William Paterson
William Paterson was born in County Antrim, Northern Ireland, United Kingdom on December 24th, 1745 and is the Supreme Court Justice. At the age of 60, William Paterson biography, profession, age, height, weight, eye color, hair color, build, measurements, education, career, dating/affair, family, news updates, and networth are available.
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Paterson was selected as the Somerset County delegate for the first three provincial congresses of New Jersey, where, as secretary, he recorded the 1776 New Jersey State Constitution. After Independence, Paterson was appointed as the first attorney general of New Jersey, serving from 1776 to 1783, establishing himself as one of the state's most prominent lawyers. He was sent to the 1787 Philadelphia Convention, where he proposed the New Jersey Plan for a unicameral legislative body with equal representation from each state. After the Great Compromise (for two legislative bodies: a Senate with equal representation for each state, and a House of Representatives with representation based on population), the Constitution was signed.
Paterson, who was a strong nationalist who supported the Federalist Party, went on to become one of New Jersey's first U.S. senators (1789–90). As a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, he played an important role in drafting the Judiciary Act of 1789 that established the federal court system. The first nine sections of this very important law are in his handwriting.
In 1790, he became the first person to resign from the U.S. Senate, when he did so in order to succeed fellow signer William Livingston as governor of New Jersey. As governor, Paterson pursued his interest in legal matters by codifying the English statutes that had been in force in New Jersey before the Revolution in Laws of the State of New Jersey. He also published a revision of the rules of the chancery and common law courts in Paterson, later adopted by the New Jersey Legislature.
President George Washington nominated Paterson for the Supreme Court of the United States on February 27, 1793, to the seat vacated by Thomas Johnson. Washington withdrew the nomination the following day, having realized that since the Judiciary Act of 1789 (the law creating the Supreme Court) had been passed during Paterson's current term as a Senator, the nomination was a violation of the Ineligibility Clause (Article I, Section 6) of the Constitution. Washington re-nominated Paterson to the court on March 4, 1793, after his term as Senator had expired; Paterson was immediately confirmed by the Senate and received his commission.
He resigned from the governorship to become an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. On the circuit, he presided over the trials of individuals indicted for treason in the Whiskey Rebellion, a revolt by farmers in western Pennsylvania over the federal excise tax on whiskey, the principal product of their cash crop. Militia sent out by President Washington successfully quelled the uprising, and for the first time, the courts had to interpret the provisions of the Constitution concerning the use of troops in civil disturbances. Here, and, throughout his long career, Paterson extolled the primacy of law over governments, a principle embodied in the Constitution he helped write. He declined an appointment as Secretary of State in 1795. Paterson was elected to the American Philosophical Society in 1789. He was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1801. Paterson served on the Supreme Court until he died in 1806.