Representative Richard Bennett Carmichael

Richard Bennett Carmichael (December 25, 1807 – October 21, 1884) was an American politician, jurist, and delegate to multiple Democratic National Conventions from Maryland. He was born in Centreville, Queen Anne’s County, Maryland, into a family with deep roots in the state; he was the grandnephew of William Carmichael, a noted American diplomat of the Revolutionary era. Raised on the Eastern Shore, he attended the local academy at Centreville before pursuing further education out of state.

Carmichael undertook his collegiate studies first at Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, and then at the College of New Jersey (now Princeton University), from which he graduated in 1828. After completing his formal education, he read law and prepared for the bar, reflecting the common professional pathway of early nineteenth-century American lawyers. He was admitted to the bar in 1830 and commenced the practice of law in his native Centreville, quickly establishing himself in the legal community of Queen Anne’s County.

Carmichael entered public life at a young age. He was elected to the Maryland House of Delegates in 1831, beginning what would become a long and significant career in state politics. In 1832 he was elected as a Jacksonian to the Twenty-third Congress and served as a Representative from Maryland from March 4, 1833, to March 4, 1835. During his single term in the U.S. House of Representatives, he aligned with the Jacksonian Democratic program of the era. After leaving Congress in 1835, he resumed the practice of law in Centreville while remaining active in Maryland political affairs.

Over the following decades, Carmichael continued to serve in the Maryland House of Delegates, returning to that body in 1841 and remaining a member through 1866. His extended legislative tenure spanned a period of profound national change, including the antebellum years, the Civil War, and the beginning of Reconstruction. In addition to his legislative service, he became increasingly prominent within the Democratic Party. He was chosen as a delegate to the Democratic National Conventions of 1856, 1864, 1868, and 1876, participating in the nomination processes for several presidential elections and helping to shape party policy at the national level.

Carmichael’s legal and judicial career reached its height in the late 1850s and during the Civil War. In 1858 he was appointed judge of the circuit court, and during the war he served as presiding circuit court judge for Kent, Queen Anne, Caroline, and Talbot counties on Maryland’s Eastern Shore. In 1861 he also held the position of presiding judge of the county court of Queen Anne’s County. His judicial role placed him at the center of intense political and constitutional conflict as the federal government sought to suppress dissent and secure loyalty in a border state with divided sympathies.

During the American Civil War, Carmichael became a vocal opponent of arbitrary arrests and what he regarded as violations of civil liberties by federal authorities. In November 1861, federal officials arrested three men accused of interfering with the election process after they heckled Unionists at a rally. Carmichael, objecting to such actions, instructed grand juries to indict those who made or abetted these arrests, asserting the primacy of civil law and due process. His stance drew the attention and ire of federal officials. Secretary of State William H. Seward ordered his arrest, and on May 27, 1862, Union Army General John Adams Dix issued orders to seize Carmichael, who was then suspected of being a Southern sympathizer. More than 125 deputies and soldiers surrounded the courthouse; two men entered the courtroom, seized the judge, and a man identified as John L. Bishop beat Carmichael over the head with a pistol until he was rendered unconscious. He was dragged from the courtroom and transported by steamer to Fort McHenry, where he was held for approximately six months. He was ultimately released without ever being formally charged or tried for any crime, an episode that became emblematic of the tensions between civil authority and military power in wartime Maryland.

After the Civil War, Carmichael remained influential in the reordering of Maryland’s political and legal framework. In 1867 he served as a member and president of the Maryland State constitutional convention, which was convened to replace the wartime constitution and to address the state’s postwar governance and legal structure. His leadership at the convention reflected both his long experience in public life and his continued commitment to civil law and constitutional processes. Following this period, he gradually withdrew from the front rank of public affairs, returning to his legal practice and to private life on the Eastern Shore.

Richard Bennett Carmichael died on October 21, 1884, at “Wye,” near Carmichael, Maryland, an estate associated with his family. He was interred in the family burying ground at “Wye,” in Queen Anne’s County. His career, spanning service in the Maryland House of Delegates, the U.S. Congress, the state judiciary, and multiple national party conventions, left a distinct imprint on Maryland’s political and legal history in the mid-nineteenth century.