James Schoolcraft Sherman was an American politician who was a United States representative from New York from 1887 to 1891 and 1893 to 1909, and the 27th vice president of the United States under President William Howard Taft from 1909 until his death in 1912. He was a member of the interrelated Baldwin, Hoar, and Sherman families, prominent lawyers and politicians of New England and New York.

William Howard Taft was the 27th president of the United States, serving from 1909 to 1913, and the tenth chief justice of the United States, serving from 1921 to 1930, the only person to have held both offices. Taft was elected president in 1908, the chosen successor of Theodore Roosevelt, but was defeated for reelection in 1912 by Woodrow Wilson after Roosevelt split the Republican vote by running as a third-party candidate. In 1921, President Warren G. Harding appointed Taft to be chief justice, a position he held until a month before his death.