Fergus Butler-Gallie rates Smith as "one of the least successful figures in the history of British academia": his blunders included rusticating student Lord Charles Wellesley, incurring the fury of Wellesley's father the Duke of Wellington; stating that he had hit a fellow rower over the head to prevent him from capsizing a leaking boat; and failing to control the canons, fellows and students, whose disputes regarding Sir Robert Peel's bill for Catholic emancipation descended into violence and vandalism. Smith backed Peel; the anti-Peel faction in response studded the message "No Peel" into a door below the college's Great Hall.[5]
Smith resigned as Dean in 1831, accepting a prebendary at Durham Cathedral.[3]