The second son of Edward and Rachel Pease, Joseph Pease was a Quaker railway company promoter and industrialist, was born at Darlington on 22 June 1799. Educated at Tatham's academy, Leeds, and Josiah Forster's academy, London, he subsequently aided his father in the projection of the Stockton and Darlington Railway, in 1819 and 1820 by preparing the company's first prospectus. He emerged as an influential voice in the management of the railway in 1828, when he took the lead in projecting an extension of the line from Stockton to the hamlet of Middlesbrough further down the Tees estuary. The effect of this development was twofold: first, to undermine the dominance of Tyne and Wear exporters in the London coastal market for coal; and, second, to lay the foundations for the emergence of Teesside as an outstanding centre for the production of iron. The latter was facilitated by Pease's in numerous railway projections in the north-east of England, all of them designed to open up the heavy mineral wealth of the region.

After the passing of the Reform Bill in 1832, Joseph Pease was elected MP for South Durham, and retained the seat until his retirement in 1841. He was the first Quaker member to sit in the House of Commons, and on presenting himself on 8 February 1833 he refused to take the usual oath. A select committee was appointed to inquire into precedents, and on 14 February he was allowed to affirm (Hansard 3, 15, 1833, 387, 639). As a ‘worldly’ Quaker, Joseph Pease was a frequent speaker on matters of social and political reform, always avoiding the use of titles when addressing the house, and retaining his Quaker dress.

Joseph Pease married, on 20 March 1826, Emma (d. 1860), daughter of Joseph Gurney of Norwich, and their surviving children comprised five sons and four daughters.

In addition to commercial and industrial issues, Joseph Pease devoted himself to philanthropic and educational work, aiding Joseph Lancaster, and acting as president of the Peace Society from 1860. Before 1865 he became totally blind, but, with the aid of his secretary, republished and distributed many Friends' books; and in 1870 he had the Essays on the Principles of Morality of Jonathan Dymond translated into Spanish, for which service the government of Spain conferred on him (2 January 1872) the grand cross of Charles III.

Joseph Pease died on 8 February 1872 at his Darlington home, Southend, from heart disease. He was buried in the Quaker burial-ground in Darlington on 10 February. At the time of his death Pease's industrial concerns employed nearly ten thousand men in collieries, quarries, and ironstone mines. In addition he owned and directed woollen manufactories and was a leading shareholder in Robert Stephenson & Co., of Newcastle upon Tyne, numerous Teesside ironmaking concerns, and in the Middlesbrough estate.