Ramsey County Law Library Blog

Edward C. Palmer was born around 1825 in Vermont. He came to St. Paul in 1854 and formed the law partership Hale & Palmer with someone known as “Judge Hale.” (St. Paul Daily Globe)

Palmer served as attorney for the Sioux City Railroad and the First National Bank. He also served as lieutenant in the Pioneer Guards (precursor to the Minnesota National Guard). He served on St. Paul’s first Board of Education in 1856, at which time the board had “neither funds nor buildings within their possession.” The Board organized construction of St. Paul’s first three schoolhouses, Washington, Adams, and Jefferson.” (History of Ramsey County and the City of Saint Paul)

Palmer was elected State Judge of the District Court in the first state elections held in 1857. (History of Ramsey County and the City of St. Paul). During his term, Judge Palmer presided over the trial which lead to Minnesota’s first execution of a white person (and only woman to date), Ann Bilansky, who was convicted of murdering her husband. (Legacy of Violence: Lynch Mobs and Executions in Minnesota). Judge Palmer also presided over the trial testing the constitutionality of the 1862 Minnesota “Rebellion Act,” which suspended “…the [p]rivilege of all persons aiding the rebellion against the United States, of prosecuting and defending actions and judicial proceedings” in Minnesota. The Judge held that the Act only temporarily suspended the right and did not take it away permanently. Further, Judge Palmer held that the unstable situation among the states at the time justified an act whose purpose was to suppress the rebellion threat. (Minnesota History, March 1956) Judge Palmer remained the sole District Court judge until succeeded by Westcott Wilkin in 1864. (History of Ramsey County and the City of St. Paul).

Judge Palmer is credited with preparing the Revised Statutes. He was married three times and died on March 10, 1888, in Jacksonville Florida. (St. Paul Daily Globe)

The Law Library has on display judicial portraits of past Second Judicial District Court judges, going back to 1857. If you have any information or commentary about Judge Orr, please leave a response or send us an e-mail. To view the portraits in person, visit us on the 18th floor of the Ramsey County Courthouse.

Howard Wheeler was born in St. Paul on December 11, 1873 to James Wheeler and Joan Roberts Wheeler, both natives of Ireland. He graduated from the University of Minnesota, College of Law in 1895. He then entered into private practice in St. Paul. In 1903, he married Anne Long, of Toronto. To them were born three children.

In 1900 he was elected to the City Council of St. Paul, where served four years. He served for three years on the St. Paul Library Board. In January, 1922, he was appointed Judge of the Ramsey County Probate Court. Upon the retirement of Judge Grier M. Orr in 1930, Judge Wheeler was appointed to fill the vacancy on the Ramsey County District Court.

On September 5, 1931, Judge Wheeler was playing a round golf while on vacation in Kenora, Ontario. He suddenly suffered a heart attack and died shortly thereafter. He was only 54 years old. (Pioneer Press obituary)

Even though his time on the bench was short, one of the notable cases tried by Judge Wheeler was the case of State vs. Quinn, otherwise known as the Green Lantern Cafe case. This was a murder trial resulting from a shooting death that took place behind the notorious Green Lantern Cafe, which was located at Tenth St. and Wabasha in downtown St. Paul. More details about this trial are available here.

Frederick N. Dickson was born in Northfield MN on May 15, 1863, to John and Mary Dickson, originally from Ontario. He graduated from Carleton College in 1885, and married Alice Strong of Chicago in 1899. Following his graduation from Carleton, Dickson moved to St. Paul to “study law” in the offices of J.W. Lusk and C.W. Bunn, then later in the office of General John B. and Judge Walter H. Sanborn. He was formally admitted to the bar in 1887 and entered into private practice with Stan J. Donnelley. In 1901 he was appointed Assistant US Attorney, serving one year. He also served as Assistant Attorney General of MN under Attorney General Donahower. Dickson served as chairman of the St. Paul Republican Committee, and thus managed the campaign of his partner Herbert B. Keller who was then elected Mayor of St. Paul. Mayor Keller then appointed Dickson to the Board of Police Commissioners, wherein he served until he was appointed to the Ramsey County District Court bench in 1911.

According to his obituary, Judge Dickson was famed for his “Rulings that Made Law.” In one, he ruled that a tenant didn’t have to pay rent because the building had no fire escape as required by law, which was ultimately upheld by the Minnesota Supreme Court. In another he ruled that it was not unlawful for members of a labor union to agree among themselves that they would not work for a building contractor during a controversy. Even though these decisions allowed Dickson to be known as the “People’s Judge,” he left the bench in 1921 due to what he considered to be an insufficient salary. That same year he joined the practice of Moore, Oppenheimer & Peterson following Moore’s death. (The firm was later to be joined by Stan D Donnelly, son of Dickson’s first law partner, which was presumably part of its evolution into the present day firm of Oppenheimer, Wolff & Donnelly LLP.)

Frederick Dickson died in St. Paul on July 9, 1941 at age 78, three weeks after suffering a stroke.

Judge Kenneth Gray Brill was a loyal St. Paul man from beginning to end. He was born in St. Paul, MN on June 17, 1883 to Judge Hascal R. and Cora G. Brill. He graduated from St. Paul Central High School in 1903. He attended the University of Minnesota, and graduated from the St. Paul College of Law in 1907. He married Laura Cook (a St. Paul girl) in 1909. He worked in the St. Paul city attorney’s office handling damage claims against the city from 1909-1913. He then joined the St. Paul firm of Otis & Otis with Alf Boyeson in 1913, the new partnership being named Boyeson, Otis & Brill. Roland J. Faricy joined the firm on January 1, 1924, and the firm became Boyeson, Otis, Brill & Faricy. (The firm was located in St. Paul’s historic Endicott Building.) Brill left the firm in 1929 when he was appointed to the Ramsey County District Court bench. (The firm then became Boyeson Otis & Faricy, which was its name in the 1930’s when joined by future Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, Warren Burger.)

Judge Brill served in many local organizations. He was president of the Ramsey County Bar Association from 1927-1928, president of the Minnesota State District Judges’ Association from 1943-1944, as well as president of the Minnesota Historical Society for six years. He also belonged to the Sons of the American Revolution, Summit Lodge 163, and was a life member of the St. Paul Area Council of Boy Scouts.

Judge Brill’s service on the bench continued until his death in February of 1954. According to his obituary, he was taking the bus home from the Courthouse one Saturday when he suffered a heart attack. He died a few days later at Miller Hospital (which was later razed and is now the location of the present Minnesota Historical Society). Courts were closed for his funeral, with his surviving bench members attending together, and members of the Minnesota Bar Association serving as his honorary pallbearers.

Judge Grier Melancthon Orr was born in 1856 at Pike Furnace in Clarion County, Pennsylvania. He graduated from Heidelberg College in Tiffin, OH and was a school teacher there for a time. He also received his legal education and began his law practice in Ohio.
Orr moved to St Paul in 1884, where he practiced for 9 years. During this time he married Etta White of Rochester, MN. He served as a Municipal Court Judge from 1894 – 1902. In 1903 he became a Ramsey County District Court judge. He was nationally known in this position for his work in juvenile and family law. Even at a time when divorce was rare, Judge Orr oversaw more than 3000 divorce cases from 1903 – 1930. He advocated marriage law reforms, and validated the Minnesota Inheritance Tax in 1905.

Judge Orr presided over the first session of the Ramsey County Juvenile Court on June 1, 1905. His priorities for Juvenile court included helping families “to avoid publicity and to protect children and parents from a public knowledge of their misfortunes of life.” He was also instrumental in the establishment of Ramsey County Detention Homes for both boys and girls. Due to his combined work experience, “[h]e brought to the juvenile bench a humanistic background of several years as a schoolteacher, eight years as a municipal court judge, and a number of years as experiences on the district court bench.” The goal of Juvenile Court was remove wayward youth from the court system and to find appropriate rehabilitative services for them.

At his retirement in 1930, Judge Orr stated with justifiable satisfaction: “The faith and confidence of the citizens of Ramsey County in the administration of the Juvenile Court is manifest in the fact that not one jury case has ever been tried, up to this date, in the Juvenile Court.” Individualized Justice P. 11
The Law Library has on display judicial portraits of past Second Judicial District Court judges, going back to 1857. If you have any information or commentary about Judge Orr, please leave a response or send us an e-mail. To view the portraits in person, visit us on the 18th floor of the Ramsey County Courthouse.

James J. Egan was born in September 1842 in Ireland, and immigrated to the United States with his parents at the age of six.  He moved to Minnesota in 1857.

Egan served in the Minnesota-Dakota War of 1862 and published an autobiographical account describing the Thaoyateduta seige near the end of the war. 

Egan resided in Duluth from 1869-77, before moving to Saint Paul, where he served as Ramsey County Attorney for 11 years.  The dates of this service are not clear, however it is known that he served the Minnesota House from 1869-75, which covers his time in Duluth. 

As a Judge, Egan played a prominent role in the “coal combine” investigation of 1893.  Receiving national press, these investigations resulted in the 1893 interstate antitrust conference organized by Minnesota Governor Knute Nelson.  After an investigation of price fixing by the Bureau of Coal Statistics, the legislature seized the organization’s account books.  The “Bureau” filed a $50,000 suit in District Court, claiming damages and theft of property.  Judge Egan heard the case and was accused of siding with coal trusts for holding House Seargent-at Arms Basil Smout in contempt for failing to surrender the account books to the Bureau.

Richard A. Walsh (also a 2nd Judicial District judge) was involved due to his membership on the Joint Legislative Coal Investigation Committee.  While being held in the courtroom by Judge Egan, Basil phones Rep. Walsh and tells him to get the books from the Treasurers’s office before the Ramsey County Sheriff, dispatched by Egan, gets there.  In a race for the books, Walsh gets the books before the sheriff.  The legislature backs Walsh and threatens not only to impeach Judge Egan, but cut off the salaries of all District Court Judges in Minnesota. 

That is all the information we have on the coal investigations.  If you have any information or helpful resources, please leave a comment or contact us at [email protected]

William Dalton Cornish was born April 29, 1849 in Middleborough, Massachusetts. After being admitted to the bar in New York, Cornish moved to Saint Paul in 1870.  From 1883-87 he was a member of the Minnesota House, serving District 27.  In 1890 he was appointed to the bench to fill the vacancy left by the death of Orlando Simmons. 

Judge Cornish left the bench in 1893 and was appointed Special Master of Chancery of Northern Pacific-Union Pacific executive receivership cases.  He was later made Vice President of Union Pacific-Southern Pacific railway system, the Oregon Short Line, and the Oregon Railroad and Navigation Companies under E.H. Harriman. 

It was on a business trip to Chicago on November 7, 1908 that Judge Cornish died of heart failure.

Born in Springfield, Kentucky in 1837, William Louis Kelly quit school at 16 due to the death of his father and began working for the U.S. Post Office.  In a short time he was promoted to Assistant Postmaster of Louisville, and held that position until 1864, when he was commissioned as a special agent of the post office in General Sherman’s army.  During the Civil War Kelly was active in all matters connected with the western army mail service and re-establishing mail service in the Southeastern U.S. after the close of the war. 

While at the post office Kelly studied law at night and was granted a law degree by the University at Louisville in 1859.   After the Civil War, Kelly practiced law, farmed  and edited a newspaper.  While admitted to the Ramsey County Bar in 1871, he did not practice law as his sole profession until 1878.   In 1887 Kelly was appointed to the district bench by Governor McGill.  Judge Kelly decided the first railroad merge case in Minnesota, where he forbid the consolidation of Northern Pacific Railway and the Great Northern Railway Company.

The Honorable George Lincoln Bunn was born on June 25, 1865 in Sparta, Wisconsin.  His father, Romanzo Bunn was both a Wisconsin Supreme Court justice and United States federal judge who influenced him to practice law.  George Bunn received both his undergraduate and law degrees at the University of Wisconsin. 

Bunn moved to Saint Paul after graduation in 1888.  It was in Saint Paul that he met and married Ella Spaulding, who died one year later.  He would not marry again until 1908, when he married Fanny Losey of Lacrosse, Wisconsin. 

Judge Bunn was appointed a judgeship to the  District Court of Ramsey County in 1897.  In 1911, Governor Adolph Olson Eberhart appointed him to the Minnesota Supreme Court. 

Bunn served as dean of the St. Paul College of Law, the first predecessor of William Mitchell College of Law, from 1904 until his death in 1918.

The Honorable Levi M. Vilas was born in Vermont in 1841 and moved with his family to Madison, Wisconsin at the age of 10.  He graduated from the University of Wisconsin and was admitted to practice in both Wisconsin and New York a year later.  After going back and forth between the two states, he set out into frontier territory, while later staying in Saint Paul.  Vilas finally settled in Eau Claire, Wisconsin.  He was the community’s first City Attorney and served three terms as Mayor.  Interestingly, one of the Second Judicial District’s earliest judges, Vilas declined appointments to the Wisconsin Supreme Court on two occasions.

Vilas married Lizzie Stewart Ludlow in 1885.  Two years later they moved to Saint Paul, laying roots at 409 Ashland Avenue.  Judge Vilas was appointed to the bench by Governor Merriam. 

The Law Library has on display judicial portraits of past Second Judicial District Court judges, going back to 1857. If you have any information or commentary about Judge Wilkin, please leave a response or send us an e-mail.  To view the portraits in person, visit us on the 18th floor of the Ramsey County Courthouse.