Oliver Ellsworth

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Oliver Ellsworth (born April 29, 1745 in Windsor , Hartford County , Colony of Connecticut , † November 26, 1807 ibid) was an American lawyer and politician . He fought against the British in the American War of Independence , was one of the authors of the United States' Declaration of Independence and third Chief Justice of the United States .

family

Oliver and Abigail Wolcott Ellsworth

Oliver Ellsworth was born in Windsor to David and Jemima Leavitt Ellsworth. In 1762 he began studying theology at Yale University , but moved to the College of New Jersey, now Princeton University , at the end of his sophomore year . After graduating, he began to take an interest in law. After four years of study, Ellsworth was admitted to the bar in 1771.

In 1772 he married Abigail Wolcott, with whom he had nine children, including twins William W. Ellsworth and Henry Leavitt Ellsworth (founder of the insurance company Aetna ).

American War of Independence

Ellsworth had a successful law firm before becoming the Hartford County Attorney in 1777. In the same year he was appointed as a representative of Connecticut for the Continental Congress , in which he attended until 1783. In addition, Ellsworth was active for the state of Connecticut in the Revolutionary War. From 1777 he was a member of the Committee of Appeals , the forerunner of today's Supreme Court of the United States .

In 1779 he was appointed to the Connecticut Security Committee, which oversaw all activities of the armed forces . He took up his first judicial appointment at the Connecticut Supreme Court of Errors in 1784. From there he soon moved to the Connecticut Superior Court .

Work on the constitution

On May 28, 1787, Ellsworth joined with Roger Sherman and William Samuel Johnson as a Connecticut envoy to the Philadelphia Convention . Over half of the participants were lawyers, many with experience as judges. Ellsworth took an active part in the negotiations that began on June 20, 1769.

On May 30, 1787, Edmund Randolph had proclaimed a "federal government" with an executive , a legislative and a judicial branch. Ellsworth supported this system of separation of powers . He also suggested using the name United States for the newly established nation , which had already been used by the authors of the Declaration of Independence and the Articles of Confederation . This name finally caught on and was included in the final version.

However, Ellsworth also played a major role in solving the question of how the legislative power should be organized in the new United States. Together with Roger Sherman, he made a decisive contribution to the Connecticut Compromise . Together with James Wilson , John Rutledge , Edmund Randolph and Nathaniel Gorham , Ellsworth was on the committee that drew up the first draft of the constitution on the basis of resolutions already made by the envoys. For this purpose, the meeting was interrupted from July 26th to August 6th, 1787.

Although Ellsworth left the assembly on August 23, 1787 for business reasons and therefore did not sign the final document, he wrote the Letters of a Landholder to support the ratification of the constitution.

Success as a politician

From 1789 to 1796, Ellsworth was one of the first two US Senators for the state of Connecticut, alongside William Samuel Johnson . After the 1788 election he had drawn lots for the shortened term of two years, but was re-elected in 1790 or 1791 . During this time he held the position of Majority Leader . According to John Adams , he was "the safest pillar in the Washington government ." But there were also critical voices. For example, William Maclay , Senator from Pennsylvania , complained that Ellsworth repeatedly relied on negotiations within the Senate, but he shied away from public debate. In fact, the Senate kept no record of its meetings for the first five years of its existence. In contrast to the House of Representatives , no spectators were allowed to attend the meetings.

Ellsworth's first move in the Senate was the passage of the Judiciary Act , which sets the level of appeal within American jurisdiction. The important 25th section was probably written by Ellsworth himself. This gives the Supreme Court the power to overturn decisions of a supreme court of the states if they are based on state laws that are inconsistent with the constitution. Such laws can be challenged before the Supreme Court, which can then declare them unconstitutional.

After the Judiciary Act was passed, Ellsworth campaigned for the Bill of Rights to be passed . Together with the Judiciary Act , the constitution became really handy. While the states were granted a certain degree of sovereignty , the provisions of the Bill of Rights prevented the abuse of that same sovereignty against the citizen.

Ellsworth was also legislatively active in the area of ​​economic development. He supported Alexander Hamilton's economic plan, which contained , among other things, regulations for financing national debt and establishing the First Bank of the United States .

A year before the end of his term in the Senate, Ellsworth resigned on March 8, 1796 to take office as chief federal judge.

Ellsworth as chief federal judge and later life

In the spring of 1796, Ellsworth was named President of the US Supreme Court . His tenure, which lasted only until 1800, was overshadowed by the merits of his successor, John Marshall . Despite being described as an "asset to the court," he resigned after only four years due to constant excruciating pain.

In 1796, Ellsworth ran for president and received 11 votes.

As an authorized representative of the United States, he headed a delegation to settle trade disputes with the Napoleonic government from 1799 to 1800 and was able to prevent a military conflict with France . However, his countrymen accused him of being too compliant in the negotiations. He also fell seriously ill on the crossing from Europe. Therefore, after his return in 1801, he withdrew from public life. Despite everything, he worked as an advisor to Governor Jonathan Trumbull until his death in 1807 . In 1803 Ellsworth was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences .

Ellsworth is buried in the graveyard of the First Congregational Church of Windsor.

Legacy

It is speculated that Ellsworth's negotiations with Napoléon led to the Louisiana Purchase in 1803.

In retrospect, the role Ellsworth played in founding the United States seems very important. The fact that he is often overlooked by historians, despite everything, may mainly be due to the fact that he did not excel as a leader himself, but rather acted in the background. For this reason, Ellsworth is known to few today. The only available biography of William Garrott Brown was reprinted in 1970.

Ellsworth's sons followed their father into public service. William W. Ellsworth married the daughter of Noah Webster and became governor of Connecticut . His twin brother, Henry Leavitt Ellsworth , became Mayor of Hartford , worked in the United States Patent Office and was president of the insurance company Aetna .

In 1800 the town of Ellsworth , Maine, was named after him.

proof

  • Max Farrand, David Maydole Matteson (Eds.): The records of the Federal convention of 1787 . One work in 4 volumes. Yale University Press, New Haven 1911, LCCN  11-005506 , OCLC 183212557 (English).
  • William Garrott Brown: The Life of Oliver Ellsworth . Reprint of the original from 1905. Da Capo Press, New York 1970, ISBN 0-306-71940-1 (English, 369 pages).
  • William R. Casto: The Supreme Court in the early republic: the chief justiceships of John Jay and Oliver Ellsworth . University of South Carolina Press, Columbia, SC 1995, ISBN 1-57003-033-2 (English, 267 pages).
  • Richard Streb: 1787 Constitutional Convention: The First Senate of the United States 1789-1795 (=  Roots of the Republic . Vol. 3). Grolier Educational, Danbury, Conn. 1996, ISBN 978-0-7172-7612-7 (English, 161 pages).
  • William R. Casto: Oliver Ellsworth and the creation of the federal republic . Second Circuit Committee on History and Commemorative Events, New York 1997, ISBN 0-9618400-2-1 (English, 151 pages).
  • James Brown Scott (Ed.): James Madison's notes of debates in the Federal Convention of 1787 and their relation to a more perfect society of nations . Reprint of the original from 1918. Lawbook Exchange, Union, NJ 2001, ISBN 1-58477-164-X (English, 149 pages).
  • James Brown Scott: The United States of America: a study in international organization . Reprint of the original from 1920. Lawbook Exchange, Union, NJ 2002, ISBN 1-58477-171-2 (English, 605 pages).

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Jemima Leavitt, born in Suffield, Connecticut, was the daughter of Joshua Leavitt and Hannah Devotion. [1]
  2. ↑ Text of the Letters of a Landholder at infoplease.com (English)
  3. ↑ a b ELLSWORTH, Oliver (1745 - 1807) , Biographical Directory of the United States Congress retrieved November 25, 2019
  4. ^ Brown, p. 231.
  5. ↑ Brown, pp. 224-225.
  6. ↑ David L. Faigman Laboratory of Justice, The Supreme Court's 200 Year Struggle to Integrate Science and the Law , 2004 Times Books / Holt New York ISBN 0-8050-7274-8 p. 34; James Morton Smith The republic of letters: the correspondence between Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, 1776 - 1826 , 1995 Norton New York ISBN 0-393-03691-X , 15, 501.
  7. ^ Result of the presidential election of 1796 at the National Archives

literature

  • Fenton S. Martin, Robert U. Goehlert (Eds.): The US Supreme Court: a bibliography . Congressional Quarterly, Washington DC 1990, ISBN 0-87187-554-3 (594 pages).
  • James M. Buchanan: Oliver Ellsworth, Third Chief Justice . In: Supreme Court Historical Society (ed.): Journal of Supreme Court history: Yearbook of the Supreme Court Historical Society . 1991, ISSN  1059-4329 , LCCN  93-648241 , OCLC 474326288 , pp. 32–41 (English, online [PDF; 2,3 MB ; accessed on December 22, 2012]).
  • Henry Julian Abraham: Justices and Presidents: A Political History of Appointments to the Supreme Court . 3. Edition. Oxford University Press, New York 1992, ISBN 0-19-506557-3 (English, 467 pages).
  • Kermit L. Hall, James W. Ely Jr., Joel B. Grossman, William M. Wiecek (Eds.): The Oxford companion to the Supreme Court of the United States . Oxford University Press, New York 1992, ISBN 0-19-505835-6 (1032 pp.).
  • Melvin I. Urofsky (Ed.): The Supreme Court justices: a biographical dictionary (=  Garland reference library of the humanities . Vol. 1851). Garland Pub., New York 1994, ISBN 0-8153-1176-1 (570 pages).
  • Clare Cushman (Ed.): The Supreme Court justices: illustrated biographies, 1789-1995 . with a foreword by William H. Rehnquist . 3. Edition. Congressional Quarterly, Washington DC 1995, ISBN 1-56802-127-5 (English, 588 pages).
  • Leon Friedman, Fred L. Israel (Ed.): The justices of the United States Supreme Court: their lives and major opinions . A work in 5 volumes. 2nd Edition. Chelsea House Publishers, New York 1997, ISBN 978-0-7910-1377-9 .

Web links

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personal data
SURNAME Ellsworth, Oliver
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American lawyer, politician, and President of the United States Supreme Court
DATE OF BIRTH April 29, 1745
PLACE OF BIRTH Windsor , Connecticut
DATE OF DEATH November 26, 1807
Place of death Windsor , Connecticut