Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court

Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court
Court information
Justices:	7
Founded:	1692
Location:	Boston, Massachusetts
Judicial selection
Method:	Gubernatorial appointment of judges
Term:	Until 70 years of age
Active justices
Roderick Ireland  •  Francis Spina  •  Robert Cordy  •  Margot Botsford  •  Barbara Lenk  •  Fernande Duffly  •  Ralph D. Gants  •
Former justices

The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court (SJC) is the highest court in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The SJC has the distinction of being the oldest continuously functioning appellate court in the Western Hemisphere.

Justices

The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court has 7 justices.

Judge	Term	Appointed by	Party
Chief Justice Roderick Ireland	1997-2014	Deval Patrick
Justice Francis Spina	1999-2016
Justice Robert Cordy	2001-2019
Justice Margot Botsford	2007-2017
Justice Barbara Lenk	2011-2020	Deval Patrick
Justice Fernande Duffly	2011-present	Deval Patrick
Justice Ralph D. Gants	2009-2024	Deval Patrick

Jurisdiction

According to the Massachusetts Constitution, "all causes of marriage, divorce, and alimony, and all appeals from the judges of probate shall be heard and determined by the governor and council, until the legislature shall, by law, make other provision."

Judicial selection

The Court consists of a Chief Justice and six Associate Justices. Each justice is appointed by the state Governor with the consent of the Governor's Council. Additionally, justices on the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court hold tenure until the age of mandatory retirement, age 70.

Removal of justices

"Massachusetts judges may be removed in one of three ways: The commission on judicial conduct investigates complaints of judicial misconduct. Following a formal hearing, the commission may recommend to the supreme judicial court removal, retirement, or reprimand of a judge. The governor, with consent of the governor's council, may remove judges upon the joint address of both houses of the general court. The governor, with consent of the governor's council, may also retire judges because of advanced age or mental or physical disability. Judges may be impeached by the house of representatives and convicted by the senate."

Caseloads

For fiscal year 2008, there were 194 net entries for the Supreme Judicial Court, 221 total opinions and 222 total appeals decided. The seven Justices hear appeals between September and May. The court divides its tasks by sitting as single justices as well as the full bench. Single justices determine a total of roughly 600 cases each year, while the full court renders written decisions in the amount of roughly one third that number.

Fiscal Year	Gross entries	Dismissals	Net entries	Total opinions
2011	264	17	247	187
2010	231	42	189	225
2009	285	28	257	201
2008	214	20	194	221
2007	226	26	200	200

Salaries

The Chief Justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court makes $151,239 annually, while associate justices make $145,984, as of January 2010.

Notable decisions

• Rex v. Preston (1770) - Captain Thomas Preston, the Officer of the Day during the Boston Massacre, was acquitted when the jury was unable to determine whether he had ordered the troops to fire. The defense counsel in the case was a young attorney named John Adams, later the second President of the United States.

• Rex v. Wemms, et al. (1770) - Six soldiers involved in the Boston Massacre were found not guilty, and two more — the only two proven to have fired — were found guilty of manslaughter.

• Commonwealth v. Jennison (1783) - The Court declared slavery unconstitutional in the state of Massachusetts by allowing slaves to sue their masters for freedom. Boston lawyer, and member of the Constitutional Convention of 1779, John Lowell, upon the adoption of Article I for inclusion in the Bill of Rights, exclaimed: "...I will render my services as a lawyer gratis to any slave suing for his freedom if it is withheld from him..." With this case, he fulfilled his promise, and Slavery in Massachusetts no longer had any legal standing.

• Commonwealth v. Hunt (1842) - The Court established that trade unions were not necessarily criminal or conspiring organizations if they did not advocate violence or illegal activities in their attempts to gain recognition through striking. This legalized the existence of non-socialist or non-violent trade organizations, though trade unions would continue to be harassed legally through anti-trust suits and injunctions.

• Roberts v. Boston (1850) - The Court established the "separate but equal" doctrine that would later be used in Plessy v. Ferguson by maintaining that the law gave school boards complete authority in assigning students to schools and that they could do so along racial lines if they deemed it appropriate.

• Goodridge v. Department of Public Health (2003) - The Court ruled that the denial of marriage licenses to same-sex couples violated the Massachusetts Constitution.

History of the court

The John Adams courthouse in Boston, Massachusetts

Historic Massachusetts State House (circa 1900), historic home of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court

Notable firsts

• The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court has the distinction of being the oldest continuously functioning appellate court in the Western Hemisphere.

Chief justices

#	Chief Justice	Took office	Left office
1	William Cushing	1782	1789
2	Nathaniel Peaslee Sargeant	1790	1791
3	Francis Dana	1791	1806
4	Theophilus Parsons	1806	1813
5	Samuel Sewall	1814	1814
6	Isaac Parker	August 24, 1814	July 25, 1830
7	Lemuel Shaw	August 30, 1830	August 21, 1860
8	George Tyler Bigelow	September 7, 1860	December 31, 1867
9	Reuben Atwater Chapman	February 7, 1868	June 28, 1873
10	Horace Gray	September 5, 1873	January 9, 1882
11	Marcus Morton	January 16, 1882	August 27, 1890
12	Walbridge A. Field	September 4, 1890	July 15, 1899
13	Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.	August 2, 1899	December 8, 1902
14	Marcus Perrin Knowlton	December 17, 1902	September 7, 1911
15	Arthur Prentice Rugg	September 20, 1911	June 12, 1938
16	Fred Tarbell Field	June 30, 1938	July 24, 1947
17	Stanley Elroy Qua	August 6, 1947	September 6, 1956
18	Raymond Sanger Wilkins	September 13, 1956	September 1, 1970
19	G. Joseph Tauro	1970	1976
20	Edward F. Hennessey	1976	April 19, 1989
21	Paul J. Liacos	June 20, 1989	September 30, 1996
22	Herbert P. Wilkins	October 1, 1996	August 31, 1999
23	Margaret Marshall	October 14, 1999	2010
24	Roderick Ireland	2010	Incumbent (faces mandatory retirement on September 1, 2014)

• William Cushing later served on the U.S. Supreme Court
• Horace Gray later served on the U.S. Supreme Court
• Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. later served on the U.S. Supreme Court

See also

• News: Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court gives thumbs up to the middle finger, sometimes, January 31, 2012
• News: Former mayor to lead Massachusetts Supreme Court, January 14, 2012

External links

• Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Official Site
• List of Chief Justices of the Supreme Judicial Court
• Supreme Judicial Court, Office of the Reporter of Decisions
• About the Supreme Court
• Supreme Judicial Court Historical Society
• Gay-Marriage Decision: Just the Beginning of the Debate
• Memoirs v. Massachusetts
• Simpson's Contemporary Quotations

References

Portions of this article have been taken from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Copyright Notice can be found here.