John Randolph

Virginia eccentric whose slashing rhetoric made him the era's most quotable congressman.

Overview

Randolph represented Virginia in the House and Senate intermittently from 1799 to 1833. An early Jeffersonian ally who broke with the president over compromise with Federalists, he led the Tertium Quids faction, opposed the War of 1812 as unconstitutional aggression, and fought rising federal power for three decades. He commanded attention with eccentric dress, falcons and hounds, and the sharpest invective in Washington, once lacerating a colleague in words he had to be forced to withdraw. Appointed to the Senate in 1825, he served briefly and later as minister to Russia.