penitentiary labour not a punishment forced on the prisoner, but a
matter of his choice and a reward for good behaviour, bringing with it
better accommodations. His Code of Reform and Prison Discipline was
adopted by Guatemala. Livingston was the leading member of a commission
appointed to prepare a new civil code,[1] which for the most part the
legislature adopted in 1825, and the most important chapters of which,
including all those on contract, were prepared by Livingston alone.
Livingston was again a representative in Congress during 1823-1829, a
senator in 1829-1831, and for two years (1831-1833) secretary of state
under President Jackson. In this last position he was one of the most
trusted advisers of the president, for whom he prepared a number of
state papers, the most important being the famous anti-nullification
proclamation of the 10th of December 1832. From 1833 to 1835 Livingston
was minister plenipotentiary to France, charged with procuring the
fulfilment by the French government of the treaty negotiated by W. C.
Rives in 1831, by which France had bound herself to pay an indemnity of
twenty-five millions of francs for French spoliations of American
shipping chiefly under the Berlin and Milan decrees, and the United
States in turn agreed to pay to France 1,500,000 francs in satisfaction
of French claims. Livingston's negotiations were conducted with
excellent judgment, but the French Chamber of Deputies refused to make
an appropriation to pay the first instalment due under the treaty in
1833, relations between the two governments became strained, and
Livingston was finally instructed to close the legation and return to
America. He died on the 23rd of May 1836 at Montgomery Place, Dutchess
county, New York, an estate left him by his sister, to which he had
removed in 1831. Livingston was twice married. His first wife, Mary
McEvers, whom he married on the 10th of April 1788, died on the 13th of
March 1801. In June 1805 he married Madame Louise Moreau de Lassy (d.
1860), a widow nineteen years of age, whose maiden name was Davezac de
Castera, and who was a refugee in New Orleans from the revolution in
Santo Domingo. She was a woman of extraordinary beauty and intellect,
and is said to have greatly influenced her husband's public career.
See C. H. Hunt, _Life of Edward Livingston_ (New York, 1864);
Livingston's _Works_ (2 vols., New York, 1873); and Louise Livingston
Hunt, _Memoir of Mrs Edward Livingston_ (New York, 1886).
FOOTNOTE:
[1] Preliminary work in the preparation of a new civil code had been
done by James Brown and Moreau Lislet, who in 1808 reported a "Digest
of the Civil Laws now in force in the Territory of Orleans with
Alterations and Amendments adapted to the present Form of
Government."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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