Page:Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography (1900, volume 2).djvu/78

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DALLAS
DALLAS

a Volume of Miscellanies " (1859) ; " Woman's Eight to Labor" (I860); "Life of Dr. Marie Za- krewska, being a Practical Illustration of ' Wom- an's Right to Labor ' " (1800) ; " Woman's Rights under the Law " (1861) ; " Sunshine ; A Name for a Popular Lecture on Health " (1864) ; " The Col- lege, the Market, and the Court, or Woman's Re- lation to Education, Employment, and Citizen- ship" (1867); " Egypt's Place in History " (1868); " Patty Gray's Journey to the Cotton Islands " (3 vols., 1869-'70) ; " Romance of the Association, or One Last Glimpse of Charlotte Temple and Eliza Wharton " (1875) ; " My First Holiday, or Letters Home from Colorado, Utah, and Califor- nia " (1881) ; and '• What we Really Know about Shakespeare" (1885). — Their son, William Healey, naturalist, b. in Boston, Mass., 21 Aug., 1845, was educated at the Boston public schools, and then became a special pupil in natural sciences under Louis Agassiz, and in anatomy and medicine under Jeffries Wyman and Daniel Brainerd. In 1865 he was appointed lieutenant in the International tele- graph expedition, and in this capacity visited Alaska in 1865-'8. From 1871 till 1880 he was assistant to the U. S. coast survey, and under its direction spent the years 1871 till 1874, and 1884 in that district. His work, beside the exploration and description of the geography, included the anthro- pology, natural history, and geology of the Alaskan and adjacent regions. From the field-work and collections have resulted maps, memoirs, coast pilot, and papers on these subjects or branches of them. From 1884 till 1886 he was paleontologist to the U. S. geological survey, and since 180!) he has been honorary curator of the department of moUusks in the U. S. national museum. In this office he has made studies of recent and fossil mollusks of the world, and especially of North America, from which new information has been derived concerning the brachiopoda, patellidne, chitonidae, and the mollusk- fauna of the deep sea. These studies have grown out of those devoted to the fauna of northwestern America and eastern Siberia. JMr. Dall has been honored with elections to nearly all of the scientific societies in this country, and to many abroad. In 1882 and in 1885 he was vice-president of the American association for the advancement of sci- ence, and presided over the sections of biology and anthropology. His scientific papers include about two hundred titles. Among the separate books are " Alaska and its Reso^^rces " (Boston, 1870) ; " Tribes of the Extreme Northwest" (Washington, 1877); " Coast Pilot of Alaska, Appendix L. Meteorology and Bibliography " (1879) ; " The Currents and Temperatures of Bering Sea and the Adjacent Waters " (1882) ; " Pacific Coast Pilot, and Islands of Alaska, Dixon Entrance to Yakutat Bay, with the Inland Passage " (1883) ; " Prehistoric Ameri- ca," by the IVIarquis de Nadaillac, edited (New York, 1885) ; and " Report on the Mollusca Brachipoda and Pelecypoda" of the Blake dredging expedition in the West Indies (Cambridge, 1886).


DALLAS, Alexander James, statesman, b. in the island of Jamaica, 21 June, 1759 ; d. in Tren- ton, N. J., 14 Jan., 1817. He was the son of a Scottish physician who emigrated to Jamaica about 1750. The son was educated in Edinburgh and at Westminster under James Elphinston, the friend of Dr. Johnson, whose acquaintance and that of Dr. Franklin he made while a student. He then studied law in London, returned to Jamaica in 1780, and, upon the remarriage of his mother and his exclusion from the inheritance of his father's estate, removed in April, 1783, to Philadelphia. He took the oath of allegiance to the common- wealth of Pennsylvania in June, 1783, was admit- ted to the bar in July, 1785, and a few years later was admitted to practice in the United States courts, and became eminently successful as a law- yer in Philadelphia. He wrote for periodicals, and was for a time editor of the " Columbian Maga- zine." In January, 1791, he was appointed secre- tary of the commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and in December, 1793, his commission was renewed. While in this office he prepared an edition of the laws of Pennsylvania, with notes. He also com- piled four volumes of "Reports of Cases ruled and adjudged by the Courts of the United States and of Pennsylvania, before and since the Revolu- tion " (Philadelphia, 1790-1807). He accompanied an armed force to Pittsburg, in the capacity of paymaster-general, in 1794. He was again ap- pointed secretary of state in December, 1796, and held the office until Thomas Jefferson became presi- dent in 1801 and appointed him, as an ardent sup- porter of the republican party, U. S. district at- torney for the eastern district of Pennsylvania, which office he held till 1814, when he was called into the cabinet as secretary of the treasury by President Madison. When he entered upon this office, 6 Oct., 1814, the government was seriously embarrassed in its finances through the war with Great Britain, and the committee of ways and means in congress applied to Mr. Dallas for sug- gestions as to the best mode of raising money lor the requirements of the government, and of sus- taining the public credit. In a masterly report he showed that the money required could not be raised by taxation alone, but must be obtained in part by loans. He proposed for the purpose of raising a loan the establishment of a government bank. The house, in committee of the whole, re- ported in favor of the bank on 24 Oct., 1814, and a bill was passed on 20 Jan., 1815, but was vetoed by President Madison. Having been interrogated as to the probable effect of a large issue of treas- ury-notes, Secretary Dallas made a reply that had ranch influence in restoring pviblic confidence and arousing the spirit of patriotism. On 3 April, 1816, an act to incorporate a national bank was passed by congress and received the signature of the president. Mr. Dallas's administration of the ti'easury department was able and energetic. Treas- ury-notes, which were scarcely current when he assumed office, were sold at par. with interest added, a few months later. The bank had the effect of greatly improving the credit of the government. After "March, 1815, he discharged the duties of sec- retary of war in addition to the direction of the treasury department, and superintended the re- duction of the army consequent upon the restora- tion of peace. Having contributed, to tlie extent of his ability, to extricate the government from its financial difficulties, and having seen the LTnited States bank firmly established, he retired from office in November, 1816, and returned to the prac- tice of law in Philadelphia, but died a few weeks afterward.- Besides the works mentioned above and his treasury reports, he published " Features of Jay's Treaty" (Philadelphia, 1795); "Speeches on the Trial of Blount " ; " Address to the Society of Constitutional Republicans " (1805) ; and " Ex- position of the Causes and Character of the War of 1812-'15." He left unfinished a " History of Pennsylvania." The third edition of his " Reports of Cases," with notes by Thomas J. Wharton, ap- peared in Philadelphia in 1830. — His son. Alex- ander James, naval officer, b. in 1791 ; d. in Cal- lao bay, Peru, 3 June, 1844, was appointed a mid- shipman on 22 Nov., 1805, became a lieutenant