Robert Livingston (1718–1775)


Robert Robert Livingston, also called The Judge, was a prominent colonial American politician, and a leading Whig in New York in the years leading up to the American Revolution.

Early life

Robert R. Livingston was born in August 1718 at Clermont Manor in what was then the Province of New York, a part of British America. He was the only child of Robert Livingston, known as "Robert of Clermont" and Margaret Howarden. His mother was the daughter of a wealthy English merchant in New York and granddaughter of Captain Isaac Bedlow, a Huguenot after whom Bedloe's Island is named.
His paternal grandparents were Robert Livingston the Elder and Alida Van Rensselaer Livingston, daughter of Philip Pieterse Schuyler and widow of Nicholas Van Rensselaer. His uncle was Philip Livingston, the second Lord of Livingston Manor. His great-grandfather was Reverend John Livingston, a Church of Scotland minister who died in exile in 1673.

Career

Livingston, known as 'Judge Livingston' to distinguish him from his eponymous father and other prominent Livingstons, was a member of the New York Provincial Assembly from 1759 to 1768. He served as judge of the admiralty court from 1760 to 1763. He was a delegate to the Stamp Act Congress of 1765, and, in 1775, a member of the Committee of One Hundred, which briefly governed New York City.
From 1763 until 1775, he served as a Justice of the New York Supreme Court of Judicature.

Family

In 1742, he married Margaret Beekman, daughter of Col. Henry Beekman and Janet Livingston, a descendant of Wilhelmus Beekman and heir to immense tracts of land in Dutchess and Ulster counties. Their children included:
Livingston died on December 9, 1775 at his estate in Clermont, New York, several months after his own father's death on June 27, 1775.

Descendants

Through his son Major John R., he was the grandfather of Robert Montgomery Livingston, who married Sarah Barclay Bache in 1811. Livingston and his father were known for their quarrels with Cornelius Vanderbilt and Thomas Gibbons over his operation of steamboats and the breakup of the Chancellor Livingston and Gov. Aaron Ogden monopoly resulting from the landmark Supreme Court decision in Gibbons v. Ogden.
His grandson-in-law was George Croghan, a nephew of William Clark, the explorer, Lewis Livingston, Charles Edward Livingston and George Rogers Clark. His granddaughters include Margaret Lewis, Elizabeth Stevens Livingston, Margaret Maria Livingston, Julia Livingston, and Coralie Livingston.
Through Chancellor Livingston, he was the 2x great-grandfather of Mary Livingston Ludlow, herself the mother of his 3x great-granddaughter, Anna Hall Roosevelt, herself the mother of First Lady of the United States Eleanor Roosevelt.