Charles Mason

This Record of the Week features Charles Mason, who served as Chief Justice of the Iowa Territorial Supreme Court from 1838 and as the first Chief Justice of the State Supreme Court until he resigned in June 1847.

Above is Charles Mason's patent for the Southwest quarter of Section 19 in Township 69 North Range 2 West of the Fifth Principal Meridian.

Born October 24, 1804, in Onondaga County, New York. He graduated from West Point Military Academy in 1829, at the head of his class which famously included Robert E. Lee and Jefferson Davis.

He wrote the first opinion of the Supreme Court in 1839, while Iowa was still a territory. This was the case of a former slave named Ralph. In this case, it was ruled that a slave brought into the free territory of Iowa would become a free man. The ruling set the precedent that no individual could ever be held in involuntary servitude in the territory of Iowa, regardless of their place and position of origin.

Justice Mason was a member of the Code Commission of 1851 and represented Iowa in the Missouri boundary dispute. He later became the United States Commissioner of Patents, and a director of the Smithsonian Institution and the Naval Observatory. Mason also introduced the system which would later become the United States Weather Bureau. He died in Burlington, Iowa, February 22, 1882.

Mason was involved in Iowa's government before and after Iowa achieved statehood. He was able to witness Iowa's ascension from territory to state. Learn more about the process below.