Pod Insights Stuff You Missed in History Class Robert Morris, War Finance, and Early Bankruptcy Law in the U.S. About this episode Robert Morris is one of the lesser-mentioned founding fathers of the U. S. When he is mentioned, he is called the financier of the Revolutionary War. But his story is more complicated than that.
Transcript Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.
0:00 Tracy V. Wilson? This is an iHeart Podcast. Guaranteed Human.
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1:18 Tracy V. Wilson? Robert, Mick, Bill, and Jessa strut back down memory lane for season two, sharing lessons on life, love, and loss. These are the kind of insights that only come from experience. So tune into Silver Linings with The Old Gays on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Workplace chaos. We've all been there. Deadlines are slipping, projects are piling up, and suddenly you realize the missing piece is the right person. That's when you say, this is a job for Sponsored Jobs. With Indeed Sponsored Jobs, your job post gets a boost so you can connect with quality candidates faster. In fact, Sponsored Jobs posted directly on Indeed are 95% more likely to report a hire than non-sponsored jobs.
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2:15 Holly Frey? Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, a production of iHeart Radio.
2:26 Holly Frey? Hello and welcome to the podcast. I'm Holly Frey.
2:29 Tracy V. Wilson? And I'm Tracy V. Wilson.
2:31 Holly Frey? I don't know how I came across this one. I found it on a scrap of paper shoved into a book and went, I should follow up on that.
2:37 Tracy V. Wilson? I love it when that happens.
2:39 Holly Frey? It happens a shocking amount of time with me. I, um, my life is just post-its. I don't, I don't know what to tell you.
2:46 Tracy V. Wilson? Mine are often the notes app on my phone and I will see weird stuff in there and think, what is that?
2:52 Holly Frey? Oh, yeah. And sometimes I'll abbreviate it in a way I never can recover what it meant in the first place. Such is life. But this one I found. Uh, so Robert Morris is who we're talking about today and he's one of the lesser mentioned founding fathers of the United States. And when he is mentioned, he's called the financier of the Revolutionary War. He did wield a great deal of power in the money dealings that enabled the Continental Army to take on Britain. But his story is a lot more complicated than that. And it also offers us a chance to examine the way that early US history, which we often get talked about in a very grandiose kind of way.
3:34 Holly Frey? And, you know, idealistically is really mired in a lot of messy dealings and questionable judgment.
3:41 Tracy V. Wilson? So Robert Morris was born in January of 1734 in Liverpool, England. What date in January is almost hilariously different from source to source. His father was Robert Morris, Sr., and his mother was Elizabeth Murfit Morris.
3:58 Holly Frey? Yes, I literally saw everything from January 1st to January 31st and pick a number in between. I saw at least six different ones. I'm not even joking. In 1737, when Morris was either 13 or 14, he traveled to the North American colonies. At that point, his father was already living in Oxford, Maryland and making a living as a tobacco agent. Efforts to get Robert enrolled in school did not go particularly well. It seems that the teenage Morris, who was by all accounts really quite smart, was not a great student and he found school tedious. So at the age of 16, his father decided to send him to Philadelphia to become an apprentice at the mercantile house of Charles Willing.
4:42 Tracy V. Wilson? Not long after Robert's move to Philadelphia, his father died and Morris inherited his estate. He stayed with Charles Willing, though, and he continued to work. Several years later, Charles Willing also died, and at that point, Robert and Willing's son, Thomas Willing, who had become good friends, formed their own partnership.
5:03 Holly Frey? In 1757, the shipping firm of Willing, Morris and Company was founded. And this company imported and exported. And because this was the mid 18th century in North America, that meant that they were involved in the triangle of trade and thus slavery. So keep that in mind. We're not going to talk about it more, but it is a cornerstone of the wealth that he eventually builds. By the 1760s, Morris had made a very nice fortune for himself. But he, like all other businessmen in the colonies, was about to see a loss of revenues as a result of a historically significant tax. And this was a significant moment that was a major catalyst for unrest in the colonies
5:46 Holly Frey? and ultimately was one of the things that led to the revolution. So we're going to give it a little bit of time here. On March 22nd, 1765, the British government passed the Stamp Act. This act was described as, quote, "an act for granting and applying certain stamp duties and other duties in the British colonies and plantations in America towards further defraying the expenses of defending, protecting and securing the same, and for amending such parts of the several acts of Parliament relating to the trade and revenues of the said colonies and plantations, as direct the manner of determining and recovering the penalties and forfeitures therein mentioned."
6:27 Tracy V. Wilson? The Stamp Act was the first time Parliament decided that business and legal interests in the colonies were to be directly taxed in the interest of funding a standing army on the North American continent. In addition to business and legal papers, almanacs, newspapers, cards, and even dice were taxed. From the point of view of Britain, the Seven Years' War with France, which ended in 1763, had depleted the military, both financially and in terms of land holdings and power. And as Britain saw it, there was a need for an army to occupy North America and to defend against any other attacks that might incur further losses and weakening of Britain's North American position.
7:13 Holly Frey? But from the colonial point of view, this was an instance where Britain was taxing them without any agreement to such a law on their part. A case of no taxation without representation, in terms of the colonies being frustrated, because the colonies didn't have anyone representing them in Parliament. There were colonial assemblies that the colonists viewed as their governing bodies, whereas the British government claimed that British citizens living in North America had virtual representation. This disagreement about governance and the limits that the colonists felt should be in place for Parliament's actions led to massive protests, which is kind of an understatement. In some cases, British officials were hanged in effigy in the colonies, and in one instance,
7:58 Holly Frey? the home of a British governor was ransacked. Robert Morris protested the Stamp Act, along with other merchants, who were very heavily hit by this act.
8:08 Tracy V. Wilson? These protests did result in a repeal of the Stamp Act a year after it had been passed, but it wasn't really a victory. In its place, Parliament passed the Declaratory Act, which stated that British Parliament had jurisdiction over the colonies and could pass legislation and governance of them.
8:28 Holly Frey? Yeah. Okay, you got us this time, but now we're putting things in place that make it okay for us to do it again later. At the end of the 1760s, Robert got married to a woman named Mary White. She was the daughter of a prominent Philadelphia couple, Colonel Thomas and Esther White. Mary was 20, and she had grown up in high society, and it really made all the sense in the world that she would marry the successful 35-year-old Morris. The couple eventually had seven children together.
8:57 Tracy V. Wilson? In 1775, Morris served in the Pennsylvania State Assembly. One of the other representatives during that time was Ben Franklin. Morris was vice president of the Pennsylvania Committee of Safety. That committee was tasked with ensuring the state's militia was supplied and fortified. That included acquiring arms and building forts along the Delaware River.
9:22 Holly Frey? Then, in late 1775, Morris was selected by the Pennsylvania Legislature to serve in the Continental Congress. So just in case you do not know, that was the governing body established to govern the colonies as a whole and give a galvanized organization structure under which the various colonies could negotiate with Britain. And, once the war began, it was also there to coordinate their efforts. The 1775 Continental Congress that Morris joined was the second one. The first had been in 1774. Morris was a member of the Congress's secret committee, which got weapons and ammunition for the Continental Army from sources abroad.
10:04 Holly Frey? An estimated $2 million was spent by the secret committee from the years 1775 to 1777, and Morris's firm received about half a million dollars of it as contractors in overseas trade. He was also part of the secret correspondence committee, which, as its name suggests, involved reaching out to other countries on the down-low to make alliances. At this point, the Revolutionary War had been underway for about eight months, beginning in the spring of 1775 at Lexington and Concord in Massachusetts.
10:39 Tracy V. Wilson? Coming up, we'll talk about Morris's beliefs regarding independence for the colonies, but first, we will pause for a sponsor break.
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13:28 Tracy V. Wilson? Guess who's back in the house? The old gays return for season two of Silver Linings, their hit podcast from iHeart's Ruby Studio in partnership with ViiV Healthcare. Just wait until you hear what hosts Robert McMillan and Jessa have in store this time around. They strut back down memory lane, navigating life, love, loss, and everything that shaped them along the way. And as usual, someone just might break into song. From leather bars to bathhouses, dance floors to drag brunch, nothing stays off limits. These are the kinds of insights that can only come from experience. So listen to your elders, honey, and discover the silver linings you can take with you. All sass, zero filter, and decades of perspective from four friends
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14:33 Holly Frey? From the time the Revolutionary War had become a likely outcome of the conflict between Britain and the colonies, Robert Morris was kind of in a unique position in terms of his ideology. He didn't actually want the colonies to form a new nation. He did, however, want them to have a lot more autonomy to govern themselves as they saw fit, rather than being subject to laws enacted from across the Atlantic. And of course, the big sticking point for him was taxes.
15:04 Tracy V. Wilson? When the Second Continental Congress was to vote on the issue of independence, Morris sat out the vote and stayed home that day. He knew that he was in a very tiny minority, but he was also entirely willing to abide by the results of the vote. For a while, Morris thought a reconciliation between the colonies and Britain might be possible, but he eventually saw that it would just never happen. He signed the Declaration of Independence, but his name doesn't exactly jump out in part because it sits to the right of John Hancock's famously very large signature.
15:41 Holly Frey? Morris is quoted as saying of this shift to supporting independence, quote, "I am not one of those politicians that run testy when my own plans are not adopted. I think it is the duty of a good citizen to follow when he cannot lead." He also stated that it is, quote, "the duty of every individual to act his part in whatever station his country may call him to in hours of difficulty, danger, and distress."
16:07 Tracy V. Wilson? And Morris was all in when it came to supporting the Continental Army in the independence fight. He helped the militia in the colonies by leveraging his business success to aid in the cause. Through his company, he was able to import weapons and gunpowder to give to the revolutionary forces. Morris also sold the ships from his company's fleet to the Continental Navy. As the war played out, his own business interests became progressively more entangled with that of the colonial government.
16:39 Holly Frey? That raised some eyebrows, though. Given that Morris was making money by selling assets to the revolutionaries, people started to accuse him of profiteering, most prominently Thomas Paine. Those accusations were bolstered by Morris's contracts that he had taken out with privateers who went after British ships in the Atlantic. That seems like he's doing a great thing for the colonies, but as part of those deals, Morris was also getting to keep a lot of what was seized.
17:09 Tracy V. Wilson? Writing for the William and Mary Quarterly in 1934, E. James Ferguson wrote of Morris, "Another advantage of his office was the use of government money to float his private enterprises. How much he converted to his own use is impossible to know, for if private ventures were successful, money could be replaced, and a misapplication of funds would very likely leave no trace. It should be said also that in the normal course of events, there were occasions when a public officer would owe the government money and for a time have the benefit of government funds to finance his private trade. At other times, perhaps, the government might owe him money.
17:52 Tracy V. Wilson? However, it is clear that Morris took an improper advantage of his position. He diverted at least $80,000 to his own purposes and did not replace it."
18:06 Holly Frey? Yeah, and a lot of that happens in a role that we're about to talk about. But from the beginning, there were people going like, "What is Robert Morris doing exactly? What, how, how is this working?" But Morris's work in politics continued to be related almost entirely to finances, even after the profiteering accusations had begun. During his involvement in the revolutionary government, Morris was deeply involved and influential in how the Continental Congress raised money and how that money was spent, specifically when it came to military action. He is often described, with some level of debate, as having almost single-handedly managed the finances of the revolutionaries.
18:48 Tracy V. Wilson? From 1781 to 1784, he was superintendent of finance, a job created under the Articles of Confederation. This was a new role created to see to the ongoing needs of funding for the war effort and to fix some serious problems. Morris was very good friends with George Washington, and Washington offered Morris the role of secretary of treasury, but Morris turned it down. This new job as superintendent didn't have a lot of oversight. Morris had a great deal of freedom to do whatever he deemed necessary to right the finances of the fledgling nation. And that lack of oversight was something Morris had negotiated as part of agreeing to take the job.
19:33 Tracy V. Wilson? He had initially been asked to become the superintendent in 1780, but he didn't accept right away. He had two specific conditions that had to be agreed to before he would assume the role. For one, he wanted to be able to fire anyone he wished within the treasury with no approvals needed from anyone else. And two, he wanted to be able to maintain all of the various business connections he had in his private business.
20:02 Holly Frey? After accepting the position, Morris wrote a letter to George Washington in which he assured him that it was his goal to ensure that the general had provisions for his army. We have a few quotes coming up from Robert Morris, and I will say, as a writer, he's a little convoluted. So just know that going in. But he wrote to Washington in this instance, quote, "Be assured that it shall be my study to guard you as much as possible against the distress and perplexity that arise from want of provisions, et cetera. And if the several legislatures will only do their part with vigor, I shall have the strongest hopes of putting a much better face on our moneyed affairs in a short time. But without their aid, the wheels will go heavily round.
20:47 Holly Frey? I shall therefore ply them closely. In order to bring about changes gradually, I have advertised for contracts to supply rations to the troops, artificers, and prisoners that are now in this city or which may happen to be here from time to time between this and the first January next." And he also outlines in this letter his plan for sort of juggling the obligations of these various contracts, which offers a glimpse into the way that Morris thought about money and specifically about transactions. So be warned, this is an especially wild and run-on sentence. Quote, "I believe it may not..." Not answer so well to contract for rations to be delivered at the main army as to make
21:29 Holly Frey? one contract for bread, another for fresh beef, another for salted meat, another for rum, vinegar, and salt, et cetera, because by dividing these contracts, I can oblige each contractor to allow convenience in time of payment for certain part of the supplies. And it is most consistent with demonstrated ideas to divide things of this kind amongst a number of freemen, rather than permit any one to grasp all the advantages that may arise from the contract. And there is no danger of prices rising so as to create artificial scarcity under the management of several contractors, because they will all be actuated by one principle that operates effectually against that kind of competition, which raises
22:14 Holly Frey? prices, whereas a number of purchasers who have no other rule for their government than a desire to obtain what they want, never fail to raise prices by the measure they pursue, even though they mean to serve the public ever so well. Basically, like, we're gonna have an easier time juggling a bunch of people and moving our money around that way than actually having one contract.
22:37 Tracy V. Wilson? Morris did work diligently to deliver on his promise of getting Washington the resources he needed. The movement of the Continental Army from New York to Yorktown, led by George Washington, was made possible by Morris's fundraising. That fundraising came in several forms. One, borrowing from France. Two, requisitioning from the states. In the Articles of Confederation adopted in 1777, there was a provision for Congress to request money from the states, but the states didn't have to kick in any money. It was strictly a request and not a command. So the first thing Morris did in his new role was to try to establish a war debt tax. That didn't make it through Congress. All
23:20 Tracy V. Wilson? the states but Rhode Island agreed to it, but they needed a unanimous vote for the tax to be levied. Still, though, he did reach out to the states to get them to pony up as much as possible. And then three, Morris himself. When funding came up short, that was when he reached into his own pocket to make up the gap.
23:38 Holly Frey? So this may sound like kind of a wild concept, right? A public official paying from his personal coffers to finance military action. But for Morris, the fight for independence had become very much about money and commerce. In that letter to Washington that we quoted a moment ago, he also relayed some information, like really detailed information about specific market values of items and the ways in which Morris watched such things. And then he told Washington, quote, "I would not take up your time with this detail, only for the sake of this one observation, which I think should be impressed on the minds of all persons in power, in which I believe exactly coincides with your sentiments. It is that commerce should be perfectly free
24:23 Holly Frey? and property soundly secured to the owner. The only exception that should be admitted are legal restraints on the first, founded on such evident public utility as convinces the community at large of their propriety, and such restraints should continue no longer than the propriety is evident and on the last. The only exception should be as to that part of property, which is taken from all with an equal hand by taxation." Kind of like, hey, when we set up our government, keep your hands out of my business.
24:53 Tracy V. Wilson? In 1781, Morris established the Bank of North America. This was an effort to stabilize the economy, which was in the middle of what looked like an endless inflation cycle and to regulate the printing of banknotes. As the war played out, Congress had issued a lot of paper money as part of their fundraising, and it meant that the new country they were trying to establish was starting out with a really shaky financial picture.
25:20 Holly Frey? But this bank plan of Morris's also got some side eye. It was yet another instance where Morris, clearly a person with a bias for action, kind of forged ahead while other statesmen were standing around asking if this was actually legal to do. But bigger than any questions posed about the legality was the reality that there really did need to be a bank. So the plan went ahead. This was a privately owned bank run by the subscriber investors who bought into it. So the idea was that in lieu of tax income, which had been voted down, the Bank of North America would provide money through the subscribers to pay off the national debt.
25:59 Tracy V. Wilson? The bank also issued its own national notes. The banknote situation in the 1770s had gotten really messy. Massachusetts had been the first to start issuing banknotes, starting right after the Battle of Lexington and Concord. These banknotes were bills issued against money the colony would have in the future through a variety of income streams, including taxes and levies. After Massachusetts started doing it, so did the other colonies, and things rapidly got out of hand as bills were issued at a rate that just couldn't ever be backed up. But there was ongoing need for war funding, so these bills continued to be printed,
26:41 Tracy V. Wilson? though the glut in the market devalued them and led to inflation. To compound the issue, Britain started printing counterfeit notes and dropping them into circulation in North America. In 1777, the Continental Congress called for the then-states to stop issuing currencies. There was a new system initiated in 1780 with the states issuing their own notes, but as part of a larger, regulated system overseen by Congress. But that system wasn't embraced because no one trusted notes at that point, even if Congress backed the state-issued currency. Estimates put the value of currency in 1780 at a 40th of its face value.
27:24 Tracy V. Wilson? So all of this was what Morris inherited as a problem to solve, and it is why his Bank of North America introduced notes that were intended for nationwide circulation.
27:37 Tracy V. Wilson? Morris also called for the creation of a national mint, but Congress didn't prioritize that. It wasn't until 1792, eight years after Morris left the superintendent of finance role, for the national mint to be established through the Coinage Act.
27:53 Holly Frey? Morris also reorganized the treasury and established much more robust reporting structures and schedules. Morris's team gave regular monthly reports that were widely circulated to the public via newspapers, so that there was both transparency and, when needed, the opportunity for the public to see issues and call them out. This was also a way to ensure that states didn't renege on their agreements and that they were paying enough money to help the war effort, and so that the treasury could rebuild the lost trust in national finances.
28:27 Tracy V. Wilson? Robert Morris had plenty of critics, and some of them believed he had done some shady things while serving as superintendent of finance. We will talk about that and some other trouble he got into after we hear from the sponsors that keep stuff you missed in history class going.
28:49 Speaker 01 That sound? That's the National Squash League. Pro teams, the world's best players, and rallies so fast you'll forget to breathe. Season four is in full swing, and every match streams free on YouTube. Big hits, bigger rivalries, and a front row seat from wherever you are. Watch every match for free on YouTube. Search National Squash League and hit subscribe or follow live updates on Instagram at NSL.Sport.
29:18 Holly Frey? Guess who's back in the house? The old gays return for season two of Silver Linings, their hit podcast from iHeart's Ruby Studio in partnership with ViiV Healthcare. Just wait until you hear what hosts Robert McMillan and Jess A. have in store this time around. They strut back down memory lane, navigating life.
29:36 Tracy V. Wilson? Love, loss, and everything that shaped them along the way. And as usual, someone just might break into song. From leather bars to bathhouses, dance floors to drag brunch, nothing stays off limits. These are the kinds of insights that can only come from experience. So, listen to your elders, honey, and discover the silver linings you can take with you. All sass, zero filter, and decades of perspective from four friends proving that queer joy only gets better with age on the podcast that never gets old. Listen to Silver Linings, available on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
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32:04 Holly Frey? After Morris left the superintendent of finance job in 1784, there were ongoing concerns about the ways he had handled things and whether or not he had maneuvered aspects of the job to ensure his own wealth. On June 20th, 1785, there was a resolution in Congress to investigate Morris's conduct as superintendent of finances. At the time, the resolution kind of sputtered because it would have taken time and resources that were in short supply. But Morris himself continued to push for the investigation for several years because without one, he was going to be forever under suspicion and he felt that he had done nothing wrong. He wrote once again to George Washington in 1790,
32:48 Holly Frey? asking him to please get an investigation underway, writing, "Your memorialist, desirous of rescuing his reputation from the aspersions thrown upon it, came in the month of October 1788 to the city of New York as well for the purpose of urging the appointment of commissions to inspect his official transactions, as for that of procuring an adjustment of the accounts which existed previous to his administration." He was basically saying like, "Please check the receipts. Let's have it all out in the open."
33:19 Tracy V. Wilson? In February of 1790, a House committee made up of James Madison, Theodore Sedgwick, and Roger Sherman got the referral for an investigation. Because of this, Morris is sometimes said to be the first subject of a congressional committee investigation. But the extent of that investigation is a little unclear. A statement made by Madison in March of 1790 indicated that, "Regular official examination has been already made into the transactions of Mr. Morris as superintendent of the finances of the United States, and that it is inexpedient to incur the expense of a reexamination by commissioners as proposed by the resolution of the Senate on that subject."
34:06 Tracy V. Wilson? The resolution went on to a second committee, which looked at the various receipts and accounts and determined that Morris hadn't done anything wrong. To his supporters, yes, Morris did have money coming in through some of his war deals, but he was also losing money by personally financing things like arms purchases. But though he was cleared of the profiteering charges, he continued to have detractors who believed that he was a profiteer.
34:35 Holly Frey? Yeah, his declaration of innocence by the Senate committee didn't really do much. The people that distrusted him continued to do so. After the war ended and during that period of time, when the accusations against him as a public official had intensified, Morris initially actually kind of tried to go back to his pre-war life. He wanted to just get back to his business affairs. But he was pulled back into civic work as a congressional delegate. In 1787, Morris was part of the Constitutional Convention, where he worked alongside other founding fathers in drafting the first US Constitution. After the Constitution was created, Morris did not go back to his business.
35:18 Holly Frey? He served as a senator from 1789 to 1795, and his focus as a senator was actually keeping an eye on national finance lobbying for reform.
35:29 Tracy V. Wilson? During the late 1700s, Morris made a number of financial decisions that would come back to bite him. For one, he sank a lot of money into building his dream home. It was a mansion designed by Pierre L'Enfant, who also designed the District of Columbia. The lot he had for the home was near the center of the city, and there was a degree to which he was kind of hoping that he could flip this as a location for the presidential residence when that was still undecided. Once it became apparent that was not going to happen, he envisioned his own home and he saw it as a structure that would become iconic to the city. We will come back to the planned mansion in just a moment.
36:13 Holly Frey? Morris also during this time shifted his business interests away from banking and trade and put everything he had into real estate, specifically speculative real estate. And he went big, purchasing a reported millions of acres with no immediate plans for their use. There wasn't a development plan and there were no buyers in place for all of this property. And he went into debt to make those purchases. While he had been in business with a number of other speculators at various points in these acquisitions, a lot of those other partners bowed out after a certain point. So then Morris was on the hook for ever greater amounts of debt.
36:55 Tracy V. Wilson? Meanwhile, his Philadelphia lot sat undeveloped. He had managed to put a fence around it before getting LaFaut involved. And then as things ramped up, he started really hemorrhaging money. According to historian Ryan K. Smith, who wrote the book, Robert Morris's Folly, it was costing Morris $2,144 each month to keep the workers going. There were rumors that the project was plagued by issues and that Morris wasn't happy with the design. LaFaut was paid nearly $10,000 over the course of several years for this project, but the house made slow progress.
37:34 Tracy V. Wilson? The 1793 yellow fever epidemic that swept through Philadelphia led Morris and LaFaut to both leave the city and that dragged the progress farther and farther behind.
37:46 Holly Frey? Then in 1797, a serious financial crisis erupted. Morris and his business partners were not the only people buying up land with the intention of quickly flipping it or working with other investors to develop it. A lot of people of means, recognizing that a country in its infancy would only grow, wanted to get in on the potential for a huge financial payout that such a moment might offer. As with any financial panic or crisis, there were many factors involved, but the two major ones in 1797 were these. One, the US credit system was still inflated and there were more loans out than could be backed up with real money.
38:28 Holly Frey? A lot of loans were backed up with property in areas that weren't yet developed, like farther out to the West, and their potential value turned out to not be real. Two, a lot of the speculation going on was carried out with the assumption that foreign investors would come in and buy land or develop it, thus boosting both the finance of the speculators and the overall US economy. But that didn't happen. The French Revolution took place in a Europe that had already been depleted in many countries by loans and expenses related to the Revolutionary War that had just played out in North America, and banks in Europe were having their own problems.
39:10 Holly Frey? When the Bank of England put a halt to any exchange of paper currency for coinage in 1797, everything kind of crashed and the speculation bubble in North America popped.
39:21 Tracy V. Wilson? Morris found himself deeply in debt with no money coming in to pay back the various loans he had taken out. And when we say deeply in debt, he had, with business partner John Nicholson, amassed $10 million in debt in their real estate speculation. That is not adjusted to today's currency value. There was no way he would ever be able to repay this, although he was constantly dancing and hustling to try to come up with any money he could. By the end of 1797, Robert and his wife Mary had stopped appearing in public. Morris's personal crisis went from bad to worse as his creditors took legal action, desperately hoping to save themselves from collapse.
40:04 Tracy V. Wilson? Unable to pay his many loans in early 1798, Morris was sentenced to debtor's prison. He was confined in the Prune Street Debtors Prison, which sat next to the Walnut Street Prison. His mansion project ended and the unfinished home was nicknamed Morris's folly by the citizens of Philadelphia.
40:25 Holly Frey? In prison, Morris was visited by a range of prestigious friends, including George Washington. Fellow founding father Governor Morris stopped by frequently and made arrangements so that Robert's wife, Mary, would at least have a small pension to live on. Throughout his confinement, Morris continued to negotiate with his creditors, hoping that he could strike a deal that would get him released.
40:49 Tracy V. Wilson? Then, the Bankruptcy Act of 1800, known more formally as a bill to establish a uniformed system of bankruptcy throughout the United States, was passed. That offered the possibility of a release. This act, which was applied to merchant debtors only, allowed those debtors to be discharged from prison if 2/3 of their creditors agreed to it. The act enabled Morris to declare bankruptcy and get out of debtor's prison. He was released in 1801. Morris was one of the most, if not the most, high-profile speculators to land in prison. So, it looks on first glance as though this law was created just to spring him.
41:32 Tracy V. Wilson? And while benefiting Morris might have been a motivator, he was one of a lot of prominent men who had gotten into similar trouble. There had actually been discussion of a bankruptcy act as early as 1792, but it did not get prioritized until after the 1797 crisis. And the act didn't exactly sail through Congress. It passed by a single vote. The 1800 Act was intended to be a piece of stopgap legislation to get the country through the immediate problem of a lot of formerly wealthy and powerful people being in debtor's prison, and it had a five-year limit on it. But it did not even last for five years. It was repealed after three.
42:15 Holly Frey? As for Morris, he never returned to his former lifestyle, having once been one of the wealthiest men on the continent. Instead, he lived in a modest house on the outer edge of Philadelphia with his wife, Mary. He did actually try to get back into business as a merchant and trader, but he was already out of pace with those industries and where they had progressed to while he was busy doing politics and then being in prison. And he also just had a shadow of distrust hanging over him.
42:44 Tracy V. Wilson? Morris died on May 8th, 1806. Despite having been really instrumental in the success of the revolutionaries and the formation of the United States, in the end, he was relatively poor and largely forgotten. Although there is a good bit of scholarship regarding his life today, he's generally not one of the founding fathers who comes up a lot when people invoke that phrase.
43:08 Holly Frey? And in wondering why, I found this really wonderful quote by Ryan Smith, who we quoted earlier, and who is a Virginia Commonwealth University history professor, who talks about how Morris was supposed to be, you know, this apex version of what it was to be a money man in the new country. But then he wrote, quote, "Instead, he had this horrible crash that threatened to bring down his peers. For a variety of reasons, people wanted to forget Robert Morris and his role in the revolution."
43:42 Holly Frey? Which is just a good example of how the stories we tell ourselves about things like history and particularly like civic pride get tweaked to leave out the uglier stuff and the messier stuff.
43:55 Tracy V. Wilson? Right.
43:56 Holly Frey? But that is Robert Morris, who I find ceaselessly fascinating and also just kind of wild. I have thoughts. I have thoughts.
44:08 Tracy V. Wilson? Do you also have listener mail?
44:09 Holly Frey? I do. This listener mail came with some of the cutest cat pictures of all time. That's all you need to do. And it's about Ada Coleman, who I love. This is from our listener page. He writes, "Hello, Holly and Tracy. Longtime fan of the show and loved your most recent episode on Ada Coleman and the Savoy American Bar. I have to share that we have our own Gilbert and Sullivan tradition here in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, called the Savoy Company. I also picked this because it related to today's episode location-wise. We are the oldest amateur theater company in the world solely dedicated to the works of Gilbert and Sullivan since Doily Cart's dissolution in 1982. We have been performing in Philly and the surrounding area since 1901 and often use the Savoy Cocktail Book during our happy hours. Absolutely loved learning more about Ada Coleman."
44:54 Holly Frey? Coleman, and of course, some GNS history. They have shows coming up. They're doing the Mikado this spring. You can look for more information if you want it on their website, which is savoy.org. For pet tax, I'm sending pictures of my great tabby Carlo, including his studying of the Rudigore score and other GNS work. Thank you for the podcast. I always look forward to a new episode. This cat is so cute. I borderline can't deal with it. One of them, he has on an adorable outfit, which is like one of those fabulous pet costumes that isn't really the cat wearing an outfit. It's kind of draped over his shoulders. So in front, it looks like arms and a little cowboy person. Yeah.
45:37 Holly Frey? It's so stinking cute. And he's so very cute. He looks a lot like one of my best friend's babies. So thank you, Paige, because I always need more kitties and kitties that can read or keep that one for sure. If you would like to write to us, share your pet pictures or your love of anybody we've talked about or your dislike of them, that's also fine. You can do that at [email protected] . If you would like to subscribe to the show, that is as easy as pie. You can do it on the iHeartRadio app or anywhere you listen to your favorite shows.
46:13 Tracy V. Wilson? Stuff You Missed in History Class is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
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Previous Spite Houses Next Behind the Scenes Minis: Spiteful Robert Page updated November 4, 2026 · transcript and summary are machine-generated