Henry Wheaton

Henry Wheaton (painting by George Healy )

Henry Wheaton (born November 27, 1785 in Providence , Rhode Island , † March 11, 1848 in Dorchester , Massachusetts ) was an American politician , diplomat and writer .

Life

Henry Wheaton graduated from Brown University (then Rhode Island College) in Providence in 1802 , where he studied law, which he continued from 1805 to 1806 in France , Holland and England . After returning to the USA, he became a lawyer in Rhode Island and later in New York . He wrote for the National Advocate, a daily newspaper, on the issue of neutrality rights that had arisen during the war with Britain . In 1812 he was briefly a member of the Maritime Tribunal in New York. Here he published his book Digest of the Law of Maritime Captures or Prizes in 1815 , which was in fact a description of the law of nations as it was applied at the time. Around the same time he wrote, "An Essay on the Means of Maintaining the Commercial and Naval Interests of the United States."

From 1816 he worked in the United States Supreme Court in Washington, DC as Reporter of Decisions where he collected all decisions that were made there. His reports reached 12 volumes and were largely commented on. He thereby achieved the highest authority. He published the decision of the Supreme Court under the title: Digest of the Decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States, 1789-1829 (2 vols. 8vo, New York, 1821-'9). During this period he also contributed consistently to the American Quarterly and the North American Review. His 1820 anniversary address to the New York Historical Society on the Science of Public or International Law already contained the seeds of his work on The Law of Nations.

In 1821 he was a member of the New York Constitutional Convention ; two years later he was elected to the New York State Assembly , the House of Representatives. In 1824 he founded the Athenaeum , a public literary institute in New York , and in 1826 he participated in the drafting of a private law code for the state of New York. In 1827 he was sent to Copenhagen as the first American ambassador and during his stay of several years he devoted himself to the study of Scandinavian languages , history and antiquities, which were reflected in his works "History of the Northmen or Danes and Normans" (Lond. 1831, French. 1844) appeared. After traveling to France, England and Germany several times , he returned to the USA in 1834, but returned to Berlin as an envoy in 1835 , specifically to negotiate with the German Customs Union .

In 1836 his Elements of international law appeared in two editions, one printed in Philadelphia and the second in London, which immediately identified him as an international law capacity. A third was published in Philadelphia in 1846. In 1848 a French edition of his work was printed in Leipzig and Paris and in 1853 a second edition in French, also printed in Leipzig and Paris. In 1857 there was an edition in English, which was called the sixth and was published by William Beach Lawrence at the request of the Wheaton family and printed in Boston. A second edition, also edited by LB Lauwrence, appeared in 1863. The next edition appeared in 1864, translated into Chinese, and carried out on behalf of the Chinese government. (8th edition by Dana, Boston 1866; also edited by Boyd, Lond. 1880; in French adaptation, 5th edition, Leipz 1874, 2 vols.)

The expanded History of the Law of Nations followed in 1845 . The same subject is dealt with in the prize publication Histoire des progres du droit des gens en Europe et en Amerique depuis la paix de Westphalie (Leipzig 1841; 4th ed., Das . 1865, 2 vol.).

In 1846 he was removed from his diplomatic post and became a teacher of international law at Harvard Law School , a faculty of Harvard University . Since 1843 he was an honorary member of the Prussian Academy of Sciences .

Works

• Elements of International Law ISBN 0-306-70206-1 (English)
• Inquiry into the Validity of the British Claim to a Right of Visitation and Search of the American Vessels Suspected to be Engaged in the African Slave Trade ISBN 0-8371-2072-1 (English)
• Henry Wheaton books on the Internet Archive
• Online Books by Henry Wheaton (1785–1848) compiled from the University of Pennsylvania

literature

• Wheaton, Henry . In: The American Cyclopædia (1879)
• Wheaton, Henry . In: James Grant Wilson, John Fiske (Eds.): Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography . tape 6 : Sunderland - Zurita . D. Appleton and Company, New York 1889, p. 450 (English, full text [ Wikisource ]).

Web links

• Biography (English)
• Report of the copy-right case of Wheaton v. Peters. Decided in the Supreme court of the United States: with an appendix, containing the acts of Congress relating to copy-right. Van Norden, New York 1834; Text archive - Internet Archive

predecessor	Office	successor
Office newly established	US envoy in Copenhagen September 20, 1827-29. May 1835	Jonathan F. Woodside
vacant since 1801	US envoy in Berlin June 9, 1835-18. July 1846	Andrew Jackson Donelson