Erasmus Darwin Smith was an American jurist from New York.
Background
He was born on October 10, 1806 at De Ruyter, New York, United States. He was the son of Hubbard Smith, a physician, and Eunice (Jones) Smith, who moved about 1801 from Rensselaer County to Madison County, New York, while it was still part of the frontier.
Education
He obtained his early education in the district schools of De Ruyter, New York. Completing his preparatory studies at Hamilton Academy in three summers, he entered Hamilton College in 1826, but did not remain for graduation. In 1829 he went to Rochester and began studying law in the office of Gregory & Humphrey.
Career
At the age of fifteen he began to teach, using his earnings for further schooling. In 1830 he was admitted to the bar, and began practising in partnership with Ebenezer Griffin.
He held the minor positions of master of chancery, 1832-35; injunction master for the eighth district, 1840; and chancery clerk for that district, 1841-47. The Democratic party nominated him for the Assembly and for Congress but, the districts being strongly Whig, he was defeated. For a short time in 1849 he was the political editor of the Rochester Daily Advertiser.
In 1855 he was elected justice of the supreme court and served by subsequent reelections until he was retired on account of age, January 1, 1877. After 1872 he was a general term justice of the fourth department. The state constitution then provided that supreme court justices might be designated to sit on the court of appeals, and Smith was so designated in 1862 and again in 1870. With these exceptions his judicial service was wholly in the inferior courts of the state.
In 1863 he upheld the legal tender act as an incident to the war powers of Congress and the right of the national government to preserve its existence (Hague vs. Powers). Secretary Chase said that the decision was, in its influence on the credit of the government, equal to a victory in the field.
After his retirement from the bench he was frequently employed as a referee. His death followed an apoplectic stroke in his seventy-eighth year.
Achievements
Views
The tendency of his decisions was to uphold legislative acts whenever possible. In both law and equity cases he was unsympathetic toward artificial rules.
Personality
He approached every his inquiry in a large spirit. Having arrived at a conclusion, it was his custom to write his opinions with great vigor and positiveness. Sometimes his enthusiasm led him into dicta which the higher courts would not approve.
Connections
He married Janet Morrison in 1831. He married his second wife, Emilie Maria (Perkins), widow of Erastus T. Smith, June 6, 1879, and had several children.