Thomas Smith (1745 – March 31, 1809) was a politician and jurist from Pennsylvania.
Born near Cruden, Aberdeenshire, Scotland in 1745, Smith attended the University of Edinburgh, and then immigrated to the United States, where he settled in Bedford, Pennsylvania on February 9, 1769. He became a deputy surveyor that same year. Smith then studied law, was admitted to the bar, and began practicing as a lawyer in 1772.
In 1773, Smith became a deputy register of wills and prothonotary, and a justice of the peace in 1774.
When the Revolutionary War broke out, Smith served as a deputy colonel of a militia unit.
In 1776, he was appointed as a delegate to Pennsylvania's constitutional convention and was then elected to the Pennsylvania House of Representatives, serving in that capacity from 1776 until 1780. Smith was then chosen to be a delegate to the Continental Congress from 1781 to 1782.
Appointed as a judge of the Pennsylvania court of common pleas in 1791, Smith was subsequently appointed to the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, a post he held from 1794 until 1809.
Smith died in Philadelphia on March 31, 1809 and was buried in Christ Church Burial Ground.
While serving as a justice on the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, Smith was impeached on March 23, 1804 by the Democratic–Republican-led Pennsylvania House of Representatives, along with two Federalist justices of the Supreme Court, Edward Shippen IV and Jasper Yeates. The sole Democratic–Republican member of the court, who had been not in attendance on the day the court heard the case central to the impeachment, was not impeached. The justices were not removed, being acquitted in their impeachment trial before the Pennsylvania Senate in the vote held on January 28, 1805. [1]
Thomas McKean was an American lawyer, politician, and Founding Father. During the American Revolution, he was a Delaware delegate to the Continental Congress in Philadelphia, where he signed the Continental Association, the Declaration of Independence, and the Articles of Confederation. McKean served as a President of Congress.
The chief justice of the United States is the chief judge of the Supreme Court of the United States and is the highest-ranking officer of the U.S. federal judiciary. Article II, Section 2, Clause 2 of the U.S. Constitution grants plenary power to the president of the United States to nominate, and with the advice and consent of the United States Senate, appoint "Judges of the Supreme Court", who serve until they resign, retire, are impeached and convicted, or die. The existence of a chief justice is only explicit in Article I, Section 3, Clause 6 which states that the chief justice shall preside on the impeachment trial of the president; this has occurred three times.
William Paterson was an American statesman, lawyer, jurist, and signer of the United States Constitution. He was an Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court, the second governor of New Jersey, and a Founding Father of the United States.
The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania is the highest court in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania's Unified Judicial System. It also claims to be the oldest appellate court in the United States, a claim that is disputed by the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court. The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania began in 1684 as the Provincial Court, and casual references to it as the "Supreme Court" of Pennsylvania were made official in 1722 upon its reorganization as an entity separate from the control of the royal governor. Today, the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania maintains a discretionary docket, meaning that the Court may choose which cases it accepts, with the exception of mandatory death penalty appeals, and certain appeals from the original jurisdiction of the Commonwealth Court. This discretion allows the Court to wield powerful influence on the formation and interpretation of Pennsylvania law.
Thomas Willing was an American merchant, politician and slave trader who served as mayor of Philadelphia and was a delegate from Pennsylvania to the Continental Congress. He also served as the first president of the Bank of North America and the First Bank of the United States. During his tenure there he became the richest man in America.
Charles Willing was a Philadelphia merchant, trader and politician; twice he served as Mayor of Philadelphia, from 1748 until 1749 and again in 1754.
Hamilton Ward Sr. was an American lawyer and politician who served as a judge on the Supreme Court of New York, the attorney general of New York, and a Republican member of the United States House of Representatives.
Thomas Burnside was an American politician and judge who served as a Democratic-Republican member of the United States House of Representatives for Pennsylvania's 9th congressional district from 1815 to 1816 and as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania from 1845 until his death in 1851.
Edward Shippen was an American lawyer, judge, government official, and prominent figure in colonial and post-revolutionary Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. His fourth daughter, Margaret Shippen, was the second wife of Benedict Arnold.
Robin Jean Davis is an American jurist who served on the Supreme Court of Appeals of West Virginia. First elected to fill an unexpired term in 1996, Davis later won full twelve-year terms in 2000 and 2012. However, Davis retired before the end of her second full term in August 2018 after the West Virginia House Judiciary Committee named Davis in articles of impeachment during the Impeachment of the Supreme Court of Appeals of West Virginia.
David Davis was an American politician and jurist who was a U.S. senator from Illinois and associate justice of the United States Supreme Court. He also served as Abraham Lincoln's campaign manager at the 1860 Republican National Convention, engineering Lincoln's successful nomination for president by that party.
The nomination and confirmation of justices to the Supreme Court of the United States involves several steps, the framework for which is set forth in the United States Constitution. Specifically, Article II, Section 2, Clause 2, provides that the president of the United States nominates a justice and that the United States Senate provides advice and consent before the person is formally appointed to the Court. It also empowers a president to temporarily, under certain circumstances, fill a Supreme Court vacancy by means of a recess appointment. The Constitution does not set any qualifications for service as a justice, thus the president may nominate any individual to serve on the Court.
Jasper Yeates (1745–1817) was an American lawyer and judge from Pennsylvania, a justice of the state Supreme Court from 1791 to 1817.
Samuel Chase, an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, was impeached by the United States House of Representatives on March 12, 1804 on eight articles of impeachment alleging misconduct. His impeachment trial before the United States Senate delivered an acquittal on March 1, 1805, with none of the eight articles receiving the two-thirds majority needed for a conviction.
Similar to the Congress of the United States, state legislatures can impeach state officials, including governors and judicial officers, in every state except Oregon. In addition, the legislatures of the territories of American Samoa, Northern Mariana Islands, and Puerto Rico have impeachment powers. Impeachment describes the process through which the legislature may bring charges and hold a trial with a penalty including removal from office.