ELLSWORTH, OLIVER

born April 29, 1745, Windsor, Conn. died Nov. 26, 1807, Windsor American lawyer, politician, and diplomat and third chief justice of the United States (17961800), who is best remembered as the coauthor (with Roger Sherman) of the Connecticut Compromise (1787), concerning representation in the two houses of Congress, and as the chief author of the Judiciary Act of 1789, establishing the federal court system. From 1775 Ellsworth built a practice in Hartford, Conn. (The future lexicographer Noah Webster read law in his office.) He served in the Continental Congress (177783), on the Connecticut governor's council (178084), and on the state Superior Court (178489). In 1789 Ellsworth became one of Connecticut's first two U.S. senators and the acknowledged Federalist leader in the Senate. He was a principal draftsman of the conference report on the first 12 proposed amendments to the Constitution (accepted by Congress in September 1789; 10 amendmentsthe Bill of Rightswere ratified by the states and became effective in December 1791). Ellsworth was commissioned as chief justice on March 4, 1796. While presiding over the U.S. Circuit Court for Connecticut, he ruled, in United States v. Isaac Williams (1799), that a U.S. citizen could not expatriate himself without the consent of the government. He resigned late in 1800 because his health had been permanently impaired on an arduous trip to France to negotiate a treaty.