This essay examines the public career of James Iredell, who was probably Revolutionary-era North Carolina’s most influential propagandist. His first published essay, which appeared in September 1773, defended the jurisdiction of colonial courts in the foreign attachment controversy, and he was one of the first Whig writers to reject the sovereignty of Parliament in America. During the Revolution, Iredell continued to write on behalf of the American cause, but financial woes limited his political activities. During the debate over the ratification of the Constitution, however, Iredell emerged as one of North Carolina’s most energetic Federalists, and George Washington rewarded him with an appointment to the United States Supreme Court. Like many southern Federalists, Iredell supported the new government, but was wary of pushing federal power too far, and in his best known opinion, a dissent in Chisholm v. Georgia (1793), he argued that a state could not be sued in federal court without its consent.
Case of Misplaced Technology
