Smith, Robert

• Author: Jeffrey Lehman, Shirelle Phelps

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Robert Smith was a lawyer and statesman who served as attorney general of the United States under President THOMAS JEFFERSON and as SECRETARY OF STATE under President JAMES MADISON.

Smith's father, John Smith, a native of Strabane, Ireland, immigrated to the American colonies in the 1740s. By 1759, he was living in Baltimore and had established himself as a merchant and shipping agent. In 1766, he financed the building of Baltimore's first market house and the development of the city's first residential neighborhood. He was an advocate of independence for the American colonies and active in politics and the military.

Smith was born in November 1757 in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. He came of age at the height of the American Revolution and, like his father and his brother, Samuel Smith, volunteered to serve. He distinguished himself at the Battle of Brandywine, but his experience convinced him that he was not suited to a military career.

After the war, Smith attended the College of New Jersey (later Princeton University). He graduated in 1781 and went on to study law. Following his ADMISSION TO THE BAR, he established a practice in Baltimore, and looked after family business interests while his father served the first of two terms in the Maryland state senate.

By 1793, Smith had followed his father into the political arena. He served in the Maryland state senate from 1793 to 1796 and in the Maryland House of Delegates from 1796 to 1800. While in the house of delegates, he served a concurrent term on Baltimore's city council.

In 1801, Smith was appointed secretary of the Navy when his brother stepped down from that post following an appropriations dispute with Congress. Up to that time, military appropriations had not been monitored or controlled as closely as other government expenditures?and President Jefferson and members of his cabinet had become increasingly concerned about moneys drawn from the Treasury by the Secretaries

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of War and the Navy. When the cabinet curtailed lump-sum payments and demanded an itemized accounting of how funds were spent, Smith's brother considered the demands to be a personal attack, and he resigned. Smith, who had a far better understanding of business and accounting practices, was less inclined to view the increased scrutiny as an attack on his character.

Most historians record that Smith served as secretary of the Navy from January 1802 to March 1805, but there are...