{{Short description|American lawyer and diplomat (1822–1900)}} {{Use mdy dates|date=April 2021}} {{Infobox officeholder | name = Edward John Phelps | image = Professor Edward J Phelps.jpg | caption = | order = | minister_from = United States | country = United Kingdom | term_start = May 19, 1885 | term_end = January 31, 1889 | president = Grover Cleveland | predecessor = James Russell Lowell | successor = Robert Todd Lincoln | office1 = President of the American Bar Association | term_start1 = 1880 | term_end1 = 1881 | predecessor1 = Benjamin Bristow | successor1 = Clarkson Nott Potter | office2 = Second Comptroller of the Treasury | term_start2 = 1851 | term_end2 = 1853 | predecessor2 = Hiland Hall | successor2 = John M. Brodhead | birth_date = {{Birth date|1822|07|11}} | birth_place = Middlebury, Vermont | death_date = {{Death date and age|1900|03|09|1822|07|11}} | death_place = New Haven, Connecticut | resting_place = Greenmount Cemetery, Burlington, Vermont | education = Middlebury College<br />Yale Law School | spouse = Mary Haight (m. 1845-1900, his death) | children = 4 | parents = Samuel S. Phelps<br/>Francis (Shurtleff) Phelps | occupation = Attorney | party = Whig (before 1854)<br/>Democratic (from 1854) | signature = Signature of Edward John Phelps (1822–1900).png }} '''Edward John Phelps''' (July 11, 1822{{snd}}March 9, 1900) was a lawyer and diplomat from Vermont. He is notable for his service as Envoy to Court of St. James's from 1885 to 1889. In addition, Phelps was a founder of the American Bar Association, and served as its president from 1880 to 1881.
A prominent Democrat even as Vermont was trending towards the Republicans, Phelps was the son of Senator Samuel S. Phelps and his first wife, Francis (Shurtleff) Phelps. Edward Phelps graduated from Middlebury College in 1840, taught school in Virginia, and studied for a career as an attorney, first in the office of Middlebury attorney Horatio Seymour, then at Yale Law School. He practiced in Burlington, and served as Second Comptroller of the Treasury from 1851 to 1853. Phelps supported the Union during the American Civil War, but was a critic of what he regarded as the excesses of the Abraham Lincoln administration. He served as a delegate to the Vermont constitutional convention of 1870, and was one of the founders of the American Bar Association.<ref name="Britannica"/> Phelps served as ABA president from 1880 to 1881. In 1880, he was the unsuccessful Democratic nominee for Governor of Vermont.
Phelps was Envoy to Court of St. James's in Britain from 1885 to 1889. He later taught law at Yale Law School, the University of Vermont, and Boston University. He supported Republicans after 1896, in response to his disagreement with the Democratic Party's turn towards the Free Silver movement. He died in New Haven, Connecticut, and was buried at Greenmount Cemetery in Burlington.
==Early life== Phelps was born in Middlebury, Vermont on July 11, 1822, the son of Samuel S. Phelps and Francis (Shurtleff) Phelps.<ref name="Cyclopaedia">{{cite book |date=1894 |title=The National Cyclopaedia of American Biography |volume=V |url=https://archive.org/details/nationalcyclopae05newy/page/410/mode/2up |location=New York, NY |publisher=James T. White & Company |pages=411–412 |via=Internet Archive}}</ref><ref name="Shurtleff">{{cite book |last=Shurtleff |first=Benjamin |date=1912 |title=Descendants of William Shurtleff of Plymouth and Marshfield, Massachusetts |volume=1 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=GbpRAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA442 |location=Revere, MA |publisher=Benjamin Shurtleff |pages=210, 442 |via=Google Books}}</ref> He was educated in the schools of Middlebury and then began attendance at Middlebury College, from which he graduated in 1840.<ref name="Cyclopaedia"/> He worked as a school teacher and principal in Virginia, then began studying law in the Middlebury office of Horatio Seymour.<ref name="Cyclopaedia"/>{{efn|Some sources indicate that Phelps studied law with Horatio Seymour of Utica, New York. This is incorrect, because Horatio Seymour of Utica did not practice law after attaining admission to the bar.}} Phelps completed his legal studies with a year at Yale Law School, attained admission to the bar in 1843, and began a practice in Middlebury.<ref name="Cyclopaedia"/> Phelps moved to Burlington in 1845, where he continued to practice law.<ref name="Cyclopaedia"/>
==Start of career== Phelps practiced in Burlington with different partners at various times, the most prominent being Lucius E. Chittenden and David Allen Smalley.<ref name="Muller">{{cite news |last=Muller |first=H. N. |date=November 13, 1977 |title=Edward J. Phelps: Diplomat, Lawyer, Versifier |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/81238478/phelps-muller/ |work=Rutland Herald |location=Rutland, VT |page=17 |via=Newspapers.com}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |editor-last=Rann |editor-first=William S. |date=1886 |title=History of Chittenden County, Vermont |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=KsFAAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA494 |location=Syracuse, NY |publisher=D. Mason & Co. |pages=493–494 |via=Google Books}}</ref> The Phelps and Smalley firm counted George F. Edmunds among the prospective attorneys who studied law under their tutelage.<ref name="Muller"/>
Originally a Whig, after that party's demise he became a Democrat.<ref name="Muller"/> In 1851, Phelps was the successful Whig nominee for state's attorney of Chittenden County, defeating Democrat Leverett B. Englesby in the general election.<ref>{{cite news |date=September 15, 1851 |title=Vote for County Officers |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/9341336/the-burlington-free-press/ |work=Burlington Free Press |location=Burlington, VT |page=2 |via=Newspapers.com}}</ref> He received a federal appointment before assuming office, and Aaron B. Maynard filled the vacancy.<ref>{{cite news |date=April 8, 1852 |title=trial for Murder |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/81245193/trial-murder/ |work=Woodstock Mercury |location=Woodstock, VT |page=2 |via=Newspapers.com}}</ref> From 1851 to 1853, Phelps served as Second Comptroller of the Treasury.<ref name="Cyclopaedia"/> He then practiced law in New York City as a partner in Wakeman, Latting & Phelps, the senior partner of which was Abram Wakeman.<ref>{{cite magazine |last=Publication Committee |date=April 1891 |title=John Jordan Latting |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=PZsyAQAAMAAJ&pg=RA2-PA103 |magazine=The New York Genealogical and Biographical Record |location=New York, NY |publisher=New York Genealogical and Biographical |pages=102–103 |via=Google Books}}</ref> He returned to Burlington in 1857 and resumed practicing law.<ref name="Britannica">{{EB1911|inline=y|wstitle=Phelps, Edward John|volume=21|page=363}}</ref> Phelps served as a delegate to the state constitutional convention in 1870.<ref name="Cyclopaedia"/>
Phelps was one of the founders of the American Bar Association and was its president from 1880 to 1881.<ref name="Cyclopaedia"/> He also served as a trustee of the Vermont State Library, a position he held for more than 20 years.<ref name="Ullery">{{cite book |last=Ullery |first=Jacob G. |date=1894 |title=Men of Vermont Illustrated |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Nvg_AAAAYAAJ&pg=RA2-PA179 |location=Brattleboro, VT |publisher=Transcript Publishing Company |pages=308, 310 |via=Google Books}}</ref> From 1881 until his death he was Kent Professor of Law at Yale Law School.<ref name="Cyclopaedia"/> Phelps lectured on medical jurisprudence at the University of Vermont from 1881 to 1883, and on constitutional law at Boston University from 1882 to 1883.<ref name="Ullery"/>
==Continued career== In politics, Phelps was always conservative. He opposed the anti-slavery movement before 1860, the free-silver movement in 1896, when he supported the Republican presidential ticket, and after 1898 becoming an "anti-expansionist" with respect to American foreign policy.<ref name="Britannica"/><ref name="Harper's">{{cite news |date=March 24, 1900 |title=The Late E. J. Phelps |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FsY4AQAAMAAJ&pg=PA264 |work=Harper's Weekly |location=New York, NY |page=264 |via=Newspapers.com|last1= Bonner|first1= John|last2= Curtis|first2= George William|last3= Alden|first3= Henry Mills|last4= Conant|first4= Samuel Stillman|last5= Schuyler|first5= Montgomery|last6= Foord|first6= John|last7= Davis|first7= Richard Harding|last8= Schurz|first8= Carl|last9= Nelson|first9= Henry Loomis|last10= Bangs|first10= John Kendrick|last11= Harvey|first11= George Brinton Mcclellan|last12= Hapgood|first12= Norman}}</ref>
In 1880 Phelps was the Democratic nominee for Governor of Vermont.<ref name="Cyclopaedia"/> Democrats were a perpetual minority in Vermont, and lost every statewide election from the 1850s to the 1960s.<ref name="Cyclopaedia"/> 1880 was no exception, and Phelps was excoriated as an unrepentant Copperhead:<blockquote> Had he maintained his resolution to accept no political nomination, the memory of his attitude during the memory of his attitude from 1860 to 1865 might have quite died; but the Democratic nomination and his speech of acceptance, in which, with surprising want of tact, he aired afresh his old hatred of the African and attacked the Southern Republicans, white and black, with a virulence which few Southern Democrats could equal … have brought it into strong prominence. Still stronger light has been thrown on it by the publication of a careful stenographic report of a speech made by Mr. Phelps in September, 1864, before a little club of Copperheads in Burlington. In this he called Mr. Lincoln a 'wooden-head' and a 'twentieth-rate back country attorney,' declared that the North was fighting simply to 'turn loose all the [racial epithet]' and 'whitewash the [racial epithet] in the blood of millions[.]'.<ref>{{cite news |date=September 1, 1880 |title=Vermont Ready to Vote |url=https://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9B0CE3D9143FEE3ABC4E53DFBF66838B699FDE |work=The New York Times |location=New York, NY |page=1 |via=TimesMachine}}</ref></blockquote>
Phelps was Envoy to Court of St. James's in Britain from 1885 to 1889.<ref name="Ullery"/> He was praised for his work as minister, which focused on restoring the congenial relationship the two countries had enjoyed prior to the American Civil War, when relations deteriorated because England was on the verge of formally recognizing the Confederate States of America.<ref name="Harper's"/> Phelps' efforts were continued by his immediate successors, Robert Todd Lincoln and Thomas F. Bayard.<ref name="Harper's"/>
Phelps was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1890.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2023-02-13 |title=Edward John Phelps {{!}} American Academy of Arts and Sciences |url=https://www.amacad.org/person/edward-john-phelps |access-date=2024-03-13 |website=www.amacad.org |language=en}}</ref> In 1893, Phelps was elected a member of the American Antiquarian Society, a national research library of pre-20th Century American history and culture which was founded in 1876.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.americanantiquarian.org/memberlistp |title=Members Directory |website=American Antiquarian.org |publisher=American Antiquarian Society |location=Worcester, MA |access-date=July 11, 2021}}</ref> Also in 1893, he served as senior counsel for the United States before the international tribunal in Paris which considered the Bering Sea Controversy.<ref name="Ullery"/> In 1895, he was appointed to the commission which worked to end the Venezuelan crisis of 1895, in which Venezuela and England disputed the location of the border between Venezuela and British Guiana.<ref>{{cite magazine |date=January–February 1896 |title=The Venezuelan Commission |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5wBCAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA113 |magazine=The American Law Review |volume=XXX |location=St. Louis, MO |publisher=Review Publishing Co. |page=113 |via=Newspapers.com}}</ref> That same year, he was elected to the American Philosophical Society.<ref>{{Cite web |title=APS Member History |url=https://search.amphilsoc.org/memhist/search?creator=Edward+J.+Phelps&title=&subject=&subdiv=&mem=&year=&year-max=&dead=&keyword=&smode=advanced |access-date=2024-03-13 |website=search.amphilsoc.org}}</ref>
Phelps was a highly sought after speechmaker and delivered numerous public addresses, among them ''The United States Supreme Court and the Sovereignty of the People'' at the centennial celebration of the Federal Judiciary in 1890, and an oration at the dedication of the Bennington Battle Monument, unveiled in 1891 at the centennial of Vermont's admission to the Union.<ref name="Britannica"/><ref>{{cite book |last=Carson |first=Hampton Lawrence |date=1892 |title=The Supreme Court of the United States: Its History |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=g3gcAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA686 |location=Philadelphia, PA |publisher=A. R. Keller Company |page=686 |via=Google Books}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |editor-last=Stillson |editor-first=Henry Leonard |date=1892 |title=The Dedication of the Bennington Battle Monument |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FQItAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA84 |location=Bennington, VT |publisher=Banner Book and Job Printing |page=84 |via=Google Books}}</ref>
At the urging of Senator George F. Edmunds, President Grover Cleveland intended to appoint Phelps as U.S. Chief Justice in 1888.<ref name="Ely">{{cite book |last=Ely |first=James W. Jr. |author-link=James W. Ely Jr. |date=1995 |title=The Chief Justiceship of Melville W. Fuller, 1888-1910 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=NDcMCAAAQBAJ&pg=PA17 |location=Columbia, SC |publisher=University of South Carolina Press |pages=16–18 |isbn=978-1-5700-3018-5 |via=Google Books}}</ref> Phelps was concerned that his tenure as ambassador in London would cause the Democratic Party to lose the support of Irish Americans, who supported a growing movement for Irish independence, and Cleveland concurred.<ref name="Ely"/> In addition, New England was already represented on the Supreme Court by Horace Gray; in an era when the government was expected to reflect geographic balance, Cleveland decided to appoint someone from the western states.<ref name="Ely"/> After considering Phelps and several other candidates, Cleveland nominated Melville Fuller.<ref name="Ely"/>
==Death and burial== Phelps died at his home in New Haven, Connecticut on March 9, 1900.<ref>{{cite news |date=March 10, 1900 |title=Learned Lawyer has Passed Away |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/81228912/learned-lawyer/ |work=The Evening Argus |location=Montpelier, VT |page=1 |via=Newspapers.com}}</ref> A funeral was held at Battell Chapel on the Yale campus; Theodore T. Munger officiated, and university president Timothy Dwight V delivered the eulogy.<ref name="Register">{{cite news |date=March 16, 1900 |title=Death of E. J. Pehlps |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/81230949/e-j-phelps/ |work=Middlebury Register |location=Middlebury, VT |page=1 |via=Newspapers.com}}</ref>
A second service took place at the Cathedral Church of St. Paul in Burlington.<ref name="Register"/> Attendees and honorary pall bearers included Edward Curtis Smith, John G. McCullough, Benjamin F. Fifield, and Robert Roberts.<ref name="Register"/> Phelps was buried at Greenmount Cemetery in Burlington.<ref name="Register"/>
==Family== 150px|thumb|Coat of Arms of John Phelps In August 1845, Phelps married Mary S. Haight (1827-1909) of Burlington.<ref name="Shurtleff"/><ref>{{cite news |editor-last=Walton |editor-first=E. P. Jr. |editor-link=Eliakim Persons Walton |date=August 28, 1845 |title=Married: Edward J. Phelps, Mary Haight |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/81234647/phelps-married/ |work=Watchman & Journal |location=Montpelier, VT |page=3 |via=Newspapers.com}}</ref> They were the parents of four children: Edward Haight Phelps (1847–1884), Francis Shurtleff Phelps (1849-1863), Mary Haight Phelps (1855–1911) who married Horatio Loomis, and Charles Pierpont Phelps (1861–1912).<ref name="Shurtleff"/>
==Legacy== ===Professorship=== In 1887, Junius Spencer Morgan endowed the Edward J. Phelps professorship at Yale University.<ref name="Swanton">{{cite news |date=March 15, 1900 |title=Edward J. Phelps, One of Vermont's Most Gifted Sons, Dies at New Haven |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/81227497/edward-phelps/ |work=Swanton Courier |location=Swanton, VT |page=4 |via=Newspapers.com}}</ref>
===Honorary degrees=== In 1870, Middlebury College awarded Phelps the honorary degree of LL.D.<ref name="Swanton"/> In 1881, he received an honorary Master of Arts from Yale University.<ref name="Swanton"/> In 1887, he received honorary LL.D. degrees from the University of Vermont and Harvard University.<ref name="Swanton"/>
===Quotes=== "The man who makes no mistakes does not usually make anything." From a speech given at the Mansion House in London on January 24, 1899, quoting Bishop W. C. Magee of Peterborough in 1868.<ref name="gigausa">{{cite web|url=http://www.giga-usa.com/quotes/authors/edward_j_phelps_a001.htm|title=Edward J. Phelps, American jurist and diplomatist}}</ref>
"Better a hundred times an honest and capable administration of an erroneous policy than a corrupt and incapable administration of a good one." Spoken at a dinner of the New York Chamber of Commerce.<ref name="gigausa"/>
==Notes== {{notelist}}
==References== {{reflist}}
==External links== {{Portal|Biography|Politics}} {{Gutenberg|no=18422|name=Modern Eloquence: Vol III, After-Dinner Speeches P-Z}}, contains the text of Phelps' 1889 farewell speech in London. *[https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_hU35umQHJAgC ''Orations & Essays of Edward John Phelps: Diplomat and Statesman''] (1901). Phelps, Edward John, and John Griffith McCullough. Published by Harper & Brothers. 475 pages *{{Find a Grave|14983596}}
{{s-start}} {{s-ppo}} {{s-bef|before=W. H. H. Bingham}} {{s-ttl|title=Democratic nominee for Governor of Vermont|years=1880}} {{s-aft|after=George W. Eaton}} {{s-end}}
{{US Ambassadors to the UK}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Phelps, Edward John}} Category:1822 births Category:1900 deaths Category:People from Middlebury, Vermont Category:Vermont Whigs Category:Vermont Democrats Category:Middlebury College alumni Category:New York (state) lawyers Category:Vermont lawyers Category:19th-century American diplomats Category:Yale Law School alumni Category:Presidents of the American Bar Association Category:Ambassadors of the United States to the United Kingdom Category:Yale Law School faculty Category:19th-century American lawyers Category:Members of the American Philosophical Society Category:American people of English descent