Asa P. French
| Asa P. French | |
|---|---|
 | |
| United States Attorney for the District of Massachusetts | |
|
In office 1906–1914 | |
| Preceded by | Melvin O. Adams |
| Succeeded by | George Weston Anderson |
| Personal details | |
| Born |
January 29, 1860[1] Braintree, Massachusetts United States |
| Died |
September 17, 1935 (aged 75)[1] Wellesley, Massachusetts United States |
| Resting place | Central Cemetery, Randolph, Massachusetts |
| Nationality | American |
| Political party | Republican |
| Spouse(s) | Elisabeth Ambrose Wales |
| Residence | Randolph, Massachusetts[2] |
| Alma mater | Yale University[2] |
| Occupation | Attorney |
Asa Palmer French (January 29, 1860 – September 17, 1935)[3][4] was an American attorney who served as the United States Attorney for the District of Massachusetts from 1906 to 1914.[1]
French was born on January 29, 1860. His father was a Commissioner of the Court of Alabama Claims. In 1882 French graduated from Yale University, where he served on the tenth editorial board of The Yale Record[5] and was a member of Skull and Bones.[3] He subsequently studied law at Boston University.[2]
In 1896 he came to prominence as court appointed junior counsel for Thomas M. Bram, who was tried (and ultimately convicted, then pardoned) for a triple axe murder committed on the high seas.[4]
From 1901 to 1906 French was the District Attorney for the Southeastern District of Massachusetts.[2] In 1905 he was an unsuccessful candidate for the Republican nomination for Massachusetts Attorney General.[6] In 1906 he was appointed by President Theodore Roosevelt to serve as the United States Attorney for the District of Massachusetts. He was re-appointed by President William Howard Taft in 1910 and remained U.S. Attorney until 1 November 1914 when he resigned to enter private practice.[2]
In 1916 he testified before the United States Senate during the confirmation hearings of United States Supreme Court nominee Louis Brandeis. Of Brandeis, French said: "Mr. Brandeis has, in my experience, the reputation of being a man of integrity, a man of honor, a man who is conscientiously striving for what he believes to be right".[2]
French was elected to serve as a member of the Massachusetts Constitutional Convention of 1917, representing the Massachusetts Fourteenth Congressional District. [7]
In 1920 French was a counsel for the complainants in a $150,000,000 suit against William Rockefeller and other former directors of the New York, New Haven & Hartford Railroad. He split a fee of more than $800,000 with four other lawyers.[4]
French died on November 17, 1935.[1]
References
- 1 2 3 4 "French, Asa Palmer". PoliticalGraveyard.com. The Political Graveyard. Retrieved 6 September 2011.
- 1 2 3 4 5 6 Nomination of Louis D. Brandeis: hearings before the subcommittee of the Committee on the judiciary, United States Senate, sixty-fourth Congress, first session, on the nominationof Louis D. Brandeis to be an associate justice of the Supreme court of the United States. 1916. pp. 769–770.
- 1 2 Obituary Record of Graduates of Yale University Deceased during the Year 1935-1936, New Haven, Connecticut: Yale University Press, 1935/6, pp. 23–4 Check date values in:
|date=(help) - 1 2 3 "Asa Palmer French, Leader of Bar, Dies", The New York Times (New York, New York), 18 September 1935
- ↑ "Record Editors". The Yale Banner. New Haven: Thomas Penney and G. D. Pettee. 1877. p. 182.
- ↑ Speech of Dist. Atty. Asa P. French: candidate for the Republican nomination for attorney general, at the summer outing of the Norfolk Club, Hotel Pemberton, Hull, 15 July 1905. 1905.
- ↑ Bridgman, Arthur Milnor (1919), A Souvenir of the Massachusetts Constitutional Convention, Boston, 1917-1919, Stoughton, MA: A. M. (Arthur Milnor) Bridgman, p. 72.