Cadwallader David Colden (April 4, 1769 – February 7, 1834) was an American politician who served as the 54th Mayor of New York City and a U.S. Representative from New York. Early life Colden was born at Spring Hill in Flushing, the family home, on April 4, 1769 in the Province of New York. He was the son of David Colden and Ann Alice (née Willett) Colden. He was the brother of Alice Christy Colden, Maria Colden, who married Josiah Ogden Hoffman, Elizabeth Colden, who married Edward Laight, and Catherine Colden, who married Thomas Cooper. He was the grandson of Alice (née Chrystie) Colden and Cadwallader Colden (1688–1776), who served as the Governor of the Province of New York several times in the 1750s and 1770s. He was taught by a private tutor, and then provided a classical education in Jamaica, New York and in London. After returning to the United States in 1785, he studied law, and was admitted to the bar in 1791. Career Colden first practiced law in New York City, then moved to Poughkeepsie, New York in 1793. He returned to New York in 1796 and from 1798 to 1801, he was Assistant Attorney General for the First District, comprising Suffolk, Queens, Kings, Richmond and Westchester counties. From 1810 to 1811, he was District Attorney of the First District, comprising the above-mentioned counties and New York County. Colden was an active Freemason. He was the Senior Grand Warden of the Grand Lodge of New York in 1801-1805 and 1810–1819.<ref>Proceedings of the Grand Lodge of Free and Accepted Masons of the State of New York, May 1921, p. 254.</ref> He became a Colonel of Volunteers in the War of 1812. Despite having owned slaves, in 1815 he became president of the New York Manumission Society, established in 1785 to promote the abolition of slavery in the state. He oversaw the rebuilding of the Society's African Free School in New York City. Later historians cited the energetic aid of Colden, Peter A. Jay, William Jay, Governor Daniel D. Tompkins, and others in influencing the New York legislature to set the date of July 4, 1827, for the abolition of slavery in the state. Colden was also a member of the New York State Assembly in 1818, and the 54th Mayor of New York City from 1818 to 1821, appointed by Governor DeWitt Clinton. He successfully contested the election