Isaiah Lewis Green

Isaiah Lewis Green (December 28, 1761 – December 5, 1841) was a U.S. Representative from Massachusetts and a long-serving federal customs official. He was born in Barnstable in the Province of Massachusetts Bay, where he pursued classical studies in preparation for higher education. Raised in the late colonial period, he came of age during the American Revolution, a context that shaped the early political and legal culture in which he would later build his career.

Green graduated from Harvard College in 1781, completing a classical curriculum that was typical for New England’s professional and political elite of the era. Following his graduation, he studied law, undertaking the legal training then required for entry into the bar. After completing his legal studies, he was admitted to the bar and commenced the practice of law, establishing himself in the profession in Massachusetts.

Building on his legal background and local standing, Green entered national politics as a member of the Democratic-Republican Party. He was elected as a Democratic-Republican to the Ninth and Tenth Congresses, serving in the U.S. House of Representatives from March 4, 1805, to March 3, 1809. After a brief interval out of office, he returned to Congress when he was elected to the Twelfth Congress, serving from March 4, 1811, to March 3, 1813. His terms in Congress coincided with a period of growing tension between the United States and Great Britain that culminated in the War of 1812, and he served during a formative era in the development of the young republic’s legislative institutions.

Following his congressional service, Green continued in public life through a significant federal appointment. In 1814, President James Madison appointed him collector of customs for the district of Barnstable, Massachusetts. In this capacity he was responsible for overseeing the administration of customs laws, the collection of import duties, and the regulation of maritime commerce in his district—functions of considerable importance in a coastal New England community dependent on shipping and trade. He held this post for an extended period, serving from 1814 until 1837, which reflected both the continuity of his public service and the confidence successive administrations placed in his performance.

After leaving the customs post in 1837, Green resumed the practice of law, returning to the profession in which he had first established his public reputation. In his later years he resided in Cambridge, Massachusetts, an intellectual and civic center of the Commonwealth closely associated with Harvard and the state’s legal and political leadership. He died in Cambridge on December 5, 1841. Isaiah Lewis Green was interred in the Old Cambridge Cemetery, a historic burial ground that contains the graves of many prominent Massachusetts figures of the colonial and early national periods.