Elisha Cooke, Jr.

Who was Elisha Cooke, Jr.?

Elisha Cooke, Jr. was a physician and politician from the Province of Massachusetts Bay. He was the son of Elisha Cooke, Sr., a wealthy Massachusetts physician and politician who was elected Speaker of the Massachusetts House of Representatives in 1683.

Like his father, the junior Cooke was the leader of the "popular party", a faction in the Massachusetts House that resisted encroachment by royal officials on colonial rights embodied in the Massachusetts Charter. As such, he was involved in contentious disputes with several colonial governors. When the House selected Cooke as its Speaker in 1720, Governor Samuel Shute dissolved the House and called for new elections. Cooke and the House insisted on the right to choose their own Speaker, to no avail.

Cooke was one of the richest men in the province, with an estate valued at his death in 1737 at £63,000. He was a heavy drinker, and the owner of the Goat Tavern on King Street. There is strong evidence to suggest that the Boston Caucus was established around 1719 by Elisha Cooke, Jr.