Joseph Philo Bradley (March 14, 1813 – January 22, 1892) was an American jurist who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1870 to 1892. He was also a member of the Electoral Commission that decided the disputed 1876 United States presidential election.
Early life
The son of Philo Bradley and Mercy Gardner Bradley, Bradley was born to humble beginnings in Berne, New York. He was the oldest of 12 children. He attended local schools and began teaching at the age of 16.
He was persuaded by his Rutgers classmate Frederick Theodore Frelinghuysen to join him in Newark and pursue legal studies at the Office of the Collector of the Port of Newark. He was admitted to the bar in 1839.
Bradley began in private practice in New Jersey, specializing in patent and railroad law, and he became very prominent in these fields and quite wealthy. Bradley remained dedicated to self-study throughout his life and collected an extensive library. He married Mary Hornblower in Newark in 1844. In 1851, Bradley, once employed as an actuary for the Mutual Benefit Life Insurance Company, submitted an article to the Journal of the Institute of Actuaries detailing an historical account of a Severan dynasty-era Roman life table compiled by the Roman jurist Ulpian in approximately 220 AD during the reign of Elagabalus (218–222) that was included in the Digesta seu Pandectae (533) codification ordered by Justinian I (527–565) of the Eastern Roman Empire.
Supreme Court
Appointment
On February 7, 1870, President Ulysses S. Grant nominated Bradley as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, to the seat created by the Judiciary Act of 1869. Several weeks later, on March 21, he was confirmed by the U.S. Senate by a 46–9 vote. Bradley was the president's second nominee for the position. The first, Ebenezer R. Hoar was rejected by the Senate.
The U.S. House and Senate named five members each to serve on the commission, and the Supreme Court named five associate justices to serve. The key vote would fall to one of the named justices, David Davis, an independent. However, when Davis was elected to the Senate, he excused himself from the Commission and resigned from the Supreme Court to take his seat in the Senate. Bradley, a long time Republican, replaced him on the commission, shifting its political balance.
Bradley's personal, legal, and court papers are archived at the New Jersey Historical Society in Newark and open for research.
Historical reappraisal
In 2021, Rutgers University, Bradley's alma mater, deleted his name from a building the university acquired in 1971; a University committee "recommended Bradley's name be removed after a study of his judicial record. The study showed Bradley chose to use his position as a Supreme Court Justice to undo reconstruction, regressing on civil rights and opening a new era of oppression".
See also
- List of justices of the Supreme Court of the United States