On 6 April 1687 he was promoted to the
chief-justiceship of the Common Pleas on the death of
Sir Henry Bedingfield. This office he held only five days, for
Herbert, having refused to assist
the king to establish martial law in the army in time of peace by countenancing the execution of a deserter, was transferred to the
chief-justiceship of the Common Pleas. Wright, who took his place as
Chief Justice of the King's Bench, hanged deserters without hesitation. He gave further proof of his zeal by fining the
Earl of Devonshire, an opponent of the court, the sum of £30,000 for assaulting Colonel Thomas Colepeper in the Vane chamber at
Whitehall while the king and queen were in the presence, overruling his plea of privilege, and committing him to prison until the fine was paid. Wright accompanied the sentence with the remark that the offence was ' next door to pulling the king off his throne.' In October 1687 Wright was sent to Oxford as an ecclesiastical commissioner with
Thomas Cartwright (1634–1689) and
Sir Thomas Jenner on the famous visitation of
Magdalen College, Oxford when all the fellows but three were expelled for resisting the royal authority, and declared incapable of holding any ecclesiastical preferment. When the president of Magdalen,
John Hough, protested against the proceedings of the commission, Wright declared that he would uphold his majesty's authority while he had breath in his body, and bound him over in a thousand pounds to appear before the king's bench on the charge of breaking the peace. On 29 June 1688 Wright presided at the trial of the
Seven Bishops. Although he so far accommodated himself to the king as to declare their petition a libel, he was overawed during the trial by the general voice of opinion and the apprehension of an indictment. In the words of a bystander "he looked as if all the peers present had halters in their pockets". He conducted the proceedings with decency and impartiality, apart from his obvious antipathy to the
Solicitor General,
William Williams, whom he accused, irrelevantly, of taking bribes. At an early stage the evidence of publication broke down, and Wright was about to direct the jury to acquit the prisoners when the prosecution was saved by the testimony of
Sunderland. In his charge, while declaring in favour of the right of the subject to petition, he gave it as his opinion that the particular petition before the court was improperly worded, and was, in the contemplation of the law, a libel. He failed, however, to pronounce definitely in favour of the dispensing power of the crown. For this omission, his dismissal was afterwards contemplated, and he was probably saved by the difficulty of finding a successor. In December 1688 the
Prince of Orange caused two impeachments of high treason against
Jeffreys and Wright to be printed at
Exeter. Wright was accused among other offences of taking bribes "to that degree of corruption as is a shame to any court of justice". He continued to sit in court until the flight of James on 11 Dec. He then sought safety in concealment, and on 10 Jan. 1688-9 addressed a supplicating letter to the
Earl of Danby asserting that he had always opposed popery, and had been compelled to act against his inclinations. His hiding-place in the
Old Bailey was discovered by Sir
William Waller (d. 1699) on 13 February, and he was taken before Sir John Chapman, the
Lord Mayor of London, who committed him to
Newgate on the charge that, "being one of the judges of the
Court of King's Bench, he had endeavoured the subversion of the established government by alloweing of a power to dispence with the laws; and that hee was one of the commissioners for ecclesiastical affairs." On 6 May he was brought before the House of Lords for his action in regard to the
Earl of Devonshire: but, although his overruling the earl's plea of privilege and committing him to prison was declared a manifest breach of privilege of parliament, no further action was taken against him. On 18 May he died of fever in
Newgate. In the debate on the act of indemnity on 18 June, it was determined to except him from the act in spite of his decease. His name, however, does not appear in the final draft of the act. ==Family life==