Report of the Trial of the Hon. Samuel Chase, One of the Associate..

1805. The Only Impeachment of a U.S. Supreme Court Justice [Trial]. Chase, Samuel [1741-1811], Defendant. Evans, Charles, Reporter. Report of the Trial of the Hon. Samuel Chase, One of the Associate Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States, Before the High Court of Impeachment, Composed of the Senate of the United States, For Charges Exhibited Against Him by the House of Representatives, In the Name of Themselves, And of All the People of the United States, For High Crimes and Misdemeanors Supposed to Have Been by Him Committed; With the Necessary Documents and Official Papers, From His Impeachment to Final Acquital. Baltimore: Printed for Samuel Butler and George Keatinge, 1805. [vi], [12], [3]-268, [2], 68 pp. Main text in double columns. Octavo (10" x 6"). Contemporary three-quarter burgundy calf over marbled boards, gilt fillets and title to spine. Binding slightly cocked, light rubbing to boards, moderate rubbing to extremities, corners lightly bumped and moderately worn, crack in text block between p. 68 and following endleaf. Moderate toning to interior, light foxing and corner folds in places, faint dampstaining to endleaves, one-quarter inch top-edge neatly removing a former owner's signature from title page with no loss to text. $450. * First and only edition (one of several accounts published in 1805). Chase was impeached for alleged misdemeanors in the trials of John Fries and James Thomson Callender for treason and seditious libel under the Alien and Sedition Acts. This was the only time a Supreme Court justice was impeached. Hall notes, "[Chase] is usually dismissed by most American historians as nothing but a rabid partisan. He was, as a study of Chase's opinions reveals, one of the most important political and legal theorists at work in the early republic, and there is still much that can be learned from his work... There is even a chance that future scholars will begin to accord Chase the recognition he deserves and raise the man...to his proper place in the judicial pantheon, one very possibly at the level of Marshall himself." Hall, Oxford Companion to the Supreme Court 138ff. Cohen, Bibliography of Early American Law 14471.