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John Breckinridge (December 2, 1760 – December 14, 1806) was a lawyer and politician from the U.S. state of Virginia. He served in the state legislatures of Virginia and Kentucky before being elected to the U.S. Senate and appointed United States Attorney General during the second term of President Thomas Jefferson. He is the progenitor of Kentucky's Breckinridge political family and the namesake of Breckinridge County, Kentucky. Breckinridge's father was a local politician, and his mother was a member of the Preston political family. Breckinridge attended the William and Mary College intermittently between 1780 and 1784; his attendance was interrupted by the Revolutionary War and his election to the Virginia House of Delegates. One of the youngest members of that body, his political activities acquainted him with many prominent politicians. In 1785, he married "Polly" Cabell, a member of the Cabell political family. Despite making a comfortable living through a combination of legal and agricultural endeavors, letters from relatives in Kentucky convinced him to move to the western frontier. He established "Cabell's Dale", his plantation, near Lexington, Kentucky, in 1793. Breckinridge was appointed as the state's attorney general soon after arriving. In November 1797, he resigned and was elected to the Kentucky House of Representatives the next month. As a legislator, he secured passage of a more humane criminal code that abolished the death penalty for all offenses except first-degree murder. On a 1798 trip to Virginia, an intermediary gave him Thomas Jefferson's Kentucky Resolutions, which denounced the Alien and Sedition Acts. At Jefferson's request, Breckinridge assumed credit for the modified resolutions he shepherded through the Kentucky General Assembly; Jefferson's authorship was not discovered until after Breckinridge's death. He opposed calling a state constitutional convention in 1799 but was elected as a delegate. Due to his influence, the state's government remained comparatively aristocratic, maintaining protections for slavery and limiting the power of the electorate. Called the father of the resultant constitution, he emerged from the convention as the acknowledged leader of the state's Democratic-Republican Party and was selected Speaker of the Kentucky House of Representatives in 1799 and 1800. Elected to the U.S. Senate in 1800, Breckinridge functioned as Jefferson's floor leader, guiding administration bills through the chamber that was narrowly controlled by his party. Residents of the western frontier called for his nomination as vice president in 1804, but Jefferson appointed him as U.S. Attorney General in 1805 instead. He was the first cabinet-level official from the West but had little impact before his death from tuberculosis on December 14, 1806. ==Early life and family== John Breckinridge's grandfather, Alexander Breckenridge, immigrated from Ireland to Bucks County, Pennsylvania, around 1728.〔Klotter in ''The Breckinridges of Kentucky, p. 6〕〔Davis notes that John Breckinridge changed the spelling of the family name for unknown reasons during his time in the Virginia House of Delegates between 1781 and 1784. See Davis, p. 5.〕 In 1740, the family moved to Augusta County, Virginia, near the city of Staunton.〔 John Breckinridge was born there on December 2, 1760, the second of six children of Robert Breckenridge and his second wife, Lettice (Preston) Breckenridge.〔Klotter in ''The Breckinridges of Kentucky'', p. 8〕 His mother was the daughter of John Preston of Virginia's Preston political family.〔"John Breckinridge". ''Dictionary of American Biography''〕 Robert Breckinridge had two children by a previous marriage, and it was through one of these half-brothers that John Breckinridge was uncle to future Congressman James D. Breckinridge.〔〔The paternity of James D. Breckinridge is disputed; see ''The Breckinridges of Kentucky'', p. 8.〕 A veteran of the French and Indian War, Robert Breckinridge served first as Augusta County's under-sheriff, then sheriff, then justice of the peace.〔 Soon after John Breckinridge's birth, the family moved to Botetourt County where Robert Breckinridge became a constable and justice of the peace, as well as serving in the local militia.〔〔 He died in 1773, leaving 12-year-old John of land, one slave, and half-ownership of another slave.〔Klotter in ''The Breckiridges of Kentucky'', p. 9〕 According to his biographer, Lowell H. Harrison, Breckinridge may have attended school, including Augusta Academy (now Washington and Lee University), but any records containing this information have been lost.〔 After his father's death, the younger Breckinridge helped support the family by selling whiskey, brandy, and hemp.〔Harrison in "A Young Virginian", p. 21〕 He learned surveying from his uncle, William Preston, and between 1774 and 1779, he was employed as a recorder in the land office of Fincastle.〔 Preston sought opportunities for his nephew to attend private schools alongside his sons, but such schools were prone to intermittent operation, and Breckinridge's other responsibilities interfered with his attendance.〔Harrison in ''John Breckinridge: Jeffersonian Republican'', p. 5〕 Preston also nominated Breckinridge as deputy surveyor of Montgomery County, a position he accepted after passing the requisite exam on February 1, 1780.〔Harrison in ''John Breckinridge: Jeffersonian Republican'', p. 6〕 Later that year, he joined his cousin, future Kentucky Senator John Brown, at William and Mary College (now College of William & Mary).〔〔Harrison in "A Young Virginian", p. 22〕 The instructors who influenced him most were Reverend James Madison and George Wythe.〔 The Revolutionary War forced William and Mary to close in 1781, as its buildings were used as barracks for British, French, and American troops as each nation successively controlled the college and surrounding area.〔Harrison in ''John Breckinridge: Jeffersonian Republican'', p. 7〕 Although William C. Davis records that Breckinridge had previously served as an ensign in the Botetourt County militia, Harrison notes that the most reliable records of Virginians' military service do not indicate his participation in the Revolutionary War, but less reliable sources mention him as a subaltern in the Virginia militia.〔Davis, p. 4〕〔Harrison in ''John Breckinridge: Jeffersonian Republican'', p. 20〕 If he enlisted, Harrison speculates that he served in one or two short 1780 militia campaigns supporting Nathanael Greene's army in southwest Virginia.〔Harrison in ''John Breckinridge: Jeffersonian Republican'', p. 9〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「John Breckinridge (U.S. Attorney General)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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