Presidents Thomas Jefferson and James Madison Appoint the Marshal for the District of New York

A rare early Marshal’s appointment

President Washington considered the several offices created by the Judiciary Act of 1789 of premier importance to the new nation. “Impressed with a conviction that the due administration of justice is the firmest pillar of good Government,” he wrote Attorney General Edmund Randolph on September 28, four days after signing the Act into law, “I have considered the first arrangement of the Judicial department as essential to the happiness of our Country, and to the stability of its political system; hence the selection of the fittest characters to expound the laws, and dispense justice, has been an invariable object of my anxious concern.” The Supreme Court Justices, the Attorney General, the district court judges and attorneys, the court clerks, and the United States Marshals would define, administer, and enforce the growing body of federal laws. By their actions, these men would determine the boundary between federal authority and local autonomy.

Marshal’s appointments are very uncommon. We were unable to find one having reached the market from the Jefferson administration.

Peter Curtenius was a prominent New Yorker and son of Peter T. Curtenius, member of the New York Committee of Correspondence and Revolution era Commissary General.

Document signed, Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, Washington, January 16, 1807. “Know Ye, That reposing special Trust and Confidence in the Integrity, Ability, and Diligence of Peter Curtenius of New York, I have nominated, and by and with the advice and Consent of the Senate, do appoint him Marshal in and for the New York District….”