Robert Treat Paine (1731-1814)

He was born at Boston, Massachusetts, and was educated at the Boston Latin School and Harvard (1749). After a brief stint of teaching and then pursuing a mercantile career that saw him travel to the Carolinas, the Azores, and Spain, he turned to a legal career in 1755. The following year, he changed his mind again but was unsuccessful in his attempt to become an officer and instead became a preacher while returning to his legal studies. In 1761, he set up a law practice in Taunton, Massachusetts. He was appointed to the Provincial Congress and represented Massachusetts at the Continental Congress until 1776. In a bid to avoid war with Britain, he signed the Olive Branch Petition but when it failed he signed the U.S. Declaration of Independence the following year. He was Speaker of the Massachusetts House of Representatives in 1777 and a Member of the Executive Council in 1779. He was Massachusetts Attorney General from 1777 to 1790. His final position was Justice of the State Supreme Court from which he retired in 1804. He was a charter member of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences and having been a lifelong opponent of slavery was a founding Member of the Pennsylvania Abolition Society. In 1770, he married Sally Cobb and had 8-children.