James Wilson
James Wilson ( born 14 September 1742 in Carskerdo, Fife, Scotland; † August 21, 1798 in Edenton, North Carolina, United States) was a signer of the Declaration of Independence of the United States, was elected twice to the Continental Congress and has contributed significantly to creating a helped draft the Constitution of the United States. He was a leading legal theorist and one of the original six Supreme Court judges who were appointed in 1789 by George Washington. Wilson was considered a genius, what the topic Government concerned, and generally regarded as the most learned of the founding fathers of the United States. A colleague delegates the Philadelphia Convention of 1787, which spawned the U.S. Constitution, James Wilson described as follows: "It seems that the government is very particular subject of his investigation; he knows all the political institutions of the world in detail and may appoint gradually all the causes and effects of revolutions of the earliest stages of the Greek community until the present time. "Along with James Madison, he was probably best versed in the field of economics.
Curriculum vitae
James Wilson was born in 1742 as one of seven children of a Presbyterian farming family in Carskerdo in the district of Fife in the Scottish lowlands. He received his education at the University of St Andrews, the University of Edinburgh and the University of Glasgow, but was unable due to the death of his father to finish his studies in law with a degree. Then he went in 1765 to America, where he quickly found a job as a tutor at the College of Philadelphia. After arriving in Philadelphia, he got a job as a Legal Assistant at the resident lawyer John Dickinson, where he gained much of his legal expertise. After several years as an assistant, he passed his bar exam and then opened his own law firm in Reading and only then in Carlisle, a small town west of Harrisburg. He was one of the most sought after attorneys of his time.
With his 1774 published pamphlet " Considerations on the Nature and Extent of the Legislative Authority of the British Parliament" ( German: " Reflections on the nature and scope of the legislative powers of the British Parliament " ), he took a revolutionary stance. Although it is considered by former scholars as synonymous with the seminal writings of Thomas Jefferson and John Adams, Wilson had written it already in 1768. This makes it potentially the first cogent argument formulated against British supremacy on the American continent.
Wilson also began a military career, he was Colonel of the 4th Battalion of 1775 Associators and continued to rise in rank to brigadier general of the State Militia on.
As a member of the Philadelphia Congress in 1776, Wilson was a staunch supporter of American independence and highly regarded by his fellow deputies. However, since Pennsylvania was divided when it came to the separation of the States of England, he refused initially to choose on this issue in Congress because he did not want to go against the wishes of his constituents. This changed when he won considerable support for his position from the population.
Wilson's lasting effect on his country stirred from his membership in the Committee of Detail ago that the first draft of a Constitution for the United States created in 1787, a year after the death of his wife. He wanted senators and the president are elected by the people, and also proposed the Three- Fifth Compromise ago at a meeting of the Committee, through which slaves in the calculation of the delegates number of each State for the House of Representatives and the tax distribution to the individual States than three fifths of a free person included. Reason for this proposal was mainly the fact that the slave-owning farmers in the southern states wanted their slaves, the Calculate in the population of their state, by which the number of representatives to be delegated was determined. The Northern states thought this was unfair. This eventually resulted in this compromise.
Wilson clearly saw the problems that resulted from the double sovereignty: Firstly, the sovereignty of the individual states, but then also the sovereignty of the State Union towards other nations. He saw the same limitless future for the United States, sat down strongly in favor of adoption of the Constitution, even though he did not agree with all parts of the final version, which contained necessarily compromises. He held to this end campaign speeches and made so that Pennsylvania to Delaware State was the second who accepted the document in the ratification meeting. Of particular importance in this context was a speech which he delivered on October 6, 1787 State House Yard and both locally as well as nationally set standards. It focused in particular on the fact that the United States should be given a popularly elected government for the whole country for the first time in its history. Later, Wilson was involved in revising the draft of the Constitution of the State of Pennsylvania in 1776 and led the group, which advocated a new constitution. He made an agreement with William Findley, president of the opposition party, by which the only party strategic approach of the people was limited to the politics of their state and led to the discourse more turning the actual factual issues.
1790 Wilson began to give a series of lectures law at the College of Philadelphia. This was only the second series of lectures on law at a university in the United States. Like many of his contemporaries, he formed regarded the study of law as a branch of a comprehensive, general education, not only in preparation for the exercise of a profession in this field. In April of the following year, he broke off the lectures, because it was my turn to meet the obligations of an item as a judge in the Supreme Court. There is much to suggest that he began a second course end 1791 or early 1792, as had been the College of Philadelphia already incorporated into the University of Pennsylvania, however, heard his lectures to a non- traditional time again and did not start again. The lectures were relocated to the first non- writing during his lifetime; after his death, she released his son Bird Wilson in 1804.
Recently Wilson's life was dominated by his failure. By investing in lands he became heavily indebted and has therefore been inserted in Burlington (New Jersey) short jail. His son paid his debts, and Wilson went to North Carolina to escape other creditors, but was imprisoned there again briefly. Nevertheless, he was there employed as a District Judge. In 1798 he fell ill with malaria, but managed to overcome the disease; yet he died in August of the same year from a stroke when he was visiting a friend in Edenton. Wilson was also the first buried in a cemetery in this place, but his grave was in 1906, over 100 years later, moved to Philadelphia to Christchurch yard.