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Scots and Scots Descendant in America
Part I - Scots in the Settlement and Development of The United States
Scots in the Courts


WHERE is the Scottish influence more marked and dominating than in the legal profession and the courts. The interpretation of law in America has been chiefly the work of non-English judges; and perhaps it is not too much to say that the distinctive character of American jurisprudence is due to the preponderating influence of men of Celtic blood at the bench and bar.

The second Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court, John Rutledge, and three of the four original Associate Justices, Blair, Wilson and Iredell, were of Scottish origin. John Marshall, the great Chief Justice, was Welsh and Scottish. His mother was a Keith.

Of fifty judges of the United States Supreme Court from 1789 to 1882, not more than twenty-two were of English blood: Rutledge, Wilson, Blair, two Johnsons, Paterson, Moore, Livingston, Todd, Thompson, Trimble, McLean, Barbour, McKinley, Daniel, Nelson, Grier, Campbell, Miller, Davis and Harlan were of Scottish descent. Biographies of some of these will be found elsewhere in this book.


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