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"I" is for Izard, Ralph [1742-1804]

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"I" is for Izard, Ralph [1742-1804]. Diplomat, congressman, legislator, U.S. Senator. After attending Christ College, Cambridge, Izard married Alice DeLancey and the couple decided to live in England. With the coming of the Revolution, they moved to France and the Continental Congress appointed him as its representative to Tuscany. He remained in Paris until 1780 when he returned to South Carolina and was elected to the Continental Congress. After the war he and his sons-in-law-- William Loughton Smith and Gabriel Manigault—formed a powerful political faction. Izard served five terms in the South Carolina House of Representatives and was the acknowledged “planter-boss of the lowcountry.” In January 1789 he was elected United States senator and served as president pro-tempore of the Senate during the Third Congress. At the expiration of his senate term Ralph Izard retired from public life.

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Dr. Walter Edgar has two programs on South Carolina Public Radio: Walter Edgar's Journal, and South Carolina from A to Z. Dr. Edgar received his B.A. degree from Davidson College in 1965 and his Ph.D. from the University of South Carolina in 1969. After two years in the army (including a tour of duty in Vietnam), he returned to USC as a post-doctoral fellow of the National Archives, assigned to the Papers of Henry Laurens.