Luke Fox (judge)
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Biography
He was born in County Leitrim, the fifth son of Michael Fox of Tully, a small landowner, and Margaret Coane.[1] Fox was privately educated by a Dr. Armstrong. He graduated from Trinity College Dublin in 1779 and entered Lincoln's Inn in 1781. His father was not a rich man, and had a large family to support, and Luke paid his way through university by giving private tuition lessons. He was called to the Irish Bar in 1784 and practised on the north-western circuit. He was an excellent lawyer. He joined the Whig Club and wrote political pamphlets for the Whig Party.
In 1790 he made an extremely advantageous marriage to Anne, daughter of Richard Annesley and Mary Tottenham, and niece of Charles Loftus, 1st Marquess of Ely.[1] They had three children, including Michael who married Katherine Bushe, daughter of Charles Kendal Bushe, Lord Chief Justice of Ireland. He had a townhouse on Harcourt Street in central Dublin and a country residence at Trimleston near Clonskeagh, now a suburb in South Dublin.[1]
MP and judge
Through Lord Ely's patronage he entered the Irish House of Commons as MP for Fethard, and later sat for Clonmines and then for Mullingar.[1] He and Ely later quarrelled over his initial attitude to the Act of Union 1800, which was ambiguous. He later became a strong supporter of the Union, and in the last stages of the passing of the Bill for the Union, his services were of such value to the Crown that he was among the first barristers to be appointed to the bench after the Union.[2]
His conduct after that seemed to be specially designed to irritate the Government: apart from his extraordinary behaviour on circuit in 1803, which led to the attempt to remove him from office, he was often absent from duty in England for months on end.[2] He also applied for compensation for the delay in issuing his patent.[2]
He died suddenly three years after his retirement, at Harrogate. His widow married Thomas West in 1831.[1]
Character
Fox was a superb advocate, but notoriously bad-tempered, and so untrustworthy that it was said that "Fox" was the perfect name for him.[2] Daniel O'Connell described him as "morose, sour and impetuous",[3] while another critical witness described him as "vulgar, coarse, harsh and cunning". He was a firm believer in judicial independence. His strange conduct while on the North-West circuit in 1803, which led to his abortive impeachment, is difficult to explain, even allowing for his hot temper: Ball states that he "lost his head completely". He was accused of partisan political motives; on the other hand, as Ball remarks,[4] the Robert Emmet rising and the murder of the Lord Chief Justice of Ireland, Arthur Wolfe, 1st Viscount Kilwarden, had left the whole judiciary in an extremely agitated state, and better-tempered men than Fox were behaving strangely.[4]
The Juverna affair
Fox's eventual acquittal on the charges of misconduct did not redeem his reputation with his colleagues, many of whom thought him unfit for office. It is significant that when in 1803 a series of scurrilous attacks on the Irish Government were published by the radical English journalist William Cobbett by a writer using the pen-name "Juverna", who from the internal evidence can only have been a senior Irish judge, Fox was immediately suspected of being the author, despite his vehement denials.[4] In fact, the author was another High Court judge, Robert Johnson, who after a long delay was prosecuted and convicted of seditious libel, and forced to retire under threat of being removed from office.[4] Fox managed with some difficulty to convince his colleagues of his innocence, but he could not alter their low opinion of him.[5]
References
- ^ a b c d e Ball, F. Elrington The Judges in Ireland 1221-1921 John Murray London 1926 p. 331
- ^ a b c d Ball p.236
- ^ Geoghegan, Patrick M. (2010). King Dan: the rise of Daniel O'Connell, 1775-1829. Gill and Macmillan. p. 64.
- ^ a b c d Ball p.245-6
- ^ Nash, Michael L. The Removal of Judges Under the Act of Settlement 1701 Glion Institute of Higher Education 2007
Sources
- Volcansek, Mary L. (1996). Judicial Misconduct: A Cross-National Comparison. Gainesville, Fla.: University Press of Florida. ISBN 0-8130-1421-2.
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