He Quit The Bench To Fight A Duel – And Killed A Sitting U.S. Senator

In 1859, which chief justice of California’s Supreme Court resigned his seat, challenged a sitting United States senator to a duel over a political grudge, and shot him dead?

Hint: Three decades later, that same man was himself gunned down — by a deputy U.S. marshal assigned to guard a Supreme Court justice he had threatened — in a killing that produced a landmark ruling on the reach of federal power.

See the answer on the next page.

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