CHOATE, JOSEPH HODGES (1832- )

This article appears in Volume V06, Page 258 of the Encyclopedia Britannica.

Encyclopedia Britannica - Main :: CHA-CHR

CHOATE, JOSEPH HODGES (1832- ) , American lawyer and diplomat, was born at Salem, Massachusetts, on the 24th of January 1832. He was the son of Dr George Choate, a physician of considerable note, and was a nephew of Rufus Choate. After graduating at Harvard College in 1852 and at the law school of Harvard University in 1854, he was admitted first to the Massachusetts (1855) and then (1856) to the New

York

bar, and entered the law office of Scudder & Carter in New

York

City. His success in his profession was immediate, and in 186o he became junior partner in the firm of Evarts, Southmayd & Choate, the senior partner in which was William M. Evarts. This firm and its successor, that of Evarts, Choate & Beaman, remained for many years among the leading law firms of New York and of the country, the activities of both being national rather than local. During these busy years Mr Choate was associated with many of the most famous litigations in American legal history, including the Tilden, A. T. Stewart, and Stanford will cases, the Kansas prohibition cases, the Chinese exclusion cases, the Maynard election returns case, and the Income Tax Suit. In 1871 he became a member of the " Committee of Seventy " in New York City, which was instrumental in breaking up the " Tweed Ring," and later assisted in the prosecution of the indicted officials. In the retrial of the General Fitz John

Porter

case he obtained a reversal of the decision of the

original

ORIGINAL

court-martial. His greatest reputation was won perhaps in cross-examination. In politics he allied himself with the Republican party on its organization, being a frequent speaker in presidential campaigns, beginning with that of 1856. He never held political office, although he was a candidate for the Republican senatorial nomination against Senator Thomas C. Platt in 1897. In 1894 he was president of the New York state constitutional convention. He was appointed, by President

McKinley

MCKINLEY, WILLIAM (1843—1901)

ambassador

AMBASSADOR (also EMBASSADOR, the form sometimes still used in America; from the Fr. ambassadeur, with which compare Ital. ambasciatore and Span. embajador, all variants of the Med. Lat. ambassiator, ambassiator, ambasator, &c., derived from Med. Lat. amba

to Great Britain to succeed John Hay in 1899, and remained in this position until the

spring

SPRING (from " to spring," " to leap or jump up," " burst out," O. Eng., springau, a common Teut. word, cf. Ger. springer, possibly allied to Gr. QnrFpxecOac, to move rapidly)

of 1905. In England. he won great personal popularity, and accomplished much in fostering the good relations of the two great English-speaking powers. He was one of the representatives of the United States at the second Peace Congress at the Hague in 1907.
Several of his notable public addresses have been published. The Choate Story Book (New York, 1903) contains a few of his addresses and after-dinner speeches, and is prefaced by a brief biographical sketch.

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