Asheton Bayard, and nephew of Col. John Bayard, into whose family he was adopted after his father's death, which occurred on 8 June, 1770. He was graduated at Princeton in 1784, studied law under Gen. Joseph Reed and Jared Ingersoll, was admitted to the bar in 1787, and settled in Wilmington, Del., where he acquired a high reputation. In 1796 he was elected a representative in congress as a federalist. He was distinguished as an orator and constitutional lawyer and became a leader of the party in the house. In 1797 he distinguished himself by his management of the impeachment of William Blount, of North Carolina, who was expelled from the senate for instigating the Creeks and Cherokees to assist the English in their aim of conquering the Spanish possessions in Louisiana. In 1801, when the choice between Burr and Jefferson in the undecided presidential election of 1800 devolved upon the house of representatives, Bayard stood at the head of the federalists, and his influence, combined with that of Alexander Hamilton, contributed chiefly to bring about the election of Jefferson. President Adams appointed him minister to France before the accession of the new administration in 1801, and the senate confirmed the nomination, but the appointment was declined. In the 8th congress, which met 7 Dec., 1801, he opposed, with great force, on constitutional grounds, the repeal of the judiciary bill, enacted by federalist votes in the preceding session. He served in the house of representatives from 15 May, 1797, till 3 March, 1803. In 1804 he was chosen the successor of William Hill Wells when the latter resigned his seat as representative of Delaware in the U. S. senate. He sat in the senate from 15 Jan., 1805, to 3 March, 1813, and opposed the declaration of war against Great Britain in 1812. In 1813 he was selected by President Madison joint commissioner with Albert Gallatin (who was afterward rejected by the senate), and John Quincy Adams, to conclude a peace with Great Britain, through the mediation of Russia. He left Philadelphia 8 May, 1813, and met his fellow-commissioner, Mr. Adams, at that time envoy to Russia, at St. Petersburg in July of that year. After the refusal of Great Britain to treat at St. Petersburg, he was included in the new commission, constituted 18 Jan., consisting, besides himself and John Q. Adams, of Henry Clay and Jonathan Russell, Albert Gallatin being added in the following month. Going to Holland, he took a prominent part in the negotiations that resulted in the treaty of peace signed at Ghent, 24 Dec., 1814. He received the appointment of minister to the court of St. Petersburg, but declined the mission, declaring that he had no desire to serve the administration except where his services were necessary for the good of the country. When about to proceed to London to continue the work of the commission which included the negotiation of a treaty of commerce, he was taken alarmingly ill and returned home, only to die immediately after his arrival. His wife, daughter of Gov. Richard Bassett, of Delaware, died 10 Dec., 1854, aged seventy-six. Senator Bayard's speech on the foreign intercourse bill was published in 1798, and another on the repeal of the judiciary bill in a volume of the speeches of 1802.
BAYARD, James Asheton, statesman, b. in Wilmington, Del., 15 Nov., 1799; d. there, 13 June, 1880. He was a son of the preceding, and the younger brother of Richard Henry Bayard. He received a classical education, studied law, and practised in Wilmington, taking a high rank in his profession. During the administration of President Van Buren was U. S. attorney for Delaware. In 1851 he was elected by the democrats a U. S. senator to succeed John Wales, a whig, and was re-elected in 1857, and again in 1862. In 1863, on taking his seat in the senate, when required to take the “iron-clad” oath, he resented it as an indignity and an invasion of the sovereign rights of the states; but, after uttering a protest against its constitutionality, he took the oath, and immediately resigned his seat. George R. Riddle, who was elected in his place, died soon afterward, and Mr. Bayard consented to serve through his own unexpired term, from 1 April, 1867, to 3 March, 1869. In 1869 his son, Thomas F. Bayard, succeeded him as senator from Delaware. After his retirement from public life he resided in Wilmington. Mr. Bayard was for a long time chairman of the committee on the judiciary in the senate. He was eminent as a constitutional lawyer, and was highly esteemed for his refined sense of public honor, which was manifested in a noted instance upon his receiving an offer of stock of the Credit Mobilier in 1868, in reply to which he wrote: “I take it for granted that the corporation has no application to make to congress on which I should be called upon to act officially, as I could not, consistently with my views of duty, vote upon a question in which I had a pecuniary interest.”
BAYARD, John, patriot, b. at Bohemia Manor, Cecil CO., Md., 11 Aug., 1738; d. in New Brunswick, N. J., 7 Jan., 1807. He was the great great-grandson of Samuel Bayard, a rich merchant of Amsterdam, of French Huguenot extraction, who married a sister of Peter Stuyvesant, the last governor of New Amsterdam. The widow of Samuel, with her three sons and a daughter, accompanied Stuyvesant, who was himself married to Judith Bayard, a sister of Samuel, to the new world in 1647. His grandson Samuel, son of Peter, one of the three brothers who came to New York with their uncle Stuyvesant, lived in New York and alienated his relatives by joining the sect of the Labadists, removed in 1698 to Bohemia Manor, Md. His grandson, John, was christened John Bubenheim, but afterward dropped the middle name. James Asheton, twin brother of the latter, became a physician and died 8 Jan., 1770, leaving James Asheton negotiator of the treaty of Ghent, and three other children.who were adopted and educated by their uncle. John Bayard went with his brother to Philadelphia at the age of eighteen, entered the counting-house of John Rhea, a merchant, and, in the course of a few years, became one of the leading merchants in the city. He was among the signers of the non-importation agreement of 25 Oct.. 1765, was a member of the provincial congress held in July, 1774, and in January, 1775, of the convention of the province, which had for its object the care of the conduct of the assembly. He early joined the Sons of Liberty, organized in 1766, and was a leader of the movement for in-
