The Green Bag VOL. XVIII.
No. 4
BOSTON
APRIL, 1905
THE IMPEACHMENT OF JUDGE SWAYNE BY HON. CHARLES E. LITTLEFIELD CHARLES SWAYNE was born in Guyencourt, Del., in 1842. From 1865 to 1885 he resided in Pennsylvania. In 1885 he moved to Sanford, Fla., and began to practice law, intending to make Florida his home. June i, 1889, he took the oath as United States District Judge for the North ern District of Florida, having been ap pointed by President Harrison, and October i, 1890, he moved with his family to St. Augustine, Fla., where he continued to re side until July, 1894. He immediately em barked upon the trial of some election fraud cases which were the cause of great local excitement and irritation. Witnesses were intimidated, and in one or two instances murdered. A Deputy United States Mar shall was murdered and his murderer went unwhipped of justice. Others were intimi dated and in a portion of the district they were unable in these cases to execute the process of the court. Being a recess ap pointment, when his appointment came be fore the Senate for confirmation a vigorous but unsuccessful effort was made to defeat It is understood that the political conons were fully ventilated in the discusolOt .
One of the attorneys for the defense in the election fraud cases having been elected to Congress introduced a bill which was ap proved July 24, 1894, changing the bound aries of the district so as to leave St. Aug ustine, Judge Swayne's home, outside the Northern District of Florida. In 1900 and in 1901, there were some prosecutions in his court foi trespass upon timber lands in volving influential persons which caused some bad blood. In 1897 he became a
candidate for appointment as Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States and filed letters of recommendation from lawyers in Philadelphia, California, Florida and Texas. F. Carroll Brewster, brother of ex-Attorney-General Brewster, certifying that he had "established a repu tation for industry, integrity, learning and all the virtues which should adorn the bench. His patriotism and courage are undoubted." Failing in this, later in 1899, he was a candidate for a position on the Circuit bench for the Fifth Circuit. In this candidacy he was supported by twenty-two of the lawyers of Florida, largely from Pensacola (some of whom afterwards became his prosecutors in the impeachment proceedings), although for nearly five ye.ars, if the contention sub sequently made was well founded, Judge Swayne had been openly, notoriously, wil fully and flagrantly committing a "high misdemeanor" by non-residence in his dis trict, for which he ought then to have been impeached. Yes, more than that, nearly six years before, as now claimed, he had committed an impeachable offense by cor ruptly converting to his own use a private car and sundry provisions belonging to a railroad in the hands of a receiver, a pro ceeding which was in 1893, if Prof. John Wurtz's (of the -Yale Law School) reminis cences import verity, the occasion of "a great deal of scandalous talk." In view of the subsequent developments the statement in 1899 of an ex-United States District At torney, afterwards counsel against Swayne, makes interesting reading. "Judge Swayne has presided over our District and Circuit Courts with great satisfaction both to mem
