Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 14.djvu/499

 TANGUAY

443

TANIS

vate Bchools and by tutors until 15 yeara old, when he entered Dickinson College, Carlisle, Pennsylvania. He obtained his B. A. in 1795, and in the spring of 1796 went to Annapolis to read law in the office of Jeremiah Townley Chase, one of the chief justices of the General Court of Maryland. Early in 1799 he was admitted to the bar. Returning to his father's home in Calvert County to practice his profession, he shortly afterwards was elected to the House of Delegates, being then scarcely twenty -three years ot age and the youngest member of the Assembly. In March, ISOl, he went to Frederick to establisli himself better in his legal practice, having been defeated for re-election to the Legisla- ture from Calvert County. He wiis a candidate for member of the House of Delegates from Frederick county in 1803 on the Federal ticket, but, the county being strongly Republican, he was again defeated. On 7 January, 1806, he married Anne Phoebe Charl- ton Key, only daughter of John Ross Key, and sister of Francis Scott Key, a law student with Taney, at Annapolis, who afterwards wrote the "Star-spangled Banner".

When General Wilkinson, then Commander-in- Chief of the United States Army, was tried before a court martial, convened at Frederick in 1811, on charges of being an accomphce of Aaron Burr, Taney was one of the counsel in his defence, and, together with John Hanson Thomas, succeeded in winning his acquittal. Both refused any fee for their service be- cause they had shared the suspicion against the ac- cused. Taney was defeated on the Federal ticket for member of the House of Representatives of the United States, but in 1816 was elected to the state Senate. At the March term, 1819, of the Frederick County Court, he successfully defended Jacob Gruber, a Methodist minister, who was indicted for inciting slaves to the disturbance of the peace of the state. In 1823, he moved to Baltimore, and was soon recog- nized as the leading lawyer of that city, being ap- pointed in 1827 by Governor Kent as Attorney-Gen- eral of Maryland, upon the unanimous recommen- dation of the Baltimore bar. President Andrew Jackson, a warm admirer of Taney, appointed him Attorney-General of the United States on 21 June, 1831, and, upon the refusal of William J. Duane, Sec- retary of the Treasury, to remove the government deposits from the United States Bank, the president removed Duane from office on 23 Sept., 1833, and, on the same day, appointed Taney in his stead. The latter assumed the duties of the secretaryship on the following day, and two days later gave the order for the removal of the deposits to take effect on the first of October following. His appointment to the office of Secret ary of the Treasury having been made during a recess of Congress, his nomination was sent to the Senate by the president on 23 June, 1834, and was rejected after a heated debate. This was the first time in the history of the Government that a cabinet officer appointed by a jiresident had been rejected. Taney immediately submitted his resignation to President Jackson, and the latter accejited it with much regret. Judge ( lahriel Duvall of Maryland, an associate justice of the Siijircnic Court of the United States, resigned in 1S3."), and President Jack.son nom- inated Taney in his stead, but the nomination was not brought up in the Senate imtil the end of the session, and was then indefinitely po.stponed, which amounted to a rejection. This was due to the fact that the Senate as then con.stituted was violently opposed on political grounds to the president. In the same year Jackson again named Taney for a place on the Su- preme Bench, this time as Chief Justice Marshall's successor. The nomination was strongly opposed by Senators Webster and Clay, but was finally con- firmed on 15 March, 1836, by a majority of fourteen votes.

In the outbreak of yellow fever of 1855, Justice Taney's wife, who never became a Catholic, was stricken and died at Old Point Comfort on 29 Sep- tember, and their youngest child died the following day. The most famous case decided by the Supreme Court during Chief Justice Taney's incumbency was that of Dred Scott v. John F. A. Sanford, the opin- ion in which, delivered by Taney, has been much mis- quoted and misunderstood. Chief Justice Taney did much towards the building up of the system of prac- tice in the Supreme Court, framing it after that of the English courts, yet so modified as to be adaptable to the changed conditions existing in the United States. His opinions were arrived at rather by deep reflection and apphcation of cstablislicd legal jirinciples to the questions presented to him llian llirough exhaustive research of authorities. While giving due respect to former dei-i.sidns, he did not rely slavishly upon prece- dents. By his dignified, though kindly, bearing, he always commanded the utmost respect for his Court. He had few, if any, personal enemies, and the purity of his private life was never questioned, even by his political opponents. Early in life he manumitted the slaves inherited from his father, and as long as they lived, he provided for the older ones by monthly pen- sions. He was buried at Frederick by the side of his motlier's grave, in accordance with his own request. There is a handsome statue of him in Mount Vernon Place, Baltimore.

Van .Sandvoort, Lives of the Chief Justices, (2 vols., Albany, 1822); Tyler, Memoir of Roger Brooke Taney (Baltimore, 1872); Southern Library Messenger, IV (Richniond, 1838), 348; Na- tional Quarterly Review, X (New York, 1864), .M; The Catholic World. LXVIII (New York, 1898), 396; The Green Bag, XIV (New York, 1902), 559.

J. P. W. McNeal.

Tanguay, Cyprien, genealogist, b. at Quebec, 1819; d. 1902. After a course of classics and theology at Quebec Seminary, he was ordained in 1843. The first twenty-two years of his priesthood were devoted to parochial work, especially at Rimouski, where he greatly contributed to the foundation of the future diocesan seminary. His early taste for genealogical studies fully manifested itself after his official ap- pointment to the Dominion Statistics Department (1867). His whole time was henceforth spent in consulting and compiling parochial and historical records throughout Quebec, the Maritime Provinces, Ontario, and the old French settlements in the United States. He also twice visited France for the same purpose. As the result of his labours he pub- lished (1871-90) his " Dictionnaire g^ndalogique des families canadiennes frangaises depuis les origines de la colonic jusqu'^ nos jours", comprising seven large double column volumes of over six hundred pages: a colossal undertaking, fit for a numerous body of collaborators, which he achieved alone. Although he was unable to realize the latter part of his pro- gramme entirely and many inaccuracies have crept into his work, yet on the whole it is highly reliable and almost unique. Every French Canadian by completing from contemporary registers the informa- tion supplied by this dictionary can proudly trace back his genealogy to his ancestors from old France. It has proved valuable for the discovery of canonical impediments to marriage through relationship, and has given birth to a copious genealogical literature of less comprehensiveness. In recognition of his labours the author received a prelature from Leo XIII (1887). He likewise pubhshed " Repertoire du clerg6 canadien-frangais" (1868) and "A travers les registres" (1886).

MchEAti-KosE, Canadian Biography (ToToato, 1886); Allaire, Diet, hiog, du ciergS ranadien-fran^ia (Montreal, 1910).

Lionel Lindsay.

Tanis, a titular see, suffragan of Pelusium in Au- gustamnica Prima, capital of the fourteenth district