Joseph Buffington
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Joseph Buffington (September 5, 1855 - October 21, 1947) was a longtime federal judge in the United States.
After attending Trinity College in Connecticut, Buffington returned to his hometown of Kittanning, Pennsylvania, where he "read law" and then worked as a lawyer in private practice from 1878 to 1892.
In 1892, President Benjamin Harrison named Buffington as a judge of the United States District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania in Pittsburgh. In 1906, President Theodore Roosevelt promoted Buffington to an appellate judgeship on the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit. He was the most senior judge on the court for many years and presided over its sessions.
During the 1930's, Buffington became involved in a scandal involving his colleague on the Court of Appeals, Judge John Warren Davis. Buffington was found to have been signing opinions drafted by Davis, in cases in which Davis received bribes. Davis was forced out of office, but no formal action was taken against Buffington, who was described as being "aged, senile, and nearly blind" by that time. He took what is now called senior status, a form of semi-retirement, in 1938 and ceased hearing cases. He died in 1947.
[edit] References
Van Tassel, Emily Field, et al., Why Judges Resign: Influences on Federal Judicial Service, 1789 to 1992 (Federal Judicial Center 1993), p. 23.
