Representative George Washington Smyth

George Washington Smyth (May 16, 1803 – February 21, 1866) was a Texas politician and a Democratic member of the United States House of Representatives. He is noted as a signer of the Texas Declaration of Independence and later served as commissioner of the Texas General Land Office from 1848 to 1851. His public career spanned the era of Mexican Texas, the Republic of Texas, statehood, and the Civil War.

Smyth was born in North Carolina on May 16, 1803. During his childhood he lived in Alabama and in Murfreesboro, Tennessee. He attended local schools in the communities where he was raised and pursued further study at an academy in Murfreesboro. Seeking advanced education, he enrolled at the College of New Jersey (now Princeton University), from which he graduated in 1831. Soon after completing his studies, he moved to Texas, then a province of Mexico, and settled in what is now Jasper County, where he farmed and engaged in several business ventures.

In his early years in Texas, Smyth entered public service under the Mexican government. He was appointed to several offices, including surveyor and commissioner of land titles, positions that drew on his familiarity with land matters and helped establish his later prominence in Texas land administration. As political tensions increased in Texas, he became active in the movement for self-government. In 1835 he served as a delegate to the Texas Consultation, the convention that created a provisional government for Texas. The following year, in 1836, he was a delegate to the convention that declared Texas independence from Mexico, and he signed the constitution of the Republic of Texas, thereby becoming one of the signers of the Texas Declaration of Independence.

Smyth continued to hold important roles in the government of the Republic of Texas. He was appointed commissioner in charge of determining the boundary line between the Republic of Texas and the United States, a responsibility of considerable diplomatic and practical significance. As Texas moved toward annexation, he served as a deputy in the Texas Congress in 1845 and took part in the political transition that accompanied statehood. He was one of the authors of the constitution adopted after Texas entered the Union, contributing to the legal framework that governed the new state.

Following annexation, Smyth’s expertise in land matters led to his election as commissioner of the Texas General Land Office in 1848, a position he held until 1851. In this capacity he oversaw the administration of public lands, a central issue in Texas’s economic development and settlement patterns. His work in the Land Office further solidified his reputation as a key figure in Texas’s land policy and governance during the early years of statehood.

Smyth entered national politics as a member of the Democratic Party representing Texas. In 1852 he was elected to the United States House of Representatives as a Democrat and served one term in the 33rd Congress, from March 4, 1853, to March 3, 1855. His service in Congress occurred during a significant period in American history, as sectional tensions over slavery and territorial expansion intensified. During his single term, he participated in the legislative process and represented the interests of his Texas constituents, but he declined renomination in 1854 and returned to state affairs at the close of his term.

During the American Civil War, Smyth supported the Confederacy and served in the Confederate States Army, aligning himself with the secessionist cause that dominated Texas politics during the conflict. After the war, as Texas began the process of Reconstruction and reintegration into the United States, he again took part in constitutional deliberations. In 1866 he was a delegate to the Texas state constitutional convention that framed the measures leading to Texas’s readmission to the Union. Smyth died in Austin, Texas, on February 21, 1866, while attending a session of this convention. He was buried in the Texas State Cemetery in Austin, reflecting the prominence he had attained through decades of service to Texas in territorial, republican, state, national, and Confederate capacities.