After several years of practice, in 1883 Wickersham entered the longtime law firm of
Strong and Cadwalader in New York City. He became a partner four years later, and the firm was eventually named Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft. He was appointed to the office of
Attorney General of the United States from 1909 to 1913, in the administration of
President William Howard Taft. In 1912 Wickersham supported the membership of U.S. Assistant Attorney General
William H. Lewis in the
American Bar Association, after Southerners protested the African American's presence and the executive committee voted to oust him. Wickersham sent a letter to all 4,700 members urging their support for Lewis, who refused to resign. After the election of President
Woodrow Wilson in 1912, the Democrat appointed his own people to federal positions. During Wilson's first term, from 1914 to 1916, Wickersham was out of government and served as president of the
Association of the Bar of the City of New York. In 1916, Wickersham opposed
Wilson's nomination of
Louis Brandeis for the Supreme Court, describing the Jewish nominee's supporters as "a bunch of Hebrew uplifters." Soon after the United States entered
World War I in 1917, Wickersham was named by President Wilson to serve on the War Trade Board to
Cuba. In 1929, President
Herbert Hoover appointed Wickersham to the
National Commission on Law Observance and Enforcement, better known as the "Wickersham Commission." (It was described as the "Wickersham Committee" by
William L. Marbury Jr. in a 1935 letter seeking the support of U.S. Senator
George L. P. Radcliffe for appointment of
Alger Hiss to the
U.S. Solicitor General's office; Hiss had served on the committee 1929–1930. ==Personal life and death==