The Washington High Bench - A Biographical History of the State Supreme Court, 1889-1991 (Paperback, illustrated edition)

Five men met in Olympia on November 11, 1889 as Washington's first state supreme court. They selected Walla Walla's Thomas Anders as chief and immediately began ruling on issues that affected every Washingtonian. Over the course of more than a century, seventy-five other jurists followed them to Washington's high bench, balancing legislative and executive authority, establishing legal precedents, and guiding Washington's judicial branch of government. In that time, the Washington Supreme Court made several landmark decisions of national significance. But even in its more routine decision-making, the court ruled in ways that directly influenced the lives of every individual in the state. Every student understands the significance of the state's diversified, tripartite government. And most recognize that individuals often cast important shadows. There have been studies of governors and legislators, but the supreme court has largely remained a nameless and faceless body, its justices screened from general view. That is, until now. Charles H. Sheldon breathes life and personality into the high bench, providing concise, honest, and highly readable biographical sketches of each of the court's eighty jurists. He introduces his work with four chapters that place the court and its often colorful individual jurists into an analytical framework. "It is of vital importance that citizens of this state learn about the important work of the supreme court and the people who perform it, " former Justice Vernon Pearson writes in his foreword. Charles Sheldon has now provided the state's residents with the information they need for such an understanding.