[1] Following this split, Randolph proclaimed himself the leader of the "Old Republicans" or "Tertium Quids", a wing of the Democratic-Republican Party[2] who wanted to restrict the role of the federal government.

Described as a quick-thinking orator with a remarkable wit, he was committed to republicanism and advocated a commercial agrarian society throughout his three decades in Congress.

Randolph "attracted great attention from the severity of his invectives, the piquancy of his sarcasms, the piercing intonation of his voice and his peculiarly expressive gesticulation.

"[3] Randolph's conservative stance, displayed in his arguments against debt and for the rights of the landed, slaveholding gentry, have been attributed to his ties to his family estate and the elitist values of his native Southside Virginia[citation needed].

His belief in the importance of a landed gentry led him to oppose the abolition of entail and primogeniture: "The old families of Virginia will form connections with low people, and sink into the mass of overseers' sons and daughters".

With mixed feelings about slavery, he was one of the founders of the American Colonization Society in 1816, to send free blacks to a colony in Africa.

On the other hand, others, particularly northern advocates of democracy, mocked Randolph for his eccentricities discussed below, as did many Virginians including Thomas Jefferson.

His defense of limited government appeals to modern and contemporary conservatives, most notably Russell Kirk, who wrote an influential monograph on Randolph.

[9] Modern science has established that latent pulmonary tuberculosis can sometimes settle in the genital tract and can cause the symptoms and permanent damage that would prevent the onset of puberty.

Federalist William Plumer of New Hampshire wrote in 1803 of his striking presence: Mr. Randolph goes to the House booted and spurred, with his whip in hand, in imitation, it is said, of members of the British Parliament.

I admire his ingenuity and address; but I dislike his politics.Randolph was chairman of the Committee on Ways and Means in the Seventh through the Ninth Congresses, acting as the Democratic-Republican Party leader.

In 1804, Randolph proposed the ill-fated Mobile Act, which implicitly allowed the President to claim parts of Spanish West Florida for the US.

In 1806, Randolph founded the Tertium quids (Latin for "Third things", i.e. neither pro-Jefferson nor Federalist), a breakaway faction of the Democratic-Republican Party.

Although he greatly admired the political ideals of the Revolutionary War generation, Randolph, influenced by Southern anti-Federalism, propounded a version of republicanism that called for the traditional patriarchal society of Virginia's elite slaveholding gentry to preserve social stability with minimal government interference.

Randolph was one of the House managers who successfully prosecuted the impeachment trial of John Pickering, judge of the United States District Court for New Hampshire, in January 1804.

By the end of the review, he was angry with Thomas Jefferson for supporting General James Wilkinson, Burr's chief accuser.

During the Missouri Crisis, Randolph emerged as an outspoken defender of the slaveholding gentry and a critic of democracy, even though he repeatedly insisted that he hated slavery.

Randolph argued these measures would give advantage to the emerging industrial powers of New England at the expense of the Southern states.

Speaking about Cuba, Randolph said "It is unquestionable but this invasion will be made with this principle – this genius of universal emancipation – the sweeping anathema against the white population... And then, sir, what is the position of the southern United States?"

He was appointed United States Minister to Russia by President Andrew Jackson and served from May to September 1830, when he resigned for health reasons.

His Virginia home, Roanoke Plantation, remains standing today, and was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1973.

[19][20][21] Places named in his honor include: Despite being a Virginia gentleman, one of the great orators in the history of Caroline,[further explanation needed] and House leader, Randolph after five years of leadership became, by 1803, a permanent outsider.

His personal eccentricities may have been made worse by his lifelong ill health (he died of tuberculosis), heavy drinking, and occasional use of opium.

[24] During the preliminary activities, Randolph asserted that Clay had no right to issue a challenge over political remarks made on the U.S. Senate floor.

[24] As Martin Van Buren later wrote: He [Randolph] insisted that he at no time intended to take Mr. Clay's life and assigned as a reason his respect for Mrs. Clay and his unwillingness to make her unhappy, but he admitted that, after certain occurrences, he had determined to wound him in the leg — his failure to accomplish which design he attributed to an anxiety to avoid the kneepan, to hit which he regarded as murder!

"[W]hen Clay had set about making the speakership a position of true power upon his first election to that post in 1811, he had unceremoniously ordered Randolph to remove his dog from the House floor—something no previous Speaker had dared to do.

"[32] Thus, the executors of Randolph's last will and testament (described below) included Virginia's bishop, William Meade (who had freed his slaves years earlier, but would by the end of his life during the American Civil War become a defender of the "peculiar institution").

Together with Justice Bushrod Washington and his former student Henry Clay, Randolph was among the founders of the American Colonization Society (ACS) in 1816.

It began as a collaboration of slaveholders and abolitionists that planned to transport and resettle free blacks in a colony in Africa (this territory became Liberia).

[39] Many of them ultimately settled in Miami and Shelby Counties at places such as Rossville near Piqua, Ohio,[40] of which only the community cemetery remains.