when he landed in the capital.

Citation: Cecil Stoughton photo. Courtesy Lyndon Baines Johnson Library and Museum, 2313 Red River St., Austin, TX 78705. 1A-1-WH63. In Paul K. Conkin & David Burner, A History of Recent America, 1974, p. 569.

Broadside for Boycott of Merchant who Continued to Stock English Goods, Boston, 1770

Image ID: 7820

Collection: Karen Halttunen

Topic(s): Eighteenth Century, Revolution, American Revolution, British Empire, Business, Civil Rights, Class Structure, Colonial America, Decolonization, Domesticity, Early Ads, Imperialism, Individualism, Technology, Institutions and social disorder, Invention, Labor Organizations and Leaders, Luxury, Middle-Class Culture, National Events, Nativism, Politics & Government, Pre-Industrial Work - Misc., Propaganda, Stores, Strikes and Violence, Symbols, Taxes, Trade, Women in the Revolution, Women's image, Women's organizations, Work and Workers

Region(s): United States, North America

CA Standard(s): 8.1 - Major events preceding the founding of the nation and the development of American constitutional democracy, 5.4 - Political, religious, social, and economic institutions that evolved in the colonial era. , 5.5 - The causes of the American Revolution, 5.6 - The course and consequences of the American Revolution, 5.7 - People and events associated with the development of the U.S. Constitution and it's significance as the foundation of the American republic

National Standard(s): Revolution and the New Nation (1754-1820s)

Card Text: Broadside urging the boycott of merchant William Jackson, who continued to stock English goods at his business on Corn-Hill, Boston, MA, 1770. "It is desired that the Sons and Daughters of Liberty, would not buy any one thing of him, for in so doing they will bring disgrace upon themselves, and their Posterity, for ever and ever, AMEN." Like the Stamp Act of 1765, the Townshend Acts of 1767 produced controversy and protest in the American colonies. For a second time, many colonists resented what they perceived as an effort to tax them without representation and thus to deprive them of their liberty. The fact that the revenue raised by the Townshend Acts would pay royal governors only made the situation worse, because it took away control from colonial legislatures that otherwise had the power to set and withhold a royal governor’s salary. The Restraining Act, intended to isolate New York without angering the other colonies, had the opposite effect, showing the rest of the colonies how far beyond the British Constitution some members of Parliament were willing to go. The Townshend Acts generated a number of protest writings, including “Letters from a Pennsylvania Farmer” by John Dickinson. In this influential pamphlet, which circulated widely in the colonies, Dickinson conceded that the Empire could regulate trade but argued that Parliament could not impose either internal taxes, like stamps, on goods or external taxes, like customs duties, on imports. Women were encouraged to take political action by boycotting British goods, especially tea and linen, and to manufacture their own homespun cloth. Building on the protest of the 1765 Stamp Act by the Daughters of Liberty, the non-importation movement of 1767–68 mobilized women as political actors. In Massachusetts in 1768, Samuel Adams wrote "The Massachusetts Circular" to the other colonial legislatures. It laid out the unconstitutionality of taxation without representation and encouraged the other colonies to protest the taxes by boycotting British goods. Even in this letter of protest, the humble and submissive tone shows the Massachusetts Assembly’s continued deference to parliamentary authority. Even in that hotbed of political protest, it is a clear expression of allegiance and the hope for a restoration of “natural and constitutional rights.” Britain’s response to this threat of disobedience served only to unite the colonies further. Lord Hillsborough demanded that the Massachusetts colony retract the letter, and warned that any colonial assemblies that endorsed it would be dissolved. This ultimatum pushed the other colonies to Massachusetts’s side. Even the city of Philadelphia, which had originally opposed the Circular, came around. The Daughters of Liberty once again supported and promoted the boycott of British goods. Women resumed spinning bees and again found substitutes for British tea and other goods. Many colonial merchants signed non-importation agreements, and the Daughters of Liberty urged colonial women to shop only with those merchants. The Sons of Liberty used newspapers and circulars to call out by name those merchants who refused to sign such agreements; sometimes they were threatened with violence. The boycott in 1768–69 turned the purchase of consumer goods into a political gesture. It Consumption was political; the very clothes you wore indicated whether you were a defender of liberty in homespun or a protector of parliamentary rights in superfine British attire.

Citation: Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division, Washington, DC 20540. LC-USZ62-43568. Text: "The Townshend Acts," OpenStax. https://open stax.org/books/us-history/pages/5-3-the-townshend-acts-and-colonial-protest. © 1999-2019, Rice University, 6100 Main St, MS-375, Houston, TX 77005. All rights reserved. May 17, 2020.