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McLean was one of two dissenters in the Dred Scott case. He sought the Republican nomination for President in 1860, losing to Abraham Lincoln. However, he recommended to Lincoln on a number of occasions that Swayne be nominated to replace him on the court. This proved timely; McLean died shortly after Lincoln's inauguration, in April 1861. As the American Civil War began, Swayne campaigned for the vacant seat, lobbying several Ohio members of Congress for their support. As the Supreme Court media itself notes: "Swayne satisfied Lincoln's criteria for appointment: commitment to the Union, slavery opponent, geographically correct."
It is also believed that Swayne had also represented fugitive slaves in court. So eight months after McLean's death, Swayne was nominated, on January 21 1862. The nomination was confirmed by the United States Senate on January 24, 1862, with Swayne receiving his commission the same day.
In the Slaughterhouse Cases, 83 U.S. 36 (1873) -- a pivotal decision on the meaning of Section 1 of the relatively new Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution -- Swayne dissented with Justices Stephen J. Field and Joseph Bradley. Field's dissent was important, and presaged later decisions broadening the scope of the Fourteenth Amendment. However, four years later Swayne joined the majority in Munn v. Illinois, with Field and Bradley still dissenting.
Swayne's potential judicial greatness failed to materialize. He was first of President Lincoln's five appointments to the Supreme Court: Noah Hayes Swayne – 1862; Samuel Freeman Miller – 1862; David Davis – 1862; Stephen Johnson Field – 1863; and Salmon P. Chase – Chief Justice – 1864. He is also said to have been "the weakest". His main distinction was his staunch judicial support of the president's war measures: the Union blockade (Prize Cases, 67 U.S. 635 (1862)); issuance of paper money (i.e., greenbacks); and support for the presidential prerogative to declare martial law (Ex Parte Milligan, 71 U.S. 2 (1866)).
He is most famous for his majority opinion in Springer v. United States, 102 U.S. 586 (1881), which upheld the Federal income tax imposed under the Revenue Act of 1864.
In Gelpcke v. Dubuque 68 U.S. 175 (1864) Swayne wrote the majority opinion, repudiating a claim that the Iowa constitution could impair legal obligations to bondholders. When contracts are made on the basis of trust in past judicial decisions those contracts could not be impaired by any subsequent construction of the law. "We shall never immolate truth, justice, and the law, because a state tribunal has erected the altar and decreed the sacrifice." He strongly supported "the contractual rights of railroad bond holders, "even in the face of repudiation sanctioned both by the Iowa state legislature and state supreme court. Obligations sacred to law are not to be destroyed simply because 'a state tribunal has erected the altar and decreed the sacrifice.'” For a later decision on impairment of contracts, compare Lochner v. New York, 198 U.S. 45 (1905).
Swayne remained on the court until 1881, twice lobbying unsuccessfully to be elevated to the position of Chief Justice (after the death of Roger Taney in 1864 and Salmon Chase in 1873).
After his retirement, Swayne returned to Ohio.
Read more about this topic: Noah Haynes Swayne
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