29 Facts About Gabriel Duvall

Gabriel Duvall was an American politician and jurist.

Previously, Gabriel Duvall was the Comptroller of the Treasury, a Maryland state court judge, a member of the US House of Representatives from Maryland, and a Maryland state legislator.

Whether Duvall is deserving of the title of "the most insignificant" justice in the history of the US Supreme Court has been the subject of much academic interest, most notably a debate between University of Chicago Law Professors David P Currie and Frank H Easterbrook in 1983.

Gabriel Duvall was born in Prince George's County in the Province of Maryland, as the sixth child of Benjamin Duvall and his wife Susanna Tyler, both descendants of Mareen Duvall, Gabriel was born and raised on land that would eventually become known as Marietta.

Gabriel Duvall read law to enter the bar in Prince George's County in 1778, and practiced in Anne Arundel and Prince George's County at least part-time until 1823.

Gabriel Duvall was an Anglican and maintained pews both at St Anne's Church, Annapolis, and his family's longstanding parish in Prince George's County, Holy Trinity Episcopal Church, Collington, originally a chapel of ease known as Henderson's Chapel for St Barnabas' Episcopal Church, Leeland.

Gabriel Duvall married his second wife, Jane Gibbon Gabriel Duvall, daughter of sea captain James Gibbon and Mary Gibbon.

Gabriel Duvall met Jane at the boarding house during his federal service in Philadelphia.

Jane Duvall died in 1834 and Gabriel Duvall died in 1844, both at Marietta.

The Gabriel Duvall family enslaved anywhere from nine to forty people at their tobacco plantation, Marietta, between 1783 and 1864, including multiple generations of the Duckett, Butler, Jackson, and Brown families at Marietta.

Gabriel Duvall was a clerk for the Maryland Council of Safety from 1775 to 1777, and for the Maryland House of Delegates from 1777 to 1781.

Gabriel Duvall served in the American Revolutionary War, first as a mustermaster and commissary of stores in 1776, then as a private in the Maryland militia, where he fought in the Battle of Brandywine and in Morristown, New Jersey.

Gabriel Duvall was a commissioner to preserve confiscated British property from 1781 to 1782, then a member of Maryland's Governor's Council from 1782 to 1785.

Gabriel Duvall was elected to the Maryland House of Delegates, serving there from 1787 to 1794.

Gabriel Duvall was then Chief Justice of the Maryland General Court from 1796 to 1802, and was the first US Comptroller of the Treasury from 1802 to 1811.

Paradoxically, Gabriel Duvall fought against the petition of freedom filed by Thomas and Sarah Butler, whose family Gabriel Duvall enslaved at Marietta.

On November 15,1811, Gabriel Duvall was nominated by President James Madison to an associate justice seat on the Supreme Court of the United States vacated by fellow Marylander Samuel Chase.

Gabriel Duvall was confirmed by the United States Senate on November 18,1811, and received his commission the same day.

Gabriel Duvall was sworn into office on November 23,1811, and served on the Court until January 14,1835.

The one time when Gabriel Duvall dissented was in the case of Mima Queen and Child vs Hepburn where he was the sole dissenting justice in a case that ruled whether the daughter of an ex-slave could provide hearsay evidence that her mother was free at the time of her birth.

Gabriel Duvall remained on the US Supreme Court until retiring shortly after his 82nd birthday.

In Crowell v McFadon, Duvall reversed a trover judgment from the Massachusetts courts against a federal customs collector enforcing the Embargo Act of 1807.

Gabriel Duvall executed a deed in payment of a debt that she had contracted for herself.

Gabriel Duvall held that her second marriage was invalid because she had only been abandoned for five years, rather than the requisite seven years, and that no contract signed by her in the absence of her first husband could be valid.

In Dartmouth College, Gabriel Duvall issued his sole "opinion" in a constitutional case.

Gabriel Duvall lived for a decade after his wife's death and his own retirement.

Gabriel Duvall died, aged 91, in Prince George's County, Maryland and was buried in the family cemetery at Wigwam, one of the plantations he owned.

At his death, Gabriel Duvall enslaved 39 enslaved men, women, and children, and owned approximately $14,000 in bank stock, 528 volumes of law books, 400 books on other subjects, in addition to 700 acres of real estate in Prince George's County, and other property.

Gabriel Duvall's remains were reinterred on Marietta House Museum's grounds circa 1987, as were other family graves endangered by development in the area.