William Wirt

Wirt, William (1772–1834), Virginia lawyer and U.S. attorney general under Monroe and Adams (1817–29), was the presidential candidate of the Anti‐Masonic party (1832). His first book, the popular Letters of the British Spy (1803), was followed by other essays sketching Southern customs and manners, The Rainbow (1804) and The Old Bachelor (1812), the latter written with friends. All were published anonymously. Wirt's Life of Patrick Henry (1817) re‐created many of his speeches from notes and tradition. J.P. Kennedy wrote his Memoirs (2 vols., 1849).

William Wirt , 1772-1834, U.S. Attorney General and author, b. Bladensburg, Md. He had little formal schooling but was admitted to the Virginia bar in 1792. His first book was an anonymous collection of sketches called The Letters of a British Spy (1803), which purported to be the work of a "meek and harmless" noble visitor to America. The Rainbow (1804) and The Old Bachelor (1810) are similar collections, attempting the style of Joseph Addison. Wirt's Life and Character of Patrick Henry (1817) was his first book to appear under his own name; it presumed to give the text of Henry's speeches. His role as prosecutor in the trial (1807) of Aaron Burr brought him renown as a lawyer. As U.S. Attorney General (1817-29), Wirt initiated the practice of preserving his official opinions so that they could be used as precedents. In 1832 he accepted the nomination for President of the Anti-Masonic party .

Wirt, William, (b. Bladensburg, Md., 8 Nov. 1772; d. Washington, D.C., 18 Feb. 1834), lawyer and statesman. A prominent lawyer in the early republic, William Wirt helped shape its legal system. Though Wirt was inclined toward a scholar's life, he never escaped the financial necessity of frequently arguing in court. As United States attorney general (1817–1829) in cabinets confronted with controversial issues, he seemed uninterested in politics. When nominated for president by the Antimasons in 1832, he wished to withdraw in favor of Whig candidate, Henry Clay, but did not. Originally a states' righter, he moved toward constitutional nationalism under the influence of Chief Justice John Marshall. Still, he seemed not to understand the connections between law and politics.

Wirt argued 174 cases in the Supreme Court, some as attorney general for the government and more as counsel for private clients. (He and his contemporaries saw no impropriety in a mixture of the two roles.) In his long tenure as attorney general, he strengthened that office, which before his term had been quite weak. His advocacy of state power over a chartered corporation was unsuccessful in Dartmouth College v. Woodward (1819). But in Gibbons v. Ogden (1824), the Court's first Commerce Clause case, he assisted Daniel Webster in breaking New York's steamboat monopoly. His argument for the constitutionality of the Bank of the United States in McCulloch v. Maryland (1819) was strong, though overshadowed by William Pinkney's powerful exposition of nationalism. In a valiant effort near the end of his life, he won the case of Worcester v. Georgia (1832), yet found that Indian removal to the West was unavoidable (see Cherokee Cases).

Maurice Baxter