1721-93, American political leader, b. Newton, Mass. Sherman helped to draft and signed the Declaration of Independence. He was long a member (1774-81, 1783-84) of the Continental Congress, helped to draw up the Articles of Confederation, and after serving as a member of the Constitutional Convention (1787) was one of the strongest proponents of the new Constitution. He was prominent in Connecticut colonial and state politics and was mayor of New Haven and treasurer of Yale College. Sherman was a U.S. Representative (1789-91) and U.S. Senator (1791-93).
Bibliography: See biographies by L. H. Boutell (1896) and R. S. Boardman (1938, repr. 1971); C. Collier, Roger Sherman's Connecticut (1971).
