CHOATE, JOSEPH HODGES 2-1917), American lawyer and diplomat, was born at Salem, Mass., on Jan. 24, 183 2. He was the son of Dr. George Choate, a physician of con siderable note, and was a nephew of Rufus Choate. After grad uating at Harvard college in 1852, and at the law school of Harvard university in 18S4, he was admitted to the bar in and in 1856 began practice in New York city. His success in his profession was immediate, and in 186o he became junior partner in the firm of Evarts, Southmayd and Choate, the senior partner in which was William M. Evarts. This firm and its successor, Evarts, Choate and Beaman, remained for many years among the leading law firms of New York and of the country, the activities of both being national rather than local. Choate was associated with many of the most famous litigations in American legal his tory, including the Tilden, A. T. Stewart and Stanford will cases, the Kansas prohibition cases, the Chinese exclusion cases, the Maynard election returns case and the income tax suit. In 1871 he became a member of the "Committee of Seventy" in New York city, which was instrumental in breaking up the "Tweed Ring," and later assisted in the prosecution of the indicted officials. In the retrial of the Gen. Fitz John Porter case he obtained a reversal of the decision of the original courtmartial. His great est reputation was won, perhaps, in cross-examination. In politics he allied himself with the Republican Party on its organization, being a frequent speaker in presidential campaigns, beginning with that of 1856. He never held political office, although he was a candidate for the Republican senatorial nomination against Sena tor Thomas C. Platt in 1897. In 1894 he was president of the New York Constitutional Convention. He was appointed by President McKinley ambassador to Great Britain to succeed John Hay in 1899, and remained in that position until 1905. In England he won great personal popularity, and accomplished much in fostering the good relations of the two great English-speaking Powers. He was one of the representatives of the United States at the second Peace Congress at The Hague in 1907. Upon the out break of the World War he ardently supported the British and Allied cause and severely criticized President Wilson's hesitation to recommend America's immediate co-operation, but shortly before his death retracted his criticism. He was chairman of the mayor's committee in New York for entertaining the British and French commissions in 1917. His death, which took place in New York on May 14, 1917, was hastened by the physical strain of his constant activities in this connection. Among his last works were Abraham Lincoln and Other Addresses in England (1910), American Addresses (1911) and The Boyhood and Youth of Joseph Hodges Choate (1917).
See The Choate Story Book (19o3) ; T. G. Strong, Joseph Choate, New Englander, New Yorker, Lawyer, Ambassador (1917) ; Joseph Choate, a Great Ambassador (1918) ; Edward Sandford Martin, The Life of Joseph H. Choate (5920); Arguments and Addresses of Joseph Hodges Choate, edit. Frederick C. Hicks, with a memorial by Elihu Root (1926) .