Jonathan Jennings (27 March 1784-26 July 1834) was the Democratic-Republican Governor of Indiana from 7 September 1816 to 12 September 1822 (succeeding Thomas Posey and preceding Ratliff Boon) and a member of the US House of Representatives (DR-IN AL) from 2 December 1822 to 3 March 1823 (succeeding William Hendricks) and from IN-2 from 3 March 1823 to 3 March 1831 (preceding John Carr).
Biography[]
Jonathan Jennings was born in Readington Township, New Jersey in 1784, and he studied law in Washington, Pennsylvania before migrating to Steubenville, Ohio in 1806 and then to Jeffersonville and Vincennes that same year. He became an assistant to the clerk of the territorial legislature, but a dispute with the president of the Vincennes University board of trustees William Henry Harrison persuaded Jennings to enter politics. In 1808, he settled in Charlestown and served as a delegate to the US House of Representatives from 1809 to 1816, running as an anti-Harrison candidate. By 1812, he was the leader of the anti-slavery and pro-statehood faction of the territorial government, and he served as Governor from 1816 to 1822, drafting the state's first constitution, banning slavery in the state, supporting a strong legislative branch, pressing for the construction of roads and schools, and opening up central Indiana to American settlement through the Treaty of St. Mary's (nearly leading to his impeachment). He was nearly ruined by the Panic of 1819, but he went on to serve in the US House of Representatives from 1822 to 1831 and supported federal spending on internal improvements. Jennings affiliated himself with the Jacksonian Democrats before ultimately joining the National Republican coalition. His alcoholism led to his re-election defeat in 1830, and he died in 1834.