
Oliver Wolcott Jr. (11 January 1760 – 1 June 1833) was the United States Secretary of the Treasury from 3 February 1795 to 31 December 1800, succeeding Alexander Hamilton and preceding Samuel Dexter, later serving as Governor of Connecticut from 8 May 1817 to 2 May 1827, succeeding John Cotton Smith and preceding Gideon Tomlinson.
Biography[]
Oliver Wolcott Jr. was born on 11 January 1760 in Litchfield, Connecticut, the son of future Connecticut governor Oliver Wolcott and Laura Collins. Wolcott graduated from Yale University in 1778 while serving in the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War, and in 1781 he was admitted to the bar. In 1795, President George Washington appointed Wolcott as the new Secretary of the Treasury of the United States. However, his career was ruined by unpopularity and by an accusation by his enemies that he burnt down the State Department, but he was one of the "Midnight Judges" appointed by John Adams on the eve of Thomas Jefferson's inaugaration in 1801. On 1 July 1802 his term ended when the circuit courts were terminated, and from 1813 to 1815 he operated a private business in New York. Wolcott was elected Governor of Connecticut in 1816, and although he created a new state constitution in 1818 and fostered economic growth with his moderate positions, he was defeated in 1827. Wolcott died in 1833 in Litchfield, the last surviving member of the Washington cabinet from the 1790s.