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Gerry (ELBRIDGE an American orary)

ELBRIDGE, an American orary professor. He now became an statesman; born in Marblehead, Mass., July 17, 1744; was a member of the Continental Congress in 1776-1780 and 1783- 1785; delegate to the Constitutional Convention in 1789; member of Congress from Massachusetts, in 1789-1793 ; commissioner to France in 1797-1798; governor of Massachusetts in 1810-1812; and Vice-President of the United States in 1813-1814. It was during his term as governor that an unsatisfactory redistricting of the State took place, in which he was supposed to have taken part , whence arose the term "gerrymander ," now generally applied to the process of so arranging electoral districts as to give a majority of Congressmen, or State Legislators, as the case may be, to the party having the minority in the total popular vote of the State. He died in Washington, D. C., Nov. 23, 1814 .