Roger Sherman

Roger Sherman, oil on canvas by Ralph Earl, c. 1775; in the Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, Connecticut. 164.1 × 126 cm.Gift of Roger Sherman White, B.A. 1859, LL.B.1862, 1918.3, Yale University Art Gallery

Roger Sherman,  (born April 19, 1721Newton, Massachusetts [U.S.]—died July 23, 1793New Haven, Connecticut, U.S.), American politician whose plan for representation of large and small states prevented a deadlock at the U.S. Constitutional Convention of 1787.

After learning shoemaking, Sherman moved to Connecticut in 1743, joining a brother there two years after his father had died, and became surveyor of New Haven county. He then studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1754. He held numerous public offices, serving several terms in the Connecticut legislature between 1755 and 1766. In 1755 he became a justice of the peace in Litchfield county, and he eventually rose to serve as a judge of the superior court, a post he held into the 1780s. Although a staunch conservative, he was an early supporter of American independence from Britain. As a delegate to the Second Continental Congress at Philadelphia, he signed the Declaration of Independence (1776) and helped draft the Articles of Confederation. From 1777 to 1779 he served on Connecticut’s council of safety, and in 1784 he was elected mayor of New Haven.

Sherman’s greatest service was rendered at the Constitutional Convention called to remedy the deficiencies of the Articles of Confederation. A critical difference appeared between larger states advocating congressional representation on the basis of population and smaller states desiring equal representation regardless of size. Sherman promoted what came to be known as the Connecticut (or Great) Compromise, providing for a bicameral legislature using a dual system of representation. His plan helped save the convention from disintegrating and established the basis of the present system of federal government.

Sherman served in Congress under the new Constitution, first as a representative (1789–91) and then as a senator (1791–93), supporting Alexander Hamilton’s program for assumption of state debts, establishment of a national bank, and enactment of a tariff.