William Matthew Merrick

William Matthew Merrick (* September 1, 1818 in Faulkner, Charles County, Maryland, † February 4, 1899 in Washington DC) was an American lawyer and politician. Between 1871 and 1873 he represented the state of Maryland in the U.S. House of Representatives; later he became a federal judge.

Career

William Merrick was the son of U.S. Senator William Duhurst Merrick ( 1793-1857 ). He studied until 1831 at Georgetown University in the capital Washington. After a subsequent law studies at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville and his 1839 was admitted as a lawyer, he began in 1844 to work in Frederick in this profession. From 1845 to 1850 he was deputy district attorney in Frederick County. In 1854 he moved to Washington, where he was from 1854 to 1863 Judge of the Federal Court ( Circuit Court ) for the Federal District District of Columbia. He then practiced as a lawyer again in Maryland. He also taught in the years 1866 and 1867 at the Columbian College, which later became George Washington University, Law Faculty. At the same time he proposed as a member of the Democratic Party launched a political career. In 1867 he was a delegate at a meeting on the revision of the Constitution of Maryland; in 1870 he sat in the House of Representatives of Maryland.

In the congressional elections of 1870, Merrick was selected in the fifth electoral district of his state in the U.S. House of Representatives in Washington, where he became the successor of Frederick Stone on March 4, 1871. Since he has not been confirmed in 1872, he was able to complete only one term in Congress until March 3, 1873. After the end of his time in the U.S. House of Representatives Merrick was active again as a lawyer. Between 1885 and 1889 he was a judge at the Federal District Court for the District of Columbia. He died on 4 February 1889 in the German capital Washington.