Council rejected his claimed right to the position, and Supreme Court judge Alfred Stephen was appointed. Plunkett was offered appointment as a judge, filling the position vacated by Stephen but declined it. He was made a member of the Executive Council in March 1847, and in 1848, when the national school system was founded, was appointed chairman of the Board of Education. He retired as Attorney-General in 1856, receiving a pension of £1,200 a year. He was appointed a Queen's Counsel on 6 June 1856, the first NSW Barrister to be so appointed. Parliamentary career In the same year he was elected as the member for both Bathurst (County) and Argyle in the Legislative Assembly at the first election under the new constitution. Plunkett was sworn in as member for Argyle and Bathurst on 22 May 1856, before submitting his resignation from Bathurst on 29 May, stating that the rules of the House would not allow him to send in his resignation earlier. Plunkett resigned from the Assembly in January 1857, was nominated to the Legislative Council, and elected its President. In February 1858, on account of the Board of Education having issued regulations which Charles Cowper, then Premier, disapproved of, Plunkett was dismissed from his position as chairman and he thereupon resigned from the council. There was much public sympathy with Plunkett, and the government offered to reinstate him if he would withdraw statements he had made in letters which were considered offensive. Plunkett declined to do so. Plunkett was again a member of the Legislative Assembly for Cumberland (North Riding) from September 1858 to April 1859 and for West Sydney from June 1859 to November 1860. In June 1861 he was nominated to the council, and from October 1863 to February 1865 was vice-president of the Executive Council in the first James Martin ministry. Plunkett was then reconciled with Cowper, and from August 1865 to January 1866 was Attorney-General in the fourth Cowper ministry. Plunkett was also vice-chancellor of the University of Sydney in 1865–67. For the last two years of his life he lived much at Melbourne on account of his wife's health, and he made his last public appearance there in 1869 as secretary to the provincial council of the Roman Catholic Church. He died on 9 May 1869 at East Melbourne leaving a widow but no children. Plunkett's remains were taken to Sydney and buried