Historians and biographers provide a historical look at some of America’s earliest justices—from John Jay, the first chief justice, to George Washington’s nephew Bushrod Washington and Pennsylvania Founding Father James Wilson. Join Gerard Magliocca, author of Washington’s Heir: The Life of Justice Bushrod Washington, Supreme Court historian Maeva Marcus of George Washington University Law School, and Walter Stahr, author of John Jay: Founding Father and Salmon P. Chase: Lincoln’s Vital Rival, as they discuss the impact of these early justices on American history. Jeffrey Rosen, president and CEO of the National Constitution Center, moderates.
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Gerard Magliocca is the Samuel R. Rosen Professor of Law at the Indiana University Robert H. McKinney School of Law. Magliocca is the author of many articles and books, the most recent of which is Washington's Heir: The Life of Justice Bushrod Washington. He was previously a Fellow at the Washington Library at Mount Vernon, and he appeared in "Amend: The Fight for America," a Netflix original series on the Fourteenth Amendment.
Maeva Marcus is research professor of law and director of the Institute for Constitutional Studies at the George Washington University Law School. As editor of The Documentary History of the Supreme Court of the United States, 1789-1800, Marcus published eight volumes along with many related articles on legal history. She previously served as the president of the American Society for Legal History and was appointed by the Librarian of Congress as the general editor of the Oliver Wendell Holmes Devise: History of the Supreme Court of the United States in 2015.
Walter Stahr is a historian and New York Times best-selling author. A two-time winner of the Seward Award for Excellence in Civil War Biography, he is the author of several books, including John Jay: Founding Father, and most recently, Salmon P. Chase: Lincoln’s Vital Rival. Prior to his writing career, Stahr practiced law in Washington and Asia for more than two decades.
Jeffrey Rosen is the president and CEO of the National Constitution Center, a nonpartisan nonprofit organization devoted to educating the public about the U.S. Constitution. Rosen is also professor of law at The George Washington University Law School and a contributing editor of The Atlantic.
Additional Resources
- Gerard Magliocca, Washington's Heir: The Life of Justice Bushrod Washington
- Ed. Maeva Marcus, Documentary History of the Supreme Court of the United States, 1789–1800, 8 Volumes
- Walter Stahr, John Jay: Founding Father
- Walter Stahr, Salmon P. Chase: Lincoln's Vital Rival
- Maeva Marcus, Georgetown Journal of Law & Public Policy, "Wilson as a Justice"
- Charles Paige Smith, James Wilson: Founding Father, 1742-1798
- Natalie Wexler, A More Obedient Wife
- Supreme Court Justices, Letter to George Washington (August 8, 1793)
- Chisolm v. Georgia (1793)
- Corfield v. Coryell (1823)
- Gerard Magliocca, American Founding Son: John Bingham and the Invention of the Fourteenth Amendment
- Slaughter-House Cases (1873)
- Calder v. Bull (1798)
- Hylton v. United States (1796)
- Ed., Steven Steinbach, Maeva Marcus, and Robert Cohen, With Liberty and Justice for All? The Constitution in the Classroom
- Glass v. The Sloop Betsey (1794)
TRANSCRIPT
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