Aaron Burr

On February 6, 1756, in Newark, Province of New Jersey, Aaron Burr was born into a prominent clerical family connected to Princeton. He entered the College of New Jersey at a remarkably young age, completed a classical education in 1772, and briefly considered the ministry. The outbreak of the Revolutionary War instead drew him into military service with Benedict Arnold and Richard Montgomery on the Canada expedition.

Burr fought in the Quebec campaign of 1775, later studied law in New York, and built a successful legal and political career after independence. He served in the United States Senate, won election as vice president in the contested election of 1800, and held that office from 1801 to 1805 under Thomas Jefferson. The duel with Alexander Hamilton in 1804 and the treason proceedings that followed the western conspiracy allegations in 1807 permanently altered his public standing.

Burr's career shaped the political crisis that produced the Twelfth Amendment, which changed presidential election procedures after 1804. The treason trial in United States v. Burr also gave John Marshall a major opportunity to define constitutional standards for executive power and criminal evidence in the Early Republic.