{{Short description|American judge (1831–1914)}} {{Inline|date=June 2023}} {{Infobox officeholder | honorific_prefix = | name = John Forrest Dillon | image = Annals of Iowa (1909) (14598019280).jpg | office = Judge of the United States Circuit Court for the Eighth Circuit | term_start = December 22, 1869 | term_end = September 1, 1879 | appointer = Ulysses S. Grant | predecessor = Seat established by 16 Stat. 44 | successor = George W. McCrary |office1 = 10th Chief Justice of the Iowa Supreme Court |term_start1 = 1868 |term_end1 = 1869 |predecessor1 = Ralph P. Lowe |successor1 = Chester C. Cole |office2 = Associate Justice of the Iowa Supreme Court |term_start2 = 1864 |term_end2 = 1870 |predecessor2 = |successor2 = | birth_name = John Forrest Dillon | birth_date = {{Birth date|1831|12|25}} | birth_place = Northampton, Montgomery County, New York (now Northampton, Fulton County, New York), U.S. | death_date = {{Death date and age|1914|05|06|1831|12|25}} | death_place = New York City, U.S. | death_cause = | resting_place = | resting_place_coordinates = | spouse = | children = | education = University of Iowa (MD)<br>read law }}

'''John Forrest Dillon''' (December 25, 1831 – May 6, 1914) was an American attorney in Iowa and New York, a justice of the Iowa Supreme Court and a United States circuit judge of the United States Circuit Court for the Eighth Circuit. He authored a highly influential treatise on the power of states over municipal governments.

==Education and career==

Born on December 25, 1831, in Northampton, (then part of Montgomery County, now part of Fulton County), New York,<ref name="auto">{{FJC Bio|621|nid=1380056|name=John Forrest Dillon<!--(1831–1914)-->}}</ref> Dillon received a Doctor of Medicine in 1850 from the University of Iowa.<ref name="auto"/> He read law in 1852.<ref name="auto"/> He entered private practice in Davenport, Iowa from 1852 to 1853.<ref name="auto"/> He was county attorney for Scott County, Iowa from 1853 to 1858.<ref name="auto"/> He was a Judge of the Iowa District Court for the Seventh Judicial District from 1858 to 1862.<ref name="auto"/> He was a justice of the Iowa Supreme Court from 1862 to 1868.<ref name="auto"/>

==Federal judicial service== Dillon was nominated by President Ulysses S. Grant on December 9, 1869, to the United States Circuit Court for the Eighth Circuit, to a new seat authorized by 16 Stat. 44.<ref name="auto"/> He was confirmed by the United States Senate on December 22, 1869, and received his commission the same day.<ref name="auto"/> His service terminated on September 1, 1879, due to his resignation.<ref name="auto"/>

===Scholarship and notable ruling=== While on the federal bench, Dillon wrote ''Municipal Corporations'' (1872), one of the earliest systematic studies of the subject.{{Citation needed|date=May 2019}} He also authored ''Removal of Cases from State Courts to Federal Courts'' and ''Municipal Bonds'', both in 1876.{{Citation needed|date=May 2019}} On February 17, 1876, during the Whiskey Ring graft prosecutions, Justice Dillon ruled Ulysses S. Grant's deposition for Orville E. Babcock was admissible in court.<ref>{{cite web |title=Grant, Babcock, and the Whiskey Ring, Part 2|url=https://www.archives.gov/publications/prologue/2000/fall/whiskey-ring-2.html|author=Timothy Rives|year=2000}}</ref>

==Later career== Following his resignation from the federal bench, Dillon was a professor of law for Columbia University from 1879 to 1882.<ref name="auto"/> He resumed private practice in New York City, New York from 1882 to 1914.<ref name="auto"/> He was the Storrs professor of law at Yale University from 1891 to 1892,<ref name="auto"/> during which time he wrote ''The Laws and Jurisprudence of England and America: Being a Series of Lectures Delivered Before Yale University.''<ref>{{cite book |last1=Dillon |first1=John F. |title=The Laws and Jurisprudence of England and America: Being a Series of Lectures Delivered Before Yale University |date=1894 |publisher=Little, Brown, and Company |location=Boston |url=https://archive.org/details/lawsandjurispru00dillgoog }}</ref> He died on May 6, 1914, in New York City.<ref name="auto"/>

==Memorial== [[File:Dillon Memorial.jpg|upright|thumb|Dillon Memorial in Davenport, Iowa]] [[File:Dillon family monument 01.jpg|upright|thumb|The Dillon Family monument in Oakdale Memorial Gardens in Davenport, Iowa where Dillon is buried.]] A memorial fountain to Dillon was erected in downtown Davenport in 1918, carved of Indiana limestone in Romanesque style, by sculptor Harry Liva.{{Citation needed|date=May 2019}}

==Family== {{Moresources|section|date=June 2023}} In 1853, Dillon married Anna Margery Price (born June 19, 1835). They had two sons and a daughter. Anna and their daughter, Mrs. Annie Dillon Oliver, died in the sinking of the French ocean liner {{SS|La Bourgogne||2}} in July 1898. Dillon's oldest son, Hiram Price Dillon (1855–1918), became a lawyer in Iowa and a Master of Chancery in federal court.

John F. Dillon's sister married John B. Jordan, a merchant. That marriage produced a daughter, Jennie, who married Louis Stengel. Louis and Jennie Stengel were the parents of Casey Stengel, who had a long career as a baseball player and manager.

==Dillon's Rule== {{verification section|date=March 2023}} The theory of state preeminence over local governments was expressed as Dillon's Rule in an 1868 case: "Municipal corporations owe their origin to, and derive their powers and rights wholly from, the legislature. It breathes into them the breath of life, without which they cannot exist. As it creates, so may it destroy. If it may destroy, it may abridge and control".<ref>''Clinton v Cedar Rapids and the Missouri River Railroad'', (24 Iowa 455; 1868).</ref> By contrast, the Cooley Doctrine, or the doctrine of home rule, expressed the theory of an inherent right to local self-determination. In a concurring opinion, Michigan Supreme Court Judge Thomas M. Cooley in 1871 stated, "local government is a matter of absolute right; and the state cannot take it away".<ref>''People v. Hurlbut'', (24 Mich 44, 95; 1871).</ref>

In ''Municipal Corporations'' (1872), Dillon contended that in contrast to the powers of states, which are unlimited but for express restrictions under the state or federal constitution, municipalities only have the powers that are expressly granted to them by the state, any power necessarily implied by an express power, and those powers essential to a municipality's existence. This formulation of the scope of municipal power came to be known as "Dillon's Rule".<ref>{{cite encyclopedia |title=Municipal Corporation|url=http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1G2-3437703005.html|encyclopedia=West's Encyclopedia of American Law|year=2005|access-date=2009-12-14}}</ref>

The Supreme Court of the United States cited ''Municipal Corporations'' and fully adopted Dillon's emphasis on state power over municipalities in ''Hunter v. Pittsburgh'',<ref>''[http://supreme.justia.com/us/207/161/case.html Hunter v. Pittsburgh]'', 207 U.S. 161 (1907)</ref> which upheld the power of Pennsylvania to consolidate the city of Allegheny into the city of Pittsburgh, despite the objections of a majority of Allegheny's residents. The Court's ruling that states could alter or abolish at will the charters of municipal corporations without infringing upon contract rights relied upon Dillon's distinction between public, municipal corporations and private ones. However, the Court did not prevent states from passing legislation or amending their constitutions to explicitly allow home rule. This constitutional allowance was reiterated in ''Trenton v. New Jersey'', where the Supreme Court held that "In the absence of state constitutional provisions safeguarding it to them, municipalities have no inherent right of self-government which is beyond the legislative control of the state, but are merely departments of the state, with powers and privileges such as the state has seen fit to grant, held and exercised subject to its sovereign will".<ref>''[https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/262/182/ Trenton v. New Jersey]'', 262 U.S. 182 (1923)</ref>

==References== {{Portal|Biography}} {{Reflist}}

==Sources== * Gerald E. Frug ''et al.'', ''Local Government Law'', 3rd ed. pp.&nbsp;139–158. West Publishing, 2001. * See ''Arlington County v. White'', 528 S.E.2d 706 (Va. 2000), for a modern use of the Dillon Rule to invalidate municipal action. See ''State v. Hutchison'', 624 P.2d 1116 (Utah 1980) for an example of the minority, critical view. * David Y. Miller, ''The Regional Governing of Metropolitan America'', pp.&nbsp;1–2. Westview Press, 2002. * Robert W. Creamer, "Stengel: His Life and Times," pp.&nbsp;21–23. * {{FJC Bio|621|nid=1380056|name=John Forrest Dillon<!--(1831–1914)-->}} * {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150924035844/http://www.iowacourts.gov/wfdata/frame1206-1434/pressrel14.asp|title=Iowa Judicial Branch Past Iowa Supreme Court Justices page for John Forrest Dillon}}

==External links== * {{Internet Archive author |sname=John Forrest Dillon}}

{{s-start}} {{s-legal}} {{s-bef|before=Seat established by 16 Stat. 44}} {{s-ttl|title={{nowrap|Judge of the United States Circuit Courts for the Eighth Circuit}}|years=1869–1879}} {{s-aft|after=George W. McCrary}} {{s-end}}

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Dillon, John Forrest}} Category:1831 births Category:1914 deaths Category:American legal writers Category:Columbia Law School faculty Category:Iowa lawyers Category:Iowa state court judges Category:Justices of the Iowa Supreme Court Category:Judges of the United States circuit courts Category:People from Northampton, Fulton County, New York Category:United States federal judges appointed by Ulysses S. Grant Category:Writers from Davenport, Iowa Category:Writers from New York (state) Category:Yale Law School faculty Category:United States federal judges admitted to the practice of law by reading law Category:Presidents of the American Bar Association