Introduction to John Marshall
By most measures, John Marshall was the greatest Chief Justice and perhaps the greatest justice to serve on the United State Supreme Court. What achievements earned the reputation which placed him in the lofty position of greatness?
Marshall was raised on the frontier of Virginia as the eldest child in a family of 15 children all of whom survived to adulthood. His early schooling consisted of home study, one year of study at an academy, and one year of formal study in his home with a resident parish priest. In 1775 at age 19, he and his father joined the Culpepper Minutemen to confront the Royal Governor's forces at the Battle of Great Bridge. The following year he enlisted in the Continental Army to serve with General Washington at Brandywine, Germantown, Valley Forge and Monmouth.
In 1780 while visiting with his father, who was serving in Yorktown, he met and fell in love with Polly Ambler, the 13 year old daughter of the State Treasurer of Virginia. While in the area he studied law for six weeks with Professor George Wythe at William and Mary College in Williamsburg. Later that year he passed his oral bar exams and was licensed to practice law. After a brief period of legal practice in Warrenton near his family home, he longed to get to Richmond where his love interest, Polly Ambler, then resided. In 1782 he ran for and won election to the legislature, moved to Richmond and opened a law practice there. He was modestly successful as a young lawyer and impressive as a legislator. In fact, his fellow legislators including Patrick Henry, George Mason, James Monroe and Richard Henry Lee, elected him to the Council of State which was charged with administration of the state's business along with the Governor as chief administrative officer. In 1783 he married "Dearest Polly," the love of his life, and remained her faithful husband and care giver until her death in 1831.
By 1784 Marshall had established himself as a promising young lawyer and became an associate of Edmund Randolph, the former president of the Continental Congress and Attorney General of Virginia. Marshall's father had moved to the most western counties of Virginia (now Kentucky) where he was the state's official land agent; from that position, the elder Marshall directed business his son's way. Marshall's father in law, Jacquelin Ambler, was the state treasurer and directed business Marshall's way from that position. Finally, Marshall's fellow veterans from the Revolutionary War knew and respected him and brought their land claims and debt problems to his office. Thus by 1785, Marshall had become a well known and successful lawyer in Richmond. In that year, Edmund Randolph was elected Governor and turned his practice over to Marshall, making Marshall one of the most prominent lawyers in the state.
As a state legislator and a lawyer, Marshall experienced the difficult problems of bringing the War to a conclusion and the enormous difficulties of state and national government under the Articles of Confederation. He became convinced that the national government needed to be reformed and made much stronger; thus, when the Constitution was proposed in 1787, Marshall led the fight to call a ratifying convention in Virginia. The Virginia Convention held in 1788 more carefully and thoroughly debated the constitutional provisions than in any other state. Marshall was called upon by James Madison and Alexander Hamilton to play a leading role in debating and persuading delegates to support the constitution.
Marshall moved on the national stage as a private citizen who publicly supported a strong national government generally and the Washington Administration specifically, even though those were unpopular positions in his home district and his home state. He was offered and refused appointment as Attorney General because he wished to remain in Richmond and build his legal practice. But in 1797, President Adams appointed Marshall as a special envoy to France along with Charles C. Pinckney and Elbridge Gerry, to seek a solution to commercial, political and military interference by the French Government. The mission was a diplomatic failure in the sense that the immediate problems were not resolved; indeed, they were not even addressed because the French officials demanded a personal bribe as well as a substantial national loan as a precondition to talks and any peace agreement. In a long and laborious series of exchanges, Marshall rejected the demands as an insult to the United States and nothing more than a demand that the United States yield its hard won independence to France. Marshall's full report to President Adams was made public resulting in Marshall's instant status as a national hero.
Despite the acclaim, Marshall wished to return to Richmond to care for his wife and his law practice. But in 1798 General Washington prevailed upon Marshall to run for Congress. Marshall won a narrow victory over the opposition of Jefferson and his party in Virginia in a nasty campaign; ironically, the tipping point came when Patrick Henry came out in support of Marshall after his opponent's campaign claimed that Henry opposed Marshall. In Congress, Marshall was a distinguished, effective, and independent member to the disappointment of his party's leaders. But President Adams took notice and in 1800 nominated Marshall as Secretary of State where Marshall served with distinction to the end of the Adams Administration in March of 1801.
In late 1800, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, Oliver Ellsworth, resigned. Adams and the Federalist Party knew that they had lost the presidency and the control of the congress in the 1800 election. Adams wished to assure that the Supreme Court would be led by someone who favored a strong national government; he nominated John Jay but Jay quickly rejected the appointment. Marshall and the party leaders urged Adams to appoint Associate Justice William Patterson as the Chief but Adams refused. He then abruptly turned to Marshall and declared that he would appoint Marshall to the position – a decision Adams would later describe as the best thing he ever did for his country. The Senate resisted Marshall's appointment in hopes that Adams would appoint Patterson but relented when Adams proved to be immoveable. On January 31, 1801, Marshall officially became Chief Justice of the Supreme Court.
For the next 34 years Marshall led the Court in a transition from a relatively weak, politically driven collection of individuals to a unified, generally respected institution which, for the most part, delivered principled and well reasoned opinions. The transformation of the Court took place under the most difficult circumstances. A series of powerful presidents, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe and Jackson opposed the court, sometimes in the most basic ways. Throughout Marshall's tenure, the Congress was controlled by political parties whose central tenants were antithetical to constitutional principles as Marshall saw them. And the social, political and economic climate in the country was undergoing rapid and dramatic change.
A simplified summary of the accomplishments of the Marshall Court would include establishment of the federal court as an independent defender of the constitution, assertion of constitutional limits on the federal and state governments, establishment of the United States Supreme Court as a fair, honest and reliable authority on matters of international and maritime law, and, most important, development of a rule of law built on principles of liberty and morality.
Perhaps most remarkable in the life of an active lawyer, politician, diplomat, and jurist in his era, Marshall was personally genuinely humble, pleasant and socially popular. He was beloved in Richmond where he was best known and in Washington where he worked for several months of the year. He lived a simple life, without flourishes, and socially engaged with his community. He had few personal enemies, counting among the very few, Thomas Jefferson and his neighbor Chief Justice Spencer Roane of the Virginia Court of Appeals.
From the many and varied experiences in his life and from his deep understanding of the Constitution and of natural and international law, Marshall articulated principles and doctrines which have stood the test of time and provided the foundations for federal-state relations, commercial law, shared powers in the federal branches, and individual property rights. He was primarily responsible for bringing the blueprint for our government, the Constitution, to practical reality. On these achievements, Marshall's reputation as our greatest jurist is built. He truly was the "Definer of a Nation."
General Bibliography
Beveridge, Albert, The Life of John Marshall, Four Volumes, (Boston: Houghton Mifflin 1916-1919)
Loth. David, Chief Justice: John Marshall and the Growth of the Republic, (New York: W.W. Norton & Co. 1949)
Marshall, John, An Autobiographical Sketch, edited by John Stokes Adams (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press 1937)
Newmyer, R. Kent, John Marshall and the Heroic Age of the Supreme Court, (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press 2001)
Robarge, David, A Chief Justice's Progress, (Westport, Connecticut: (Greenwood Press 2000)
Smith, Jean Edward, John Marshall: Definer of a Nation. (New York: Henry Holt and Company 1996)
