Samuel Chase (1741-1811), American politician and member of the early U.S. Supreme Court, was the most controversial of the founders of the American Republic.

Samuel Chase was born on April 17, 1741, in Somerset County, Md. He was educated, primarily in the classics, by his father, the Rev. Thomas Chase, until 1759, when he began the study of law; 2 years later he was admitted to practice. In 1762 he married Anne Baldwin. He was a member of the assembly (1764-1784) from Annapolis, where he resided until moving to Baltimore (1786).

A Force for Independence

An early and active opponent of the British crown, Chase led the tumultuous demonstrations of the Sons of Liberty against the Stamp Act. After the Boston Tea Party controversy in 1774, he was a member of the Maryland Committee of Correspondence and a delegate to the First Continental Congress. The following year he returned to Philadelphia for the Second...