 | This article includes a list ofgeneral references, butit lacks sufficient correspondinginline citations. Please help toimprove this article byintroducing more precise citations.(March 2025) (Learn how and when to remove this message) |
 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
All 6 New York seats to theUnited States House of Representatives | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||
The1790 United States House of Representatives elections in New York were held from April 27 to 29, 1790, to elect sixU.S. Representatives to represent the State ofNew York in theUnited States House of Representatives.
The first U.S. Representatives under theUnited States Constitution had been elected in March 1789, and had taken their seats in the1st United States Congress for a term ending on March 3, 1791. State elections inNew York were at that time held during the last week of April, which meant that the State election preceding the beginning of the next congressional term was held more than ten months in advance, although the regular session of Congress was scheduled to convene only on the first Monday in December. Nevertheless, the New York politicians chose to have the seats filled, in case there might be a special session to convene at an earlier date.
On January 27, 1789, theNew York State Legislature divided the State of New York into six congressional districts which were not numbered.[1] The districts remained the same as for the previous elections in March 1789.
Note: There are now 62 counties in the State ofNew York. The counties which are not mentioned in this list had not yet been established, or sufficiently organized, the area being included in one or more of the abovementioned counties.
Five Federalists and oneAnti-Federalist (later known as the Democratic-Republicans) were elected. The incumbents Laurance, Benson and Silvester were re-elected, the incumbents Floyd, Hathorn and Van Rensselaer were defeated.
| District | Federalist | Democratic-Republican | Federalist | Democratic-Republican | Democratic-Republican | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | James Townsend | 592 | William Floyd | 319 | John Vanderbilt | 327 | Thomas Tredwell | 284 | Ezra L'Hommedieu | 147 |
| 2 | John Laurance | 691 | Melancton Smith | 11 | ||||||
| 3 | Egbert Benson | 723 | Theodorus Bailey | 467 | ||||||
| 4 | Peter Van Gaasbeck | 753 | Cornelius C. Schoonmaker | 898 | John Hathorn | 61 | Christopher Tappen | 13 | ||
| 5 | Peter Silvester | 1,712 | John Livingston | 1,218 | ||||||
| 6 | James Gordon | 1,465 | Jeremiah Van Rensselaer | 1,017 | ||||||
Note: At this time political parties were still very new in the United States. Politicians aligned in two opposing groups: Those supporting the federal government and those opposing it. The first group are generally known as the Federalists, or (as a group in Congress) the "Pro-Administration Party." The second group at first were called the Anti-Federalists, or (as a group in Congress) the "Anti-Administration Party", but soon called themselves "Republicans." However, at the same time, the Federalists called them "Democrats" which was meant to be pejorative. After some time both terms got more and more confused, and sometimes used together as "Democratic Republicans" which later historians have adopted (with a hyphen) to describe the party from the beginning, to avoid confusion with both the later established and still existingDemocratic andRepublican parties.
Representative-elect James Townsend died on May 24, 1790, just a month after his election, and well before the congressional term began. A special election to fill the vacancy was held at the time of the annual state election, from April 26 to 28, 1791, and was won by Anti-Federalist Thomas Tredwell. Thus four Federalists and two Anti-Federalists represented New York in the House of Representatives of the 2nd U.S. Congress.
| District | Democratic-Republican | Federalist | Federalist | Democratic-Republican | Federalist | Democratic-Republican | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Thomas Tredwell | 666 | John Vanderbilt | 489 | Henry Peters | 369 | Ezra L'Hommedieu | 361 | Isaac Ledyard | 301 | Stephen Carman | 360 |
The House of Representatives of the2nd United States Congress convened for its first session atCongress Hall inPhiladelphia on October 24, 1791, and Gordon, Laurance, Silvester and Tredwell took their seats on this day. Benson took his seat on November 4; and Schoonmaker at some time between November 15, 1791, and January 30, 1792.[2]
