Francis Lynde Stetson (April 23, 1846 – December 5, 1920) was an American

lawyer A lawyer is a person who practices law. The role of a lawyer varies greatly across different legal jurisdictions. A lawyer can be classified as an advocate, attorney, barrister, canon lawyer, civil law notary, counsel, counselor, solicitor ...

. He was president of the

New York State Bar Association The New York State Bar Association (NYSBA) is a voluntary bar association for the state of New York. The mission of the association is to cultivate the science of jurisprudence; promote reform in the law; facilitate the administration of justice; ...

in 1909 and of the

New York City Bar Association The New York City Bar Association (City Bar), founded in 1870, is a voluntary association of lawyers and law students. Since 1896, the organization, formally known as the Association of the Bar of the City of New York, has been headquartered in a ...

from 1910 to 1911.

Early life and education

He was born in

Keeseville, New York Keeseville is a hamlet (and census-designated place) in Clinton and Essex counties, New York, United States. The population was 1,815 at the 2010 census. The hamlet was named after the Keese family, early settlers from Vermont. It developed a ...

, the son of Lemuel Stetson who served in the New York state assembly and as a

representative Representative may refer to: Politics *Representative democracy, type of democracy in which elected officials represent a group of people *House of Representatives, legislative body in various countries or sub-national entities *Legislator, someon ...

in the 28th U. S. Congress. He graduated from

Williams College Williams College is a private liberal arts college in Williamstown, Massachusetts. It was established as a men's college in 1793 with funds from the estate of Ephraim Williams, a colonist from the Province of Massachusetts Bay who was kill ...

in 1867 and from

Columbia Law School Columbia Law School (Columbia Law or CLS) is the law school of Columbia University, a private Ivy League university in New York City. Columbia Law is widely regarded as one of the most prestigious law schools in the world and has always ranke ...

in 1869.

Career

He was admitted to the bar in 1869 and practiced in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

, where he worked chiefly in corporation and railway law, becoming eminent in those domains. He became general counsel of the

International Mercantile Marine Company The International Mercantile Marine Company, originally the International Navigation Company, was a trust formed in the early twentieth century as an attempt by J.P. Morgan to monopolize the shipping trade. IMM was founded by shipping magnates ...

, the

Northern Pacific Railway The Northern Pacific Railway was a transcontinental railroad that operated across the northern tier of the western United States, from Minnesota to the Pacific Northwest. It was approved by Congress in 1864 and given nearly of land grants, wh ...

, the Southern Railway, and the

United States Rubber Company The company formerly known as the United States Rubber Company, now Uniroyal, is an American manufacturer of tires and other synthetic rubber-related products, as well as variety of items for military use, such as ammunition, explosives, chemical ...

. He was also a director in several railway companies and other corporations. In 1894, he formed the firm of Stetson, Jennings & Russell (a predecessor to the modern-day

Davis Polk & Wardwell Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP, better known as Davis Polk is a white-shoe firm, white-shoe, multinational corporation, international law firm headquartered in New York City with 980 attorneys worldwide and offices in Washington, D.C., Northern Califor ...

), which represented

J. P. Morgan John Pierpont Morgan Sr. (April 17, 1837 – March 31, 1913) was an American financier and investment banker who dominated corporate finance on Wall Street throughout the Gilded Age. As the head of the banking firm that ultimately became know ...

United States Steel Corporation United States Steel Corporation, more commonly known as U.S. Steel, is an American integrated steel producer headquartered in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, with production operations primarily in the United States of America and in several countrie ...

; he was also Morgan's personal attorney. President

Grover Cleveland Stephen Grover Cleveland (March 18, 1837June 24, 1908) was an American lawyer and politician who served as the 22nd and 24th president of the United States from 1885 to 1889 and from 1893 to 1897. Cleveland is the only president in American ...

was a partner in the firm, between his two terms as U.S. President, and a close friend."FRANCIS L. STETSON, LAWYER, DIES AT 74", ''The New York Times'', December 6, 1920, page 15. Retrieved March 11, 2021.
/ref> Stetson served as counsel for

Samuel J. Tilden Samuel Jones Tilden (February 9, 1814 – August 4, 1886) was an American politician who served as the 25th Governor of New York and was the Democratic candidate for president in the disputed 1876 United States presidential election. Tilden was ...

in the Tilden-Hayes Affair regarding the 1876 presidential election. He was president of the

in 1909, then president of the

in 1910. He lived at 4 East 74th Street, in a five-story house built for him in 1900.

Legacy

He established an estate in Ringwood, New Jersey from farm in the

Ramapo Mountains The Ramapo Mountains are a forested chain of the Appalachian Mountains in northeastern New Jersey and southeastern New York, in the United States. They range in height from in New Jersey, and in New York. Several parks and forest preserves en ...

that would become the New Jersey State Botanical Gardens in Ringwood State Park. Williams College offers a

scholarship A scholarship is a form of financial aid awarded to students for further education. Generally, scholarships are awarded based on a set of criteria such as academic merit, diversity and inclusion, athletic skill, and financial need. Scholar ...

in his name. The cactus Stetsonia coryne is named after him.

Published work

* ''Was New York’s vote stolen?'' (New York: The North American review publishing co. 914 * "Preparation of corporate bonds, mortgages, collateral trusts, and debenture indentures" in ''Some legal phases of corporate financing, reorganization, and regulation'' (New York : Macmillan, 1917.)

References

External links

Fort Worth Public Library, Stetson Family PapersFrancis Lynde Stetson Correspondence
at Williams College Archives & Special Collections {{DEFAULTSORT:Stetson, Francis L. 1846 births 1920 deaths Williams College alumni Columbia Law School alumni People from Ringwood, New Jersey Presidents of the New York City Bar Association Davis Polk & Wardwell lawyers 19th-century American lawyers