Job Durfee

Job Durfee (September 20, 1790 – July 26, 1847) was a Rhode Island politician, jurist, and author who served in the United States House of Representatives and later as chief justice of the Rhode Island Supreme Court. He was born at Tiverton, Rhode Island, in what was then a largely rural coastal community, and spent most of his life closely associated with his native town. Raised in an environment shaped by New England’s religious and civic traditions, he developed early interests in classical learning and public affairs that would inform both his legal career and his later literary and philosophical writings.

Durfee pursued higher education at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, then a leading institution in the region, and graduated in 1813. Following his graduation, he studied law, was admitted to the bar, and commenced practice in Tiverton. His legal work quickly brought him into contact with local political and commercial interests at a time when Rhode Island was beginning to experience the early stages of industrial and social change. The combination of legal training, classical education, and engagement with local issues helped prepare him for a career that would span state politics, national legislative service, and high judicial office.

Durfee entered public life as a member of the Rhode Island House of Representatives, serving from 1816 to 1820. During this period he participated in state legislative affairs in the aftermath of the War of 1812, when questions of commerce, infrastructure, and political realignment were prominent. His work in the General Assembly established his reputation as a capable legislator and aligned him with the national currents that were reshaping the old party system of the early republic.

In national politics, Durfee was elected as a Democratic-Republican to the Seventeenth Congress and was reelected as an Adams-Clay Republican to the Eighteenth Congress, serving in the U.S. House of Representatives from March 4, 1821, to March 3, 1825. His congressional service coincided with the so‑called “Era of Good Feelings” and the emergence of the Adams-Clay faction that favored internal improvements and a stronger national role in economic development. Although specific details of his committee assignments and floor activity are less fully documented, his alignment with the Adams-Clay Republicans placed him among those New England representatives who supported a nationalist program in the wake of the decline of the Federalist Party. He was an unsuccessful candidate for reelection in 1824 to the Nineteenth Congress and again for election in 1828 to the Twenty-first Congress, reflecting the increasingly competitive and factionalized politics of the Jacksonian era.

After leaving Congress, Durfee returned to state politics and to his legal practice. He was again a member of the Rhode Island House of Representatives from 1826 to 1829, and during this second period of legislative service he held the influential position of speaker of the house from 1827 to 1829. As speaker, he presided over the lower chamber during years when Rhode Island confronted questions of economic development and political representation that would later culminate in broader debates over constitutional reform. At the conclusion of his term as speaker, he declined to be a candidate for reelection and resumed the full-time practice of law, further consolidating his standing in the Rhode Island bar.

Durfee’s judicial career began in May 1833, when he was elected associate justice of the Rhode Island Supreme Court. In June 1835 he was elevated to chief justice, a position he held until his death in 1847. As chief justice, he presided over a court that dealt with issues arising from Rhode Island’s evolving commercial life and from tensions over suffrage and governance that would soon lead to the Dorr Rebellion. Among the most notable proceedings over which he presided was the trial of John Gordon, the last person executed in Rhode Island. The Gordon case, involving a controversial conviction for murder, later became a focal point in discussions of capital punishment and judicial fairness in the state, and Durfee’s role as presiding judge has remained a significant part of his historical legacy.

In addition to his legal and political work, Durfee was an active and ambitious writer, contributing to the intellectual life of Rhode Island and New England. He was the author of What Cheer, a poem in nine cantos, an extended historical and philosophical work that drew on the early history of Rhode Island and the figure of Roger Williams to explore themes of liberty, conscience, and civilization. He also delivered an oration titled The Influences of Scientific Discovery and Invention on Social and Political Progress, or Roger Williams in Exile (1843), which he published under the pseudonym “Theaptes.” In this address he examined the relationship between scientific advancement and political development, reflecting his belief that intellectual and technological progress shaped the destiny of free societies. In 1846 he published a philosophical work entitled The Panidea, in which he attempted to construct a comprehensive system of thought uniting metaphysics, history, and moral philosophy, illustrating his wide-ranging interests beyond law and politics.

Durfee’s writings attracted attention both during his lifetime and shortly after his death. In 1848 a Discourse on the Character and Writings of Chief Justice Durfee was published in Providence by George Gibbs (often cited as Gibson), assessing his contributions as a jurist and man of letters. The following year, in 1849, Complete Works of Job Durfee, with a Memoir of his Life was issued in Providence, edited by his son, preserving his poetry, orations, and philosophical essays for a wider readership. These posthumous publications helped secure his reputation as one of Rhode Island’s more reflective and literary public figures of the early nineteenth century.

Job Durfee died in Tiverton, Rhode Island, on July 26, 1847, while still serving as chief justice of the Rhode Island Supreme Court. He was interred in the family burying ground at Quaker Neck, near Tiverton, a resting place that underscored his lifelong connection to the community in which he was born. His career, spanning state and national legislative service, high judicial office, and significant literary and philosophical production, placed him among the prominent Rhode Island figures of his generation whose work bridged the worlds of law, politics, and letters in the early United States.