Matthew Deady
Matthew Paul Deady was a politician and jurist in the Oregon Territory and the state of Oregon of the United States. He served on the Oregon Supreme Court from 1853 to 1859, at which time he was appointed to the newly created federal court of the state. He served as a United States district judge of the United States District Court for the District of Oregon in Portland, as the sole Judge until his death in 1893. While on the court he presided over the trial that led to the United States Supreme Court decision of Pennoyer v. Neff concerning personal jurisdiction.
Prior to joining the court, Deady served in the legislature of the Oregon Territory, including time served as the President of the, and was elected as President of the Oregon Constitutional Convention in 1857. A native of the state of Maryland, his first profession was as a blacksmith. He also spent time as a teacher in both Ohio and Oregon. Deady read law in Ohio and practiced law for a time in that state before immigrating to the Oregon Territory via the Oregon Trail. In Oregon, he helped codify the laws of the state and assisted in the foundation of the Multnomah County Library in Portland. He also was president of the University of Oregon's board of regents. The university renamed Deady Hall in his honor after his death.
Early life
Matthew Paul Deady was born near Easton, Talbot County, Maryland, on May 12, 1824. His parents were Daniel and Mary Ann Deady.His father was born in Ireland on September 25, 1794, and married McSweeny on June 10, 1823. Matthew was the oldest of five children in the family. He began his education at the school where his father was a teacher, remaining at that school until the age of twelve. In 1828, the family relocated from the Baltimore, Maryland, area to Wheeling Virginia now. The Deadys also lived for brief periods of time in Cincinnati, Ohio and Covington, Kentucky.
In Wheeling, his father was employed as a teacher and principal at the Lancasterian Academy. On May 31, 1834, his mother died while the family was living in Wheeling. Deady's family was split up, with Matthew sent back to Baltimore for two years.
In Baltimore, he lived with an uncle and grandfather while working in a store. Deady then returned to Wheeling to live with his father while attending school and working in a local music shop. In mid-1837, he moved just across the Ohio River to the state of Ohio where his father had purchased a farm in Beaver Township.
Matthew Deady spent the next four years working for his father on the family farm, engaged in manual labor, while also reading extensively in his spare time. On February 17, 1841, he left home after a disagreement with his father and moved to Barnesville, Ohio. For four years he lived with the family of John Kelly, working as a blacksmith's apprentice.
Beginning in 1843, Deady attended Barnesville Academy, continuing his education there until four months beyond the time that his blacksmith apprenticeship ended. The apprenticeship had paid for the first six months of school. At the school he earned a certificate that allowed him to become a teacher on July 7, 1845, from his instructor Nathan R. Smith.
After graduating, Deady began teaching to pay off a debt incurred for his education, and began to read law. He read law in St. Clairsville, Ohio, under the guidance of judge and former Congressman William Kennon.
Deady passed the Ohio bar on October 26, 1847, and began practicing law in St. Clairsville at the office of Henry Kennon. He remained there until on April 17, 1849, he began his overland journey over the Oregon Trail to the newly created Oregon Territory.
Oregon
Deady originally was to travel with a government designated Indian agent and the agent's family. At Fort Leavenworth the agent remained, and Deady continued his journey in the company of a United States Army regiment bound for Fort Vancouver. Taking the Oregon Trail, he arrived where Portland, Oregon, now stands on November 14, 1849. The next day, he went to neighboring Oregon City, and then a few days later, he moved west to Lafayette, Oregon, the county seat of Yamhill County. Deady began teaching as his occupation to make ends meet. He first worked for room and board, but for the second term of the school year he was paid $75 per month.While teaching he was consulted by the county commissioner and helped to set up the courts and laws in Yamhill County. In March 1850, he began practicing law in Oregon, appearing for three cases before judge Orville C. Pratt held at a local tavern. After receiving payment for his services, he sent $100 back to Ohio to Henry Kennon to pay off some debt.
That summer he worked for Peter H. Burnett’s brother, Elder Glen Burnett, running his store while Burnett was in California acquiring supplies. While working at the store he sold many supplies to the local Native Americans and learned some Chinook jargon from them.
On June 24, 1852, Deady married Lucy A. Henderson, with whom he had three children who survived childbirth. Lucy came to Oregon in 1846 with her parents Robert Henderson and Rhoda Holman from Kentucky. The Deady's children were three sons; Edward Nesmith, Paul Robert, and Henderson Brooke. Henderson studied medicine, while Paul and Edward became attorneys like their father. Matthew Geoffrey and Mary died at birth.
While practicing law at Lafayette he represented Adam Wimple of neighboring Polk County after Wimple had been charged for murdering his wife. Deady represented him at trial and was to receive as payment Wimple's land claim via his will. Wimple was convicted of the murder and sentenced to death, but was hanged only after being recaptured from a jail break.
In 1852, Deady was among many legal minds and politicians in the territory such as Joseph C. Avery and Robert Moore that signed a petition asking Governor John P. Gaines to pardon Nimrod O'Kelly after O'Kelly's controversial conviction for the murder of Jeremiah Mahoney. O'Kelly was eventually spared from the gallows.
Political career
Deady was elected to the Oregon Territorial Legislature in 1850, where he represented Yamhill County as a Democrat in the lower chamber House of Representatives. He attended the session held in Oregon City beginning in December, where he met James W. Nesmith and Asahel Bush for the first time. Those three became influential leaders of the Democratic Party in the Oregon Territory, and later the state of Oregon. Deady was an early member of the Democratic Party in the territory.During his initial session in the territorial legislature in 1850, Deady served on the judicial committee and helped draft many of the laws in the territory. The Oregon Territory had just been created by the United States Congress in 1848, with the territorial government taking control in early 1849.
Following the 1850 to 1851 session, the secretary of the territory, Edward D. Hamilton, asked Deady to assist in publishing the laws passed by the legislature for all previous sessions of the legislative assembly. Deady helped with this process, in what became the first volume of laws published in Oregon, Deady's General Laws of Oregon.
In 1851, Deady was elected to the upper chamber Council, and the following session served as President of that chamber.
During the 1851 session he served as chairman of the council's judiciary committee. In all, Deady attended two regular sessions and one special session of the legislature from 1851 to 1853.
Territorial judicial service
In 1853, Obadiah McFadden delivered a commission from Franklin Pierce making Deady a justice of the Territorial Supreme Court. However, it was subsequently discovered that the commission named "Mordecai P. Deady"; as there was no such person, Deady withdrew from the court on the grounds that the commission was invalid, with McFadden taking his place for the remainder of the term. Historian Sidney Teiser noted contemporary speculation that both the commission and the error were the result of interference by Joseph Lane: as a result of the commission, Deady abandoned his plans to run against Lane in an upcoming election, and as a result of the commission being nullified, Lane had the opportunity to recommend someone else as Deady's replacement. Regardless, Pierce re-appointed Deady to the court in 1857.At this time justices of the court also rode circuit, presiding over trials in designated counties in addition to serving as an appellate court judge for the Supreme Court. Deady was assigned to the southern counties of the territory, holding court in each county twice per year.
During this time on the court, in the Spring of 1853, he moved south to a farm in the Umpqua River valley. After paying a squatter $100 for the land on Campas Swale, Deady filed for a land claim under the Donation Land Claim Act and moved the family there in the fall, naming it Fair Oaks. While on the court, he helped to establish the court systems in four of the counties in Southern Oregon, and traveled around each year to hold court. He won election to a full term in 1858 to take effect once Oregon became a state, but resigned before taking office in 1859.
In 1857, Deady was elected as a delegate to the Oregon Constitutional Convention. The convention was held in the territorial capital of Salem to prepare the territory for statehood. He became president of the body and was influential in shaping the new state constitution, which outlawed slavery but excluded African Americans from settling in the new state.
Deady successfully advocated for provisions in the document to set six-year terms for judges, four-year terms for state officers, and biennial sessions for the legislature. He also led the southern party, which opposed state education in all forms.
Before Secession, Deady held views that were racist and proslavery. Deady supported a constitutional provision that excluded free Blacks from the State of Oregon, a provision that won the approval of 89% percent of Oregon voters. He was paraphrased as approving the Dred Scott decision. He also reportedly advocated for discrimination towards Chinese immigrants.