PENDLETON, EDMUND (1721–1803)

Admitted to the bar in 1745, Edmund Pendleton became a justice of the peace in 1751 and a member of the Virginia House of Burgesses in 1752. He was a leader of the conservative patriot faction in Virginia and opposed patrick henry on many issues, including colonial reaction to the Stamp Act of 1765. Pendleton opposed the act and, as a justice of the peace, declared it unconstitutional, but he did not approve of Henry's famous resolutions against it. He became a member of the committee of correspondence in 1773 and a delegate to the first continental congress in 1774. Between 1774 and 1776 he was president of both the Virginia convention (the provisional legislature) and the Committee of Safety (the de facto executive). He presided over the Virginia convention of 1776 which passed the resolution Pendleton had drafted instructing Virginia's delegates to the continental congress to seek a declaration of independence, adopted the virginia declaration of rights and constitution, and appointed a committee, including Pendleton, george wythe, and thomas jefferson, to revise the state's laws. He was elected speaker of the first House of Delegates under the new constitution (1776–1777) and then appointed first presiding judge of the court of chancery (1777–1779). In 1779 he became presiding judge of the court of appeals, the state's highest court, a position he held until his death. In commonwealth v. caton (1782), he stated that laws repugnant to the state constitution were void, but he reserved the question of whether his court could so declare them.

Pendleton was unanimously chosen president of the Virginia convention of 1788 at which he argued and voted for the ratification of the constitution. He declined President george washington's offer of a federal district judgeship in order to remain on the state court. As an indication of his virtues as a judge, it is said that only one of his judicial decisions was ever reversed, and in that case he reversed himself.

Dennis J. Mahoney
(1986)