ROSSLYN, ALEXANDER WEDDERBURN, 1ST EARL OF ( 1 733-1805 ) , Lord Chancellor of Great Britain, was the eldest son of Peter Wedderburn (a lord of session as Lord Chesterhall), and was born in East Lothian on Feb. 13, 1733. He was educated at Edinburgh university and entered the Inner Temple in 1753. It was always his intention to practise at the English bar, but in deference to his father's wishes he qualified as an advocate in Edinburgh in 1754, and practised there for three years. In following a quarrel with Lockhart, then dean of faculty, he left the Scottish bar, and was called at the Inner Temple. He engaged Thomas Sheridan and Macklin to teach him oratory and to elimi nate his native accent. His countrymen, Lords Bute and Mans field, were also useful to him, and it was he who suggested to Bute a pension for Dr. Johnson. Bute's influence got him into parlia ment in 1761, and he took silk in 1763. In 1767 he married an heiress. His political career after this is complicated in the extreme. In i 768 he was a Tory, but next year he resigned his seat over the Wilkes business, thereby winning enormous popularity in the country, and getting a pocket-borough from Clive in 177o. His new associates, however, distrusted him, and with reason ; in January 1771 he deserted to the North ministry and was made solicitor-general. As Junius said "there is something about him which even treachery cannot trust." Throughout the American war he savagely attacked the colonies, and in 1778 he was made attorney-general. In i78o he became Chief Justice of the Common
Pleas with the title of Baron Loughborough. During North and Fox's coalition he was a commissioner of the great seal, and ap pears as leader of the Whigs in the Lords, with full expectations of the Woolsack. The King's recovery, however, blighted their hopes, and in 1792 Loughborough seceded from Fox, and became Lord Chancellor in Pitt's Tory cabinet. In 18or, Pitt's resignation was the end of him ; Addington had no room for him, but he re ceived the earldom of Rosslyn, and retired. He died at his country house near Windsor on Jan. 2, 18o5, and was buried in St. Paul's.
At the bar Wedderburn was the most elegant speaker of his time, and, although his knowledge of the principles and precedents of law was deficient, his skill in marshalling facts and his clearness of diction were marvellous ; on the bench his judgments were remarkable for their perspicuity, particularly in the appeal cases to the House of Lords. For cool and sustained declamation he stood unrivalled in parliament, and his readiness in debate was universally acknowledged. In social life, in the company of the wits and writers of his day, his faculties seemed to desert him. He was not only dull, but the cause of dulness in others.
See Brougham's Statesmen of the Reign of George III.; Foss's Judges; Campbell's Lives of Lord Chancellors.