Richard Stockton

Richard Stockton
Born: October 1, 1730
Died: February 28, 1781
Colony/State: New Jersey
Occupation / Public Role: Lawyer, judge, legislator, delegate to the Continental Congress
Contribution to the Founding Era: Delegate to the Continental Congress, signer of the Declaration of Independence, associate justice of the New Jersey Supreme Court, and one of New Jersey’s leading Revolutionary-era public men.

Richard Stockton was born near Princeton, New Jersey, at Morven, and graduated in the first class of the College of New Jersey in 1748, the institution later known as Princeton University. He studied law, was admitted to the bar in 1754, and built a successful legal career in Princeton. Before independence, he served on New Jersey’s executive council and as an associate justice of the New Jersey Supreme Court.

As tensions with Great Britain deepened, Stockton moved into Revolutionary politics. In 1776 he was elected to the Second Continental Congress, where he signed the Declaration of Independence as one of New Jersey’s five signers. The National Archives lists him as 45 years old in 1776 and identifies his occupation as lawyer.

Stockton’s wartime story is one of the harsher ones among the signers. Historical accounts long held that he was captured by the British, imprisoned, and physically broken by harsh treatment, and even the more restrained summary from Britannica’s student reference notes that his capture and imprisonment by the British ruined his health. That is one of those reminders that signing the Declaration was not just an elegant parchment moment. For some men, the consequences were direct, personal, and ugly.

Even after 1776, Stockton remained an important public figure in New Jersey. The U.S. House records that he was elected chief justice of the New Jersey Supreme Court on August 31, 1776, though he declined the office. He resumed the practice of law but never fully recovered from the damage done during the war years. He died at Morven in 1781 at the age of fifty.

Richard Stockton is not one of the most famous signers in modern memory, but he was no lightweight. He was a Princeton-trained lawyer, a judge, a Continental delegate, and a signer whose personal suffering became part of the price of Revolution. Not every founder paid in the same currency, but he definitely paid.

Richard Stockton Biography | Signer of the Declaration of Independence

Richard Stockton

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