Bancroft Davis

Bancroft Davis
9th Reporter of Decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States
In office
1883–1902
Preceded by William Tod Otto
Succeeded by Charles Henry Butler
7th, 9th & 14th Assistant Secretary of State
In office
March 25, 1869 – November 13, 1871
January 24, 1873  January 30, 1874
December 19, 1881 – July 7, 1882
Preceded by Frederick W. Seward
Charles Hale
Robert R. Hitt
Succeeded by Charles Hale
John Cadwalader
John Davis
13th Envoy from the United States to Germany
In office
August 28, 1874  September 26, 1877
President Ulysses S. Grant
Rutherford B. Hayes
Preceded by George Bancroft
Succeeded by Bayard Taylor
Personal details
Born John Chandler Bancroft Davis
December 22, 1822
Worcester, Massachusetts, USA
Died December 27, 1907 (aged 85)
Washington, DC, USA
Nationality American
Political party Republican
Relations John Davis (father), Horace Davis (brother)
Alma mater Harvard University
Occupation Author, lawyer, politician

John Chandler Bancroft Davis (December 22, 1822 – December 27, 1907), commonly known as Bancroft Davis, was an American lawyer, judge, diplomat, and president of Newburgh and New York Railway Company.[1]

Early life

Davis was born in Worcester, Massachusetts, the son of John Davis, a Whig governor of Massachusetts, and was the older brother of congressman Horace Davis.[2] He entered Harvard with the class of 1840 but was suspended in his senior year and did not graduate with his class. He eventually received his Bachelor of Arts degree from Harvard University in 1847.[3] He married Frederika Gore King. She was the daughter of James G. King, an American businessman and Whig Party politician and the granddaughter of Rufus King, who was one of the List of signatories of the United States Constitution.

Bancroft Davis in his later years.

Career

In 1849, Davis became secretary of the American embassy in London and later its chargé d'affaires. He practiced law in New York City and was the correspondent for The Times in London. Because of ill health, he retired from his law work in 1862. He was a member of the New York State Assembly (Orange Co., 1st D.) in 1869, but vacated his seat on March 26 after his appointment as Assistant U.S. Secretary of State.

Under President Ulysses S. Grant, he was Assistant Secretary of State in 1869–1871 and again in 1873–1874.

Between times he was a secretary of the commission which concluded the Treaty of Washington in 1871, to create a tribunal to settle the Alabama claims. He subsequently represented the United States at the tribunal, the Geneva Court of Arbitration, which met at Geneva on December 15, 1871. The American case was prepared and presented by him.

In 1874, he was appointed as the U.S. Minister to Germany, serving in that position until 1877. President Rutherford B. Hayes appointed him to be an associate judge on the United States Court of Claims on December 14, 1877, replacing retiring Judge Edward G. Loring.

For another special assignment at the State Department, he resigned from the Court of Claims in 1881 at the request of President Chester A. Arthur, who reappointed him to the court in 1882. He resigned again in 1883 to become Reporter of Decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States, and was replaced on the Court of Claims by Lawrence Weldon.

Role in corporate personhood controversy

Acting as court reporter in Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad – 118 U.S. 394 (1886), dealing with taxation of railroad properties, Davis plays a historical role in the corporate personhood debate. The position of court reporter entailed that he write "a summary-of-the-case commentary." Why Bancroft Davis's role in the controversy is worth mentioning is that he noted in the headnote to the court's opinion that the Chief Justice Morrison Waite began oral argument by stating, "The court does not wish to hear argument on the question whether the provision in the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which forbids a State to deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws, applies to these corporations. We are all of the opinion that it does."[4] In a published account of Bancroft's collected Supreme Court reports and notes from 1885-1886,[5] he wrote of the Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad case that, "The defendant Corporations are persons within the intent of the clause in section 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, which forbids a State to deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."[6] Journalists and authors, such as Thom Hartman, have since cited Davis's prior position as president of Newburgh and New York Railway as evidence of a conflict of interest in the corporate personhood interpretation of a Supreme Court ruling dealing with a railroad.

Death

Bancroft Davis died in Washington, DC in 1907.

Works

See also

Wikimedia Commons has media related to John Chandler Bancroft Davis.

References

  1. "Annual Report of the State Engineer and Surveyor of the State of New York, and of the Tabulations and Deductions from the Reports of the Railroad Corporations for the Year Ending September 30, 1867". The Argus Company, Albany, NY. 1868. p. 336. Retrieved 2009-10-04.
  2. "Davis, John Chandler Bancroft (1822–1907)". Political Graveyard. Retrieved September 17, 2008.
  3. "John Chandler Bancroft Davis". American Law Encyclopedia Vol 3. Retrieved September 17, 2008.
  4. 118 U.S. 394 (1886) - Official court Syllabus in the United States Reports
  5. Davis, J.C. Bancroft (1886). Vol. 118 of United States Reports: Cases Adjudged in the Supreme Court at October Term 1885 and October Term 1886. New York City: Banks & Brothers Publishers.
  6. Hartman, Thom (2002). Unequal Protection: The Rise of Corporate Dominance and the Theft of Human Rights. New York, NY: Rodale. p. 107. ISBN 1-57954-627-7.
Legal offices
Preceded by
William Tod Otto
Reporter of Decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States
1883–1902
Succeeded by
Charles Henry Butler