While the nation was following the Brett Kavanaugh hearings, I was thinking of what I learned about politics and the Supreme Court in writing my latest.
Consider John Rutledge, arguably the second chief justice. I say arguably because, although his friend George Washington gave him a recess appointment to succeed John Jay in the summer of 1795, and Rutledge sat for the Court’s August term (it had two in those days), the Federalist-dominated Senate refused to confirm him when it reassembled in December. Rutledge had spoken against Jay’s Treaty, a controversial agreement with Britain that the Federalist party supported. He was also called “a driveller and a fool.” So much for Rutledge, CJ.
Samuel Chase was confirmed as an associate justice in 1796, but was sometimes too hot to handle after that. He campaigned for John Adams for president and gave charges to grand juries that were (Federalist) political speeches. After the first Republican party (now the Democrats) swept Congress and the White House in the elections of 1800, Chase hung by a thread. The House impeached him at the end of Thomas Jefferson’s first term, and he was tried by the Senate in February 1805. Lame-duck veep Aaron Burr presided, despite having been indicted for killing Alexander Hamilton in a duel. Thanks to good lawyering by Chase’s defenders and blunders by the House managers, he survived, but it was a close call.
Smith Thompson…
