James Iredell
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| Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States Term in office |
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| May 12, 1790 – October 20, 1799 | |
| Preceded by | none |
| Succeeded by | Alfred Moore |
| Nominated by | George Washington |
| Born | October 5, 1751 Lewes, England |
| Died | October 20, 1799 |
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- This article is about James Iredell, the United States Supreme Court justice. For his son, governor and senator from North Carolina, see James Iredell, Jr..
James Iredell (October 5, 1751 – October 20, 1799) was one of the original Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States. He was appointed by President George Washington and served from 1790 until his death in 1799. His son, James Iredell, Jr., became governor of North Carolina.
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[edit] Early life
James Iredell was born in Lewes, England, the oldest of five children of a Bristol merchant. The failure of his father's business (and health) impelled James to immigrate to the Colonies in 1767 at the age of 17. Relatives assisted him in obtaining a position in the customs service as deputy collector, or comptroller, of the port of Edenton, North Carolina.
While working at the customs house, Iredell read law under Samuel Johnston (later governor of North Carolina), began the practice of law and was admitted to the bar in 1771. The grandson of a clergyman, he was a devout Anglican throughout his life and his writings display an interest in spirituality and metaphysics beyond a simple attachment to organized religion.
In 1773, Iredell married Johnston's sister Hannah and the two had three children. The following year (1774) he was made collector for the port.
[edit] Roles in the Revolution
Although employed by the British government, Iredell was a strong supporter of independence and the revolution. In 1774 he wrote To the Inhabitants of Great Britain in which he laid out arguments opposing the concept of Parliamentary supremacy over America. This essay established Iredell, at the age of 23, as the most influential political essayist in North Carolina at that time. His treatise Principles of an American Whig predates and echoes themes and ideas of the Declaration of Independence.
After the revolution began, Iredell helped organize the court system of North Carolina, and was elected a judge of the superior court in 1778. His career advanced through a number of political and judicial posts in the state, including that of attorney general from 1779–1781. In 1787 the state assembly appointed him commissioner and charged him with compiling and revising the laws of North Carolina. His work was published in 1791 as Iredell's Revisal.
Iredell was a leader of the Federalists in North Carolina, and a strong supporter of the proposed Constitution. In the 1788 convention at Hillsborough he argued unsuccessfully in favor of its adoption. (North Carolina later ratified the Constitution after Congress amended it through the addition of the Bill of Rights.)
[edit] Supreme Court Justice
On February 10, 1790, George Washington nominated James Iredell to the post of Associate Justice of the Supreme Court and he was confirmed by the Senate two days later. At the age of 38, he was the youngest of the original Supreme Court Justices.
The case load of the first Supreme Court was light. In fact, the court did not hear its first case until 1792. The Justices gathered to hear arguments only twice a year, and we have only a handful of opinions written by Justice Iredell in his years on the court. Of those, two of the most significant are:
- Chisholm v. Georgia (1793): At issue was whether the citizens of one state (South Carolina) could sue another state (Georgia) for repayment of Revolutionary War bills. Iredell was the lone dissent from the majority opinion that held that a state may be sued in federal court without its consent to the suit.
- Calder v. Bull (1798): At issue was whether an act of the Connecticut legislature violated the Constitution because it was an ex post facto law, forbidden pursuant to Article I, Section 9, Clause 3.
In the Chisholm case, public and political opinion agreed with Iredell against the other Justices. The outcry and strong reaction of people against the Chisholm decision would lead to its reversal by the adoption of the Eleventh Amendment in 1798.
In the unanimous decision in Calder, the Court held that the Clause applied to criminal cases only, deciding that the legislature's act was not unconsitutional. More importantly, Calder raised the question of whether "principles of natural justice" constituted law. Iredell's opinion indicated that only those actions of a state that explicitly violated a textual provision of the Constitution could be declared void. He stated: "The principles of natural justice are regulated by no fixed standard; the ablest and the purest men have differed upon the subject; and all the court could properly say, in such an event, would be, that the legislature (possessed of an equal right of opinion) had passed an act which, in the opinion of the judges, was inconsistent with the abstract principles of natural justice."
Justice Iredell's opinion in Calder helped establish the principle of judicial review five years before it was tested in Marbury v. Madison (1803). The Supreme Court has followed Iredell's approach throughout its subsequent history.
[edit] Later years
The Judiciary Act of 1789 divided the United States into 13 districts, each district having a court in one of 13 major cities. It also established three circuits, or appeals courts — one each in the eastern, central and southern United Staltes. The Supreme Court Justices were required to "ride circuit," or travel to the various circuits and hear cases, twice each year. Partially as a result of the heavy travel burden, Justice Iredell's health failed and he died suddenly on October 20, 1799. He was 48.
[edit] Quotations
- It would be not only useless, but dangerous, to enumerate a number of rights which are not intended to be given up; because it would be implying, in the strongest manner, that every right not included in the exception might be impaired by the government without usurption; and it would be impossible to enumerate every one. Let any one make what collection or enumeration of rights he pleases, I will immediately mention twenty or thirty more rights not contained in it.
- Had Congress undertaken to guarantee religious freedom, or any particular species of it, they would then have had a pretense to interfere in a subject they have nothing to do with. Each state, so far as the clause in question does not interfere, must be left to the operation of its own principles.
- [Congress] certainly [has] no authority to interfere in the establishment of any religion whatsoever...Is there any power given to Congress in matters of religion? Can they pass a single act to impair our religious liberties? If they could, it would be a just cause of alarm...If any future Congress should pass an act concerning the religion of the country, it would be an act which they are not authorized to pass, by the Constitution, and which the people would not obey.
- How is it possible to exclude any set of men, without taking away that principle of religious freedom which we ourselves so warmly contend for? ... It is never to be supposed that the people of America will trust their dearest rights to persons who have no religion at all, or a religion materially different from their own...Let religion be permitted to take its own course; the divine author of our religion never wished for its support by worldly authority.
- I think the Christian religion is a Divine institution; and I pray to God that I may never forget the precepts of His religion or suffer the appearance of an inconsistency in my principle and practice.
- Prudence, indeed will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security.
- The power of impeachment is given by this Constitution, to bring great offenders to punishment. It is calculated to bring them to punishment for crimes which it is not easy to describe, but which every one must be convinced is a high crime and misdemeanor against the government.
- If they were punishable for exercising their own judgment, and not that of their constituents, no man who regarded his reputation would accept the office either of a Senator or President. Whatever mistake a man may make, he ought not to be punished for it, nor his posterity rendered infamous. But if a man be a villain, and wilfully abuses his trust, he is to be held up as a public offender, and ignominiously punished.
- A public officer ought not to act from a principle of fear. Were he punishable for want of judgment, he would be continually in dread. But when he knows that nothing but real guilt can disgrace him, he may do his duty firmly if he be an honest man, and if he be not, a just fear of disgrace, may perhaps, as to the public, have nearly the effect of an intrinsic principle of virtue. According to these principles, I suppose the only instances in which the President would be liable to impeachment, would be where he had received a bribe, or had acted from some corrupt motive or other.
[edit] External link
| Preceded by (none) |
Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States May 12, 1790 – October 20, 1799 |
Succeeded by Alfred Moore |
| The Jay Court |  |
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|---|---|---|
| 1789–1792: | J. Wilson | Wm. Cushing | J. Blair | J. Rutledge | J. Iredell | |
| 1792–1793: | J. Wilson | Wm. Cushing | J. Blair | J. Iredell | Th. Johnson | |
| 1793–1795: | J. Wilson | Wm. Cushing | J. Blair | J. Iredell | Wm. Paterson | |
| The Rutledge Court | ||
| 1795: | J. Wilson | Wm. Cushing | J. Blair | J. Iredell | Wm. Paterson | |
| The Ellsworth Court | ||
| 1796–1798: | J. Wilson | Wm. Cushing | J. Iredell | Wm. Paterson | S. Chase | |
| 1798–February 1799: | Wm. Cushing | J. Iredell | Wm. Paterson | S. Chase | |
| February–October 1799: | Wm. Cushing | J. Iredell | Wm. Paterson | S. Chase | B. Washington | |
