# Melville Fuller *Eighth chief justice of the United States (1888–1910)* Melville Weston Fuller (February 11, 1833 – July 4, 1910) was an American lawyer, politician and judge. He was the eighth chief justice of the United States, holding the office from 1888 until he died in 1910. On the Court he wrote majority opinions on the federal income tax, the Commerce Clause and citizenship law, and he took part in decisions on racial segregation and the liberty of contract.[^1] A native of Augusta, Maine, Fuller graduated from Bowdoin College and set up a law practice in Chicago. As a Democrat he campaigned for Stephen A. Douglas in the 1860 presidential election. He served one term in the Illinois House of Representatives during the Civil War, opposing the policies of President [[Abraham Lincoln]], and he attended several Democratic National Conventions as a delegate. Fuller turned down three appointments offered by President Grover Cleveland. In 1888 he accepted Cleveland's nomination to succeed [[Morrison Waite]] as chief justice, and the Senate confirmed him over objections to his political record.[^1] Fuller's majority opinion in *Pollock v. Farmers' Loan & Trust Co.* (1895) held a federal income tax unconstitutional, and the Sixteenth Amendment later superseded that decision. His rulings drew criticism while he served and afterward, and many were later overruled or abrogated.[^1] His support of the *Plessy* and *Lochner* decisions has been particularly responsible for his low historical reputation. Most legal scholars have assessed him negatively, though a revisionist minority has viewed his jurisprudence more favorably.[^1][^2] ## Early life Fuller was born in Augusta, Maine, on February 11, 1833. He was the second son of Frederick Augustus Fuller, a lawyer in Augusta, and Catherine Martin (née Weston). His mother's father, Nathan Weston, was a justice of the Supreme Court of Maine, and his father's father was a probate judge. When Fuller was three months old, his mother won a divorce on grounds of adultery. She then took her children to live in Judge Weston's household.[^3] Fuller entered Bowdoin College in 1849, at sixteen, and graduated Phi Beta Kappa in 1853. He read law in an uncle's office and then spent six months at Harvard Law School. He left without a degree, but that period of study made him the first chief justice with formal academic legal training. He was admitted to the Maine bar in 1855 and clerked for another uncle in Bangor. Later that year he returned to Augusta and became editor of *The Age*, Maine's principal Democratic newspaper. In March 1856 he was elected to Augusta's common council, and he served as its president and as city solicitor.[^3] ## Early career Fuller moved to Chicago in 1856, where he took a position with a local law firm and entered politics. He opposed slavery but regarded it as a matter for the states rather than the federal government. He backed the Kansas–Nebraska Act, which repealed the Missouri Compromise and let Kansas and Nebraska settle the slavery question for themselves. He opposed both abolitionists and secessionists and argued for compromise. He campaigned for Stephen A. Douglas against Abraham Lincoln twice: in Douglas's successful 1858 Senate race and in his losing 1860 presidential bid.[^4] Fuller supported military action against the Confederacy after the Civil War began in 1861. He also objected to the Lincoln administration's conduct of the war and called many of Lincoln's actions unconstitutional. Fuller attended the 1862 Illinois state constitutional convention as a Democratic delegate. There he helped draw a gerrymandered plan for congressional apportionment. With his fellow Democrats, he supported provisions barring African-Americans from voting or settling in Illinois. He also pressed for court reform and for a ban on banks issuing paper money. The convention adopted many of his proposals, but voters rejected the proposed constitution in June 1862.[^4] In November 1862 he narrowly won election to the Illinois House of Representatives as a Democrat, and he served there from 1863 to 1865.[^4] ## Nomination to Supreme Court Waite's death on March 23, 1888, left the chief justiceship vacant. Republicans held a narrow Senate majority, so Cleveland needed a nominee able to win votes from both parties. He also wanted a candidate no older than sixty. Cleveland considered Edward J. Phelps, the ambassador to the United Kingdom. Phelps was opposed by the Irish-American community and was thought too old at sixty-six. Cleveland also considered Senator George Gray, but appointing Gray would have opened a seat in the closely divided Senate.[^5] Cleveland settled on an Illinois nominee, both for political reasons and because no sitting justice came from the Seventh Circuit. At Fuller's urging, Cleveland first offered the post to John Scholfield of the Illinois Supreme Court, who declined. Fuller's friends then wrote to Cleveland on his behalf. At fifty-five, Fuller met Cleveland's age requirement, and Cleveland approved of his reputation and politics. Illinois Republican senator Shelby Cullom also backed Fuller, which persuaded Cleveland that the nominee could draw support from both parties. Cleveland offered Fuller the nomination, and the Senate confirmed him.[^5][^1] ## Chief justice Fuller held the office for twenty-two years, until his death in 1910. He lacked legal genius, but he managed the Court's business ably. To foster collegiality, he began the practice of justices shaking hands before their private conferences. The Court was nonetheless divided: it split 5–4 sixty-four times during his tenure, more often than in later years. Fuller himself dissented from the majority in only 2.3 percent of cases.[^6] Fuller was the first chief justice to lobby Congress directly for legislation. He successfully pressed for the Circuit Courts of Appeals Act of 1891, which created intermediate appellate courts and reduced the Supreme Court's backlog. Fuller generally decided who would write the Court's majority opinions. He often gave major cases to other justices and kept less consequential ones for himself.[^6] Legal historian Walter F. Pratt called his prose "nondescript." Justice [[Felix Frankfurter]] said Fuller was "not an opinion writer whom you read for literary enjoyment." The scholar G. Edward White called his style "diffident and not altogether successful".[^6] In 1893 Cleveland offered to make Fuller secretary of state, and Fuller declined.[^6] ## Jurisprudence Scholars generally classify Fuller's jurisprudence as conservative. He favored the states over the federal government and tried to keep the national government from asserting broad control over the economy. He also accepted substantive due process and used it to invalidate state laws that, in his view, intruded too far into the free market. Congress or later Court majorities have reversed many of his decisions. In 1969 the scholar Irving Schiffman described him as "a conservative, laissez-faire Justice, less reactionary than some of his brethren, more compassionate than others."[^7] ### Income tax Legal scholar Bernard Schwartz judged the 1895 *Pollock v. Farmers' Loan & Trust Co.* opinion to be Fuller's most noteworthy decision. In 1894 Congress had passed the Wilson–Gorman Tariff Act with a rider imposing a two-percent tax on annual incomes above $4,000. That rider was the nation's first peacetime income tax. Challengers argued that it was a direct tax not apportioned among the states as the Constitution requires.[^7] Fuller's majority opinion held the tax unconstitutional, and the Sixteenth Amendment later superseded the ruling.[^1] ### Commerce Clause In *United States v. E. C. Knight Co.* (1895), Fuller wrote an opinion that read Congress's Commerce Clause power narrowly. The decision limited the reach of the Sherman Act and made antitrust prosecutions harder for the government to bring.[^1] ### Liberty of contract In *Lochner v. New York* (1905), Fuller joined the majority in holding that the Constitution barred states from enforcing wage-and-hour limits on businesses. That position rested on the Due Process Clause as a protection for a person's liberty to control property and business affairs.[^1] ## Personal life Fuller married Calista Reynolds in 1858. They had two children before she died of tuberculosis in 1864. In 1866 he married Mary Ellen Coolbaugh, daughter of William F. Coolbaugh. They had eight more children and remained married until her death in 1904. Fuller belonged to the Chicago Literary Club and owned a personal library of more than six thousand books.[^8] No previous chief justice had worn a mustache. Fuller's mustache produced what law professor Todd Peppers called "a curious national anxiety," and newspapers argued over it during and after his confirmation. Fuller kept it.[^8] ## Death Fuller died of a heart attack on July 4, 1910, at his summer home in Sorrento, Maine. President Taft called him "a great judge." James E. Freeman, later Episcopal Bishop of Washington, conducted the funeral. Fuller was buried at Graceland Cemetery in Chicago.[^9] ## Legacy Fuller's years on the Court have frequently been criticized or ignored. Many Fuller Court decisions were later overruled, especially those on economic regulation and labor. Some scholars have argued that the Court favored big business and worked against the working class. Yale professor John P. Frank judged Fuller by his influence on Frank's own era and found his score "as close to zero as any man's could be who held his high office so long."[^2] Chief Justice [[William Rehnquist]] observed that Fuller's more forceful colleagues, Holmes and Harlan, had overshadowed him historically. Princeton professor Alpheus T. Mason described the Fuller Court as "dominated by fear."[^2] Conservative legal thought grew in the late twentieth century, and Fuller gained new defenders. A 1993 survey of judges and legal academics still rated his reputation "average" but found it higher than in a 1970 assessment. In a 1995 book, James W. Ely argued that the traditional criticisms of the Fuller Court were flawed and that its decisions rested on principle, not partisanship.[^2] ## Notes [^1]: Wikipedia contributors, *Melville Fuller* (revision 1376241454, retrieved 2026-10-26), lead section. Establishes his dates and office, his career summary, the confirmation, and the holdings in *Pollock*, *E. C. Knight* and *Lochner* and their later treatment; licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melville_Fuller [^2]: Wikipedia contributors, *Melville Fuller* (retrieved 2026-10-26), "Legacy" section. Establishes the overruling of Fuller Court decisions; the Frank, Rehnquist and Mason assessments; the 1993 and 1970 surveys; and Ely (1995). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melville_Fuller [^3]: Wikipedia contributors, *Melville Fuller* (retrieved 2026-10-26), "Early life" section. Establishes his birth, family, education, admission to the bar and Augusta offices. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melville_Fuller [^4]: Wikipedia contributors, *Melville Fuller* (retrieved 2026-10-26), "Early career" section. Establishes his move to Chicago, positions on slavery, the 1862 convention and his Illinois House service. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melville_Fuller [^5]: Wikipedia contributors, *Melville Fuller* (retrieved 2026-10-26), "Nomination to Supreme Court" section. Establishes the vacancy of March 23, 1888, the candidates considered, Cullom's support and the nomination. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melville_Fuller [^6]: Wikipedia contributors, *Melville Fuller* (retrieved 2026-10-26), "Chief justice" section. Establishes his administration, the 5–4 divisions and dissent rate, the Circuit Courts of Appeals Act of 1891, the assessments of his writing and the 1893 offer. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melville_Fuller [^7]: Wikipedia contributors, *Melville Fuller* (retrieved 2026-10-26), "Jurisprudence" section and "Income tax" subsection. Establishes his conservative orientation, the Schiffman quotation (1969), the Wilson–Gorman Act and *Pollock*. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melville_Fuller [^8]: Wikipedia contributors, *Melville Fuller* (retrieved 2026-10-26), "Personal life" section. Establishes his marriages, children, library and the press debate over his mustache. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melville_Fuller [^9]: Wikipedia contributors, *Melville Fuller* (retrieved 2026-10-26), "Death" section. Establishes the date, place and cause of death, Taft's tribute, the funeral and the burial. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melville_Fuller