Philip Phillips (lawyer)

Philip Phillips (December 17, 1807–January 14,1884) was a lawyer and politician from the U.S. states of South Carolina and Alabama. He served in the United States House of Representatives from 1853 to 1855 representing the first congressional district of Alabama.

Family and Early Life

He was born into a Jewish family in Charleston, South Carolina, the son of Aaron Pfeiffer from Ansbach, Bavaria who changed his name to Phillips when he immigrated around 1800. The family were members of the Beth Eliohim Congregation in Charleston and in 1825 Aaron Phillips was the first President of the Reformed Society of Israelites, early leaders in the Jewish Reform movement. Philip Phillips' mother, Caroline, was the daughter of Marks Lazarus, a veteran of Fort Moultrie, the siege of Savannah and the siege of Charleston in the American Revolution and later a British prisoner of war.

Philip Phillips was educated at the Middletown Military Academy in Middletown, Connecticut where he was a roommate of Thomas Hart Seymour, later the "hero of Chapultepec," Governor of Connecticut, Ambassador to Russia, and opponent of military action against the South. He returned to Charleston in 1825 and studied law under John Gadsden, the U.S. District Attorney, and was admitted to the South Carolina Bar in 1829. He then began his legal practice at the town of Cheraw, South Carolina, living with his uncle, Joshua Lazarus.

From Cheraw, he rode the Circuit of the local Courthouses, becoming the partner of John Coit. During the controversy in South Carolina regarding the Tariff of 1832, he was among the leaders in rallying what is now known as Chesterfield County to the Union cause, in opposition to nullification. He was a member of the Nullification Convention in the Nullification Crisis of 1832 and continued to represent Chesterfield County in the South Carolina General Assembly in 1834-5.

In 1835, he began the practice of law at Mobile, Alabama, at a time when many South Carolinians were moving to that state. A year later, he returned to Charleston to marry Eugenia Levy. He was elected to the Alabama Legislature in 1844 and was Chairman of the Committee on Federal Relations. In 1840 and 1846 he published a digest of the decisions of the Supreme Court of Alabama, and in 1849 he was elected Chairman of the State Convention called for the purpose of promoting internal improvements.

Civil War

He was a delegate to the 1852 Democratic National Convention at Baltimore, Maryland and gave a speech in support of Franklin Pierce who received the nomination. In 1853 he was elected to the 33rd U.S. House of Representatives. There he was largely responsible for the final drafting of the portion of the notorious Kansas-Nebraska Act that specified the repeal of the Missouri Compromise of 1820. There is an excellent discussion of his role in this event in "The Road to Disunion" by William W. Freehling, p. 550-556

He declined reelection to Congress but remained at Washington, DC and continued his legal practice there. When the Civil War began he, being a Unionist, attempted to remain in Washington. However, his wife and daughters were quite obviously Southern sympathizers, and in August 1861, soldiers entered his house, inspected his papers, arrested his family, and imprisoned them at the home of Rose Greenhow. Fortunately, he had previously secured the friendship of Edwin M. Stanton, later Secretary of War, who aided by other prominent Union leaders, arranged for their parole and departure from Washington. After visiting in Richmond briefly, they passed on to the expected safety of New Orleans.

Within a few months, New Orleans was captured by David Farragut and Benjamin Butler. Soon his wife, Eugenia, was accused of failing to show proper respect to a soldier's passing funeral cortege, and was arrested again and sent to Ship Island for three months. Upon her release in October 1862, they again secured permission to leave Union-held territory and purchased a small house at La Grange, Georgia, where they lived for the remainder of the war.

Afterwards, the family remained at La Grange while he attempted to begin his practice, first at New Orleans and finally at Washington in 1867. In Washington he gradually became one of the leaders of the Bar (law), drawing most of his clients from the South. He generally practiced as a lawyer's lawyer, almost entirely before the U. S. Supreme Court, and appeared in over 400 cases.

Legacy

He had a solid reputation as a thoughtful moderate among the leading national figures of his day and being a Southern Unionist had the opportunity, according to at least one biographer, to have had a career more along the lines of that of Andrew Johnson. This was of course complicated by his religion and made impossible by the unrestrained activities of his wife.

References

• . ISBN 0-19-505814-3 (v.1). {{cite book}}: Missing or empty |title= (help); Unknown parameter |Author= ignored (|author= suggested) (help); Unknown parameter |Publisher= ignored (|publisher= suggested) (help); Unknown parameter |Title= ignored (|title= suggested) (help); Unknown parameter |Year= ignored (|year= suggested) (help)

• . ISBN 0-8173-0576-9. {{cite book}}: Missing or empty |title= (help); Unknown parameter |Author= ignored (|author= suggested) (help); Unknown parameter |Publisher= ignored (|publisher= suggested) (help); Unknown parameter |Title= ignored (|title= suggested) (help); Unknown parameter |Year= ignored (|year= suggested) (help)

• . ISBN 1-57003-363-3. {{cite book}}: Missing or empty |title= (help); Unknown parameter |Author= ignored (|author= suggested) (help); Unknown parameter |Publisher= ignored (|publisher= suggested) (help); Unknown parameter |Title= ignored (|title= suggested) (help); Unknown parameter |Year= ignored (|year= suggested) (help)

• Template:Journal reference