Archbishop John Joseph Hughes (June 24, 1797 - January 3, 1864) was the fourth bishop of the Roman Catholic diocese of New York. He was born in Ireland and followed his parents to America. Initially employed as a gardener at Mount St. Mary's College in Emmitsburg, Maryland, he was admitted as a student, and was ordained a priest on October 15, 1826 and ordained a bishop on January 7, 1838 with the titular see of Basileopolis. He succeeded to the bishopric of the diocese of New York on December 20, 1842 and became an archbishop on July 19, 1850, when the diocese was elevated to the status of archdiocese. He campaigned actively on behalf of Irish immigrants, and attempted to secure state support for religious schools. When he failed to secure state support, he founded an independent Catholic school system: he nearly died in the resulting anti-Catholic, anti-Irish riots. He founded St. John's College (now Fordham University) and began construction of St. Patrick's Cathedral. He served until his death. He was originally buried in old St. Patrick's Cathedral and was exhumed and reinterred in the crypt under the altar of the new St. Patrick's Cathedral.
Unshakable faith, political savvy and indefatigable energy were the assets possessed by JohnHughes, the first Archbishop of New York.
After initial failed attempts at finding a conciliatory solution to the problem, Hughes took the offensive in public speeches, sermons and writings during the 1840s, demanding public funds for Catholic schools.
Hughes was unsuccessful in obtaining taxpayer dollars for religious schools, but his struggles and the fiery debates between Hughes and members of New York’s prominent Protestant establishment helped to set in motion the secularization of American public schools, a process that began in the 19th century, and continues to this day.
And just as John Wesley, the founder of Methodism in the late 18th century, had sparked a change in the culture of the English working class that made it unusually industrious and virtuous, so too a clergyman was the catalyst for the cultural change that liberated New York's Irish from their underclass behavior.
Hughes once remarked that "the Catholic Church is a church of discipline," and Father Richard Shaw, Hughes' most recent biographer, believes that the comment gives a glimpse into the inner core of his beliefs.
Hughes and Ives made it clear that these children were the community's responsibility; their own Irish parents--not the nativists or the unfeeling city--had abandoned them to their plight.
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