and Mary after the abdication of James II. The provision reported by Lord Somers was as follows : " Eighteen Judges' commissions to be made quamdiu se bene gesserit, and their salaries to be ascertained and estab lished to be paid out of the public revenue only, and not to be removed or suspended from their office but by due eourse of law." (Campbell's " Lives of Lord Chancellors," vol. 4, page 103). English reformers, while they dreaded the oppression of such judges as Jeffries and his parasites, were not willing to trust the king with the power of removal. Mississippians lodged the power in their governor and representatives, and thus pro vided " a check and balance." The judges appointed under the first con stitution, and dates of their appointment, were as follows: John P. Hampton, C. J., W. B. Shields, John Taylor, Powhatan Ellis, Joshua G. Clark, 18 18; Walter Leake, 1820; Livingstone B. Metcalf, 1821; Richard Stockton, 1822; Edward Turner, 1824; J. Caldwell, 1825; John Black, George Win chester, 1826; William B. Griffith, Harry Cage, 1827; Isaac R. Nicholson, 1828; William L. Sharkey, 1831. Judge John P. Hampton was a native of South Carolina, and one of that family whose name adorns both the civic and mili tary annals of that great commonwealth. His character was as pure as the ermine he wore. Another writes that " his conscience was so sensitive . . . that he seems subject to the criticism of endeavoring to en force a standard of pure morality too lofty for practical use in the ordinary affairs of life." This tribute is doubtless due to his opinion in the case of Frazer v. Davis, Wal ker's Rep. p. 72, where he held that the purchaser's failure to communicate to the seller a rumor of peace between the United States and Great Britain, calculated material ly to affect the price of cotton ( the com modity sold), vitiated the sale. The cor rectness of the decision is controverted by the reporter in a note, and the converse
opinion of the Supreme Court of the United States cited : Laidlaw v. Organ, 2 Whcaton, 178. Judge W. 15. Shields, a native of Dela ware, was a man of culture and ability. He was a recognized leader of the democratic party. During the first year of his service he was called to the Federal district bench. In his residence the gifted S. S. Prentiss found his first home in Mississippi. Judge Taylor, a native of Pennsylvania, came early to Mississippi, was a member of the territorial legislature, and of the conven tion which organized the State. He retired from the bench in 1820. He was a lawyer of ability, and was held in high esteem as a judge. Powhatan Ellis was a Virginian by birth, and said to be a descendant of Pocahontas. Mr. Claiborne says he was a man of ordi nary intellectual attainments and that " with his blood he inherited the characteristic indolence of his race." Mr. Lynch, in his "Bench and Bar of Mississippi," says of Judge Ellis: " He was never married and was therefore somewhat unorthodox in his views of the relations of husband and wife; hence it may not be surprising to find him in the case of Bradley v. The State ( Wal ker, 156)holding to the old feudal doctrine that a man might chastise an obstreperous wife provided he used a rod no larger than his thumb." Happily we can add that the members of the present court, as the generous represen tatives of the lxrrons, have repudiated that doctrine and relieved the femes of such domination. In 1825 Judge Ellis was appointed Uni ted States senator to fill the vacancy caused by the death of the Hon. David Holmes. 1 le was elected to the same position in 1827, appointed United States district judge in 1832, and was later minister to Mexico. He returned to Virginia and died in Richmond during the war between the States.
