Joseph P. Bradley

The son of Philo Bradley and Mercy Gardner Bradley, Bradley was born to humble beginnings in Berne, New York. He was the oldest of 12 children. He attended local schools and began teaching at the age of 16. In 1833, the Dutch Reformed Church of Berne advanced Joseph Bradley $250 to study for the ministry at Rutgers University. He graduated in 1836. After graduation, he was made Principal of the Millstone Academy, and decided to study law.

He was persuaded by his Rutgers classmate Frederick Theodore Frelinghuysen to join him in Newark and pursue legal studies at the Office of the Collector of the Port of Newark. He was admitted to the bar in 1839.

Bradley began in private practice in New Jersey, specializing in patent and railroad law, and he became very prominent in these fields and quite wealthy. Bradley remained dedicated to self-study throughout his life and collected an extensive library. He married Mary Hornblower in Newark in 1844.

Bradley took a broad view of the national government's powers under the Commerce Clause but interpreted the Fourteenth Amendment somewhat narrowly, as did much of the rest of the court at the time. He authored the majority opinion in the Civil Rights Cases of 1883 but was among the four dissenters in the Slaughter-House Cases in 1873. His interpretation of the Fourteenth Amendment in both cases remained the basis for subsequent rulings through the modern era.

Bradley died in Washington, D.C., in 1892 and was interred at Mount Pleasant Cemetery in Newark, New Jersey.