Frederic René Coudert, Sr.

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Frederic René Coudert, Sr. (born in New York, 1 March 1832; died at Washington, D.C., 20 December 1903) was an American lawyer with Coudert Brothers.

[edit] Life

His father Charles Coudert was French, and left France in 1824^[1]. Frederic graduated from Columbia College in 1850, and on his majority was admitted to practice in the courts. He became a leader of the Bar.

During the controversy concerning American and British seal fisheries in the Bering Sea, and in the controversy concerning the disputed boundary between Venezuela and British Guiana (see Guayana Esequiba), he acted as legal adviser for the United States Government. He was an orator not only in English, but also in the French, Spanish, and Italian languages; he was gifted with ready wit and power of sarcasm.

He consented in 1876 to visit Louisiana for the purpose of urging the Returning Board to act justly, respecting election returns which were to determine the presidential succession. In 1892 and again in 1893 he was a prominent opponent of the courses taken by his own political party.

He declined the Russian mission, a judgeship of the Court of Appeals of the State of New York, and a justiceship of the Supreme Court of the United States. He accepted (as the only public office he ever held) unsalaried membership in the Board of Education of the City of New York.

[edit] References

Addresses by Frederic H. Coudert (New York and London, 1905);
Annual Reports of the Association of the Bar of the City of New York (New York, 1905);
U. S. Cath. Hist. Soc. Records and Studies