I didn't realize that with you I need to draw a perfect picture. I think you knew exactly what I meant, after all it is the same argument I have been posting all along.
"The court's opinion was authored by Chief Justice Salmon Chase, himself a former cabinet member under Abraham Lincoln and leading figure in the Union government during the American Civil War."
So, that doesn't mean he was incapable of ruling on the legal issues in the case. Many, if not most, judges are former prosecutors, yet they hear criminal cases all the time. Chief Justice Taney backed Andrew Jackson to the hilt while serving as his attorney general, yet did an about face as Chief Justice. Attorneys, when representing clients, are advocates for their client's position. When attorneys become judges they are supposed to be neutral, listen to the arguments of both parties and apply the law; if they can't do that, they should recuse themselves - it has worked that way for over 200 years.
Are you telling me that there never has been a crooked layer or a tainted decision in 200 years? I fail to believe that.
"Regarding Chase & Texas v. White, I don't see anything indicating that either party to the suit asked Chase to recuse himself. Remember, although Chase wrote the opinion, four other justices reached the same conclusion. Even if he had recused himself, it still would have been a 4-3 majority in support of the ruling. Interestingly, I didn't hear Davis, Stephens or any other southern partisans complaining of Chase's bias because of his ruling AGAINST Lincoln's military tribunals in Ex Parte Milligan, 71 U.S. 2 (1866). But as I noted above, a judge is only biased when he rules against your position"
Were Davis and Stephens citizens yet? I am not sure. I doubt that if every Southern man who survived the war did speak out it would have done little good. Look haw they were governed. Reconstruction was in full swing and it is very doubtful that few knew of this case till after the fact. I think they were just to busy trying to rebuild their lives. Ex Parte Milligan has nothing to do with what we are talking about. As I read about it was simply a war plan, no more, no less. My position is this ruling came well after the fact by a government who had just won a war and they were ruling against a former enemy. I wouldn't want a judgment of that nature against me in my private life and neither would you. I can just see it now; girl sues man 40 years later over broken date. Oh brother.
Looking at the judges we can see how the opinion is easy controlled by Chase resulting in a biased opinion.
Chase we know about.
Samuel Nelson-- Nelson was born in Hebron, New York, in 1792. He attended Middlebury College in Vermont and was licensed to practice law in 1817. Nelson served as a state circuit judge from 1823 until 1831, when he became associate justice of the Supreme Court of New York. In 1837, he was elevated to Chief Justice. In 1845, he was appointed to the United States Supreme Court by President John Tyler.
Nathan Clifford--- was born of old Yankee stock in Rumney, New Hampshire, to a farmer and his wife, the only son of seven children. After teaching school for a time, he studied law in the offices of Josiah Quincy and was admitted to the bar in Maine in 1827, establishing his first practice in Newfield, Maine. President James Buchanan appointed him an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. He was confirmed by a narrow margin of 26 votes to 23 in the Senate. Senators were hesitant about placing a pro-slavery Democrat on the Supreme Court. His specialties were commercial and maritime law, Mexican land grants, and procedure and practice. Though he rarely declared any legal philosophy about the Constitution, Justice Clifford believed in a sharp dividing line between federal and state authority.
David Davis (March 9, 1815 – June 26, 1886) was a United States 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.
Stephen Johnson Field (November 4, 1816 – April 9, 1899) was an associate justice of the United States Supreme Court from May 20, 1863, to December 1, 1897. Prior to this, he was the 5th Chief Justice of the California Supreme Court. Born in Haddam, Connecticut, he was the sixth of the nine children of David Dudley Field I, a Congregationalist minister, and his wife Submit Dickinson. He grew up in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. Abraham Lincoln appointed him to the newly created tenth Supreme Court seat, to achieve both regional balance (he was a Westerner) and political balance (he was a Democrat, albeit a Unionist one). It would also give the Court someone familiar with real estate and mining issues.
He was a vocal proponent of the substantive due process theory that protected property rights from regulation under the Fourteenth Amendment--as illustrated in his dissents to the Slaughterhouse Cases and Munn v. Illinois. Field's views were eventually adopted by the court's majority, but only after his death. However, he helped end the income tax (Pollock v. Farmers' Loan and Trust Company), limit anti-trust law (United States v. E.C. Knight Company), and the power of the Interstate
The dissenting judges were---
Noah Haynes Swayne (December 7, 1804 – June 8, 1884) was an American jurist and politician. Swayne was born in Frederick County, Virginia. This proved timely; McLean died shortly after Lincoln's inauguration, in April 1861, and Lincoln nominated Swayne after Swayne lobbied several Ohio members of Congress to support him.
Samuel Freeman Miller (April 5, 1816 – October 13, 1890), was an associate justice of the United States Supreme Court, 1862–1890.Born in Richmond, Kentucky, Miller was the son of a farmer. Lincoln appointed Miller to the Supreme Court in 1862.
Robert Cooper Grier (March 5, 1794-September 25, 1870), was an American jurist who served on the Supreme Court of the United States. Grier was born in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania to a Presbyterian minister, who tutored him until he entered Dickinson College. Grier was the lone northerner to side with the majority in the Dred Scott decision, though after the outbreak of the Civil War he supported the Union.
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I edited the above for length. For a full length bio goes to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_v._White these are the men who served with Chase and it is easy to see how the decision could very well be biased. With the above men serving on the court, I honestly do not see how the decision could have been found in favor of Texas In fact I am surprised there were not more who sided with chase.
GP