View source for William M. Meredith

{{Short description|American lawyer and politician}}
{{other people||William Morris Meredith Jr.|William Morton Meredith}}
{{Multiple issues|
{{more footnotes needed|date=September 2018}}
{{Lead too short|date=August 2021}}
}}
{{Infobox officeholder
|name         = William Meredith
|image        = WMMeredith.jpg
|office       = [[List of Pennsylvania Attorneys General|Attorney General of Pennsylvania]]
|governor     = [[Andrew Gregg Curtin]]
|term_start   = January 16, 1861
|term_end     = June 3, 1861
|predecessor  = [[Samuel Anderson Purviance]]
|successor    = [[Benjamin H. Brewster]]
|office1      = 19th [[United States Secretary of the Treasury]]
|president1   = [[Zachary Taylor]]<br />[[Millard Fillmore]]
|term_start1  = March 8, 1849
|term_end1    = July 22, 1850
|predecessor1 = [[Robert J. Walker]]
|successor1   = [[Thomas Corwin]]
|office2      = [[United States Attorney]] for the [[United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania|Eastern District of Pennsylvania]]
|president2   = [[William Henry Harrison]]<br />[[John Tyler]]
|term_start2  = 1841
|term_end2    = 1845
|predecessor2 = [[John M. Read]]
|successor2   = [[Thomas M. Pettit]]
|birth_date   = {{birth date|1799|6|8}}
|birth_place  = [[Philadelphia]], [[Pennsylvania]], [[United States|U.S.]]
|death_date   = {{death date and age|1873|8|17|1799|6|8}}
|death_place  = [[Philadelphia]], [[Pennsylvania]], [[United States|U.S.]]
|party        = [[Federalist Party (United States)|Federalist]] {{small|(Before 1824)}}<br />[[Whig Party (United States)|Whig]] {{small|(1834–1854)}}<br />[[Republican Party (United States)|Republican]] {{small|(1854–1873)}}
|spouse       = Catherine Keppele {{small|(1834–1854)}}
|children     = 5
|education    = [[University of Pennsylvania]] {{small|([[Bachelor of Arts|BA]])}}
}}
'''William Morris Meredith''' (June 8, 1799 – August 17, 1873) was an American lawyer and politician from [[Philadelphia, Pennsylvania]]. He served as the [[United States Secretary of the Treasury]], during [[President of the United States|President]] [[Zachary Taylor]]'s Administration.

==Early and family life==
Born on June 8, 1799, in [[Philadelphia]], [[Pennsylvania]], William Morris Meredith was the eldest son of William Tuckey Meredith (died 1844), a successful attorney and after 1814 president of Schuylkill Bank, who narrowly lost to [[Nicholas Biddle (banker)|Nicholas Biddle]] the presidency of the [[Second Bank of the United States|Bank of the United States]]. During the year he was admitted to the Pennsylvania Bar, 1795, William Tuckey Meredith married the writer and poet Gertrude Gouverneur Meredith (née Ogden) (died 1828). Gertrude was the niece of [[Lewis Morris]], as well as of [[Gouverneur Morris]], and highly educated and respected in her own right, as well as published in [[The Port Folio|Dennie's Port Folio]]. The couple ultimately had eleven children. William Tuckey Meredith served on the Philadelphia Common and Select Councils, and on the Vestry of [[Christ Church, Philadelphia|Christ Episcopal Church]], among other leadership positions in the city. His brother Jonathan Meredith (d. 1872) was a leader of the Bar in [[Baltimore, Maryland]]. Another brother was the Civil War colonel [[Sullivan A. Meredith]].

William M. Meredith graduated from the [[University of Pennsylvania]] in 1812 (graduation at age 13 not being unusual at the time). After assisting his father in the family's saddlery business, he read law, and was himself admitted to the Pennsylvania Bar.

After his mother's death in 1828, William Morris Meredith helped raise his younger siblings. On June 17, 1834, at the age of 35 and after a ten-year engagement, Meredith married the former Catherine Keppele (d. 1854). They had one son (William, b. 1838, later a published essayist and poet) and four daughters: Gertrude Gouverneur Meredith, Euphemia Ogden Meredith, Elizabeth Caldwell Meredith, Catherine Keppele Meredith. Catherine Meredith also helped care for her husband's siblings, and his father when he was disabled by a stroke in 1839.

==Career==
Meredith was admitted to the bar in 1817, and began practicing law. He drew considerable public attention, as did his slightly senior colleague James C. Biddle (later his brother-in-law), by questioning the conduct of Judge Frank Hallowell in ''Commonwealth v. Cook'', a murder case in which three black men were charged with killing a boy. During the jury's deliberation, the ''American Daily Advertiser'' published an article which defense counsel thought highly biased. The judge allowed counsel to question jurors as to whether they read the article, and when the judge refused to dismiss a juror who said he was offended by Meredith's questioning, complained such that the judge held both lawyers in contempt of court and ordered them jailed for 30 days, despite considerable public sympathy.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Ashhurst |first=Richard Lewis |date=1907 |title=William Morris Meredith 1799-1873 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/3307164 |journal=The American Law Register (1898-1907) |volume=55 |issue=4 |pages=201–243 |jstor=3307164 |issn=1558-3562}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Legacy Files |url=http://hsp.org/sites/default/files/legacy_files/migrated/findingaid1509meredith.pdf |website=hsp.org}}</ref> Upon their release, they secured release of two of the prisoners in an appeal on double jeopardy grounds. This gained Meredith a reputation for fearlessness and inflexible honesty, and he was elected President of the [[Philadelphia Bar Association]] the following year.

A Federalist, Meredith was then elected to the [[Pennsylvania General Assembly]], where he served in the minority for five years, from 1824 to 1828, the year of his mother's death (during which his father was grief-stricken and never fully recovered). One of his accomplishments was establishment of a House of Refuge for juvenile offenders, and he served as that institution's manager, and also on the board of the [[Pennsylvania School for the Deaf|Pennsylvania Institution for the Deaf and Dumb]], in which capacity he continued to serve for many years until his death.<ref>Ashhurst at 212</ref>

Meredith was president of the [[Philadelphia City Council]] from 1834 until 1849, and was a delegate to the Pennsylvania Constitutional Convention in 1837. That same year, he was elected as a member to the [[American Philosophical Society]].<ref>{{Cite web|title=APS Member History|url=https://search.amphilsoc.org/memhist/search?creator=&title=&subject=&subdiv=&mem=&year=1837&year-max=1837&dead=&keyword=&smode=advanced|access-date=2021-04-08|website=search.amphilsoc.org}}</ref> Meredith also served as [[United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania]] from 1841 to 1845. During that time, he prosecuted Alexander Holmes for manslaughter in the ''[[William Brown (ship)|William Brown]]'' case.

A successful attorney, particularly after he secured termination of the German Lutheran Church's interment rights in [[Franklin Square (Philadelphia)|Franklin Square]] in ''Commonwealth v. Allmyer'',<ref>Ashurst at 215</ref> Meredith owned the [[Wheatland (James Buchanan House)|Wheatland Estate]] in [[Lancaster, Pennsylvania]], from May 1845 until December 1848 before selling it to future president [[James Buchanan]].
[[File:The Taylor Administration.jpg|thumb|left|320px|''The Zachary Taylor Administration'', 1849 Daguerreotype by [[Mathew Brady]]<br />From left to right: [[William Ballard Preston|William B. Preston]], [[Thomas Ewing]], [[John M. Clayton]], [[Zachary Taylor]], William M. Meredith, [[George W. Crawford]], [[Jacob Collamer]] and [[Reverdy Johnson]], (1849).]]
[[President of the United States|President]] [[Zachary Taylor]], wanting a [[Pennsylvania]] [[United States Whig Party|Whig]] for his cabinet, appointed William M. Meredith to be the 19th Secretary of the Treasury. He began his term in office on March 8, 1849.

Meredith strongly opposed the [[free trade]] [[legislation]] passed the year before under his predecessor [[Robert J. Walker]]. He felt that there was a need to protect the American workman, who was subject to competition from poorly paid European labor. Meredith's principal contribution in office was his ''Annual Report of 1849'' in which he set forth an elaborate argument for a [[protective tariff]].

[[File:US-Fractional (5th Issue)-$0.10-Fr.1265.jpg|thumb|Meredith depicted on the 5th issue 10-cent [[Fractional currency]] note.]]
The increase in the public debt due to the [[Mexican–American War]] and the acquisition of [[California]] gave Meredith additional argument for raising revenue through higher import duties, but no action was taken on the tariff during Meredith's term. He also recommended a revision of the [[Coast Survey Code]], which had not been changed since its implementation in 1806. The Coast Survey had seen great expansion and improvement with the introduction of [[steam power]]ed ships and was in need of revision. Meredith resigned from his office as Secretary of the Treasury, upon President Taylor's death in 1850.

==Civil War and later legal career==
Meredith was elected Pennsylvania's attorney general in the 1860 election, and served for two terms (from 1861 until 1867). In 1861, as a delegate to a Peace Conference, he worked unsuccessfully to prevent the southern states from seceding from the Union. His brother [[Sullivan Amory Meredith]] had served in the Mexican War, and became a Brigadier General of Union Volunteers, commissioned in 1862, and the brothers helped assure Pennsylvania met its quota of troops. His son William served for a brief period as secretary to Major General [[George A. McCall]], but his stutter and problems with cataracts caused him to resign that position.

William Meredith later served as a member of a commission working out the settlement of the [[Alabama claims|''Alabama'' claims]], in 1870. The following year, President [[Ulysses Grant]] asked Meredith to travel to Geneva as senior counsel for the United States in an international arbitration proceeding, but he declined the position due to ill health. His last political post was as President of the 1872 Republican National Convention.

==Death and legacy==
[[File:Coat of Arms of William Morris Meredith.svg|150px|thumb|Coat of Arms of William Meredith]]
Meredith died in [[Philadelphia]] in August 1873, at the age of 74. His wife, Catherine had died in 1854. Both are interred at the [[Christ Church Burial Ground]] in Philadelphia.

The [[Historical Society of Pennsylvania]] holds the Meredith family papers.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Finding Aid 1509 Meredith |url=http://hsp.org/sites/default/files/legacy_files/migrated/findingaid1509meredith.pdf |website=hsp.org}}</ref> A [[William M. Meredith School|Philadelphia school]] was named in his honor in 1931, and remains active today.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://webgui.phila.k12.pa.us/schools/m/meredith-school |title=Meredith School - the School District of Philadelphia |access-date=2015-03-15 |archive-date=2015-04-02 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150402105916/http://webgui.phila.k12.pa.us/schools/m/meredith-school |url-status=dead }}</ref>

Meredith received one of only two 1849 [[Double Eagle]]s while serving as Treasury Secretary. That 1849 Double Eagle is a [[pattern coin]]. The other coin is on display at the [[Smithsonian Institution]]. The coin was auctioned as part of his estate but its subsequent whereabouts are unknown.<ref>{{Cite web |title=PCGS CoinFacts: Your Digital Encyclopedia of U.S. Coins |url=http://www.coinfacts.com/double_eagles/liberty_no_motto_double_eagles/1849_double_eagle.htm |website=coinfacts.com}}</ref>

==References==
{{reflist}}

==External links==
{{Portal|Biography}}
* [https://books.google.com/books?id=4P8qAAAAIAAJ&q=meredith Biographical sketch of William M Meredith], ''The American Law Registe''r, Vol. 55, No. 4, Apr 1907
* The [http://www.hsp.org/files/findingaid1509meredith.pdf Meredith Family Papers], including William M. Meredith's political correspondence, civic papers and legal case files, are available for research use at the [[Historical Society of Pennsylvania]].

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{{U.S. Cabinet official box
| before= [[Robert J. Walker]]
| after= [[Thomas Corwin]]
| years= 1849–1850
| president= [[Zachary Taylor]]
| department= Secretary of the Treasury}}
{{s-legal}}
{{succession box | title=[[Attorney General of Pennsylvania]] | before=[[Samuel Anderson Purviance]] | after=[[Benjamin H. Brewster]]| years= 1861&ndash;1867 }}
{{S-end}}

{{Whig Party (United States)}}
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{{Taylor cabinet}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Meredith, William M.}}
[[Category:1799 births]]
[[Category:1873 deaths]]
[[Category:19th-century American politicians]]
[[Category:United States secretaries of the treasury]]
[[Category:Pennsylvania attorneys general]]
[[Category:Philadelphia City Council members]]
[[Category:Pennsylvania lawyers]]
[[Category:American people of Welsh descent]]
[[Category:United States Attorneys for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania]]
[[Category:Pennsylvania Whigs]]
[[Category:University of Pennsylvania Law School alumni]]
[[Category:Taylor administration cabinet members]]