Joseph Casey

Who was Joseph Casey?

Joseph Casey was a Whig member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Pennsylvania.

Joseph Casey was born at Ringgold Manor, Maryland. He studied law in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, was admitted to the bar in 1838 and commenced practice in Bloomfield, Pennsylvania. He moved to New Berlin, Pennsylvania, and resumed the practice of law.

Casey was elected as a Whig to the Thirty-first Congress. He declined to be a candidate for renomination in 1850. In 1856, he was appointed reporter of the decisions of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, which position he held until 1861. He was appointed in 1861 by President Abraham Lincoln as one of the judges of the United States Court of Claims. Upon the reorganization of that court in 1863, he was appointed chief justice and was the first person to serve in that capacity, holding the position until December 1870, when he resigned. He was engaged in the practice of law in Washington, D.C., until his death in 1879. Interment in Oak Hill Cemetery.