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Rufus Peckham Biography

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PECKHAM, Rufus William (1838-1909). An American jurist, brother of Wheeler Hazard Peckham. He was born in Albany, N. Y., and was educated at the Albany Academy and in Philadelphia. Admitted to the bar in 1859, a year later he succeeded his father as law partner of Lyman Tremain. On Tremain's death in 1878 the firm became Peckham and Rosendale. For three years Peckham served as district attorney of Albany County. He was counsel to the Albany and Susquehanna Railroad in its famous suit against the Erie, and in 1881 was successful in the national bank tax cases before the United States Supreme Court. He had already entered politics, serving as delegate to the Democratic national conventions of 1876 and 1880, in which he supported Tilden and Hancock. After a short period as corporation counsel of the city of Albany, Peckham entered on his judicial career as associate justice of the State Supreme Court (1883-86). For nine years he sat on the bench of the (New York) Court of Appeals, and in 1895, by appointment of President Cleveland, he became associate justice of the United States Supreme Court. Regarded as one of the ablest jurists in the country, Peckham was also known as one of the most conservative. His opinions in several notable cases concerned with the police power of the States and involving labor and corporation problems were of far-reaching importance; among these were Ex parte Young, Lochmer v. New York, the Addyston Pipe case, and the Trans-Missouri Freight and Joint Traffic Associations cases. Peckham refused to recognize an interpretation of the Sherman Anti-Trust Act (q.v.) based upon the common law. Consult W. H. Taft, The Anti-Trust Act and the Supreme Court (New York, 1914).