Supreme Court of Florida and Its Predecessor Courts: 1821-1917.

• Author: Denham, James M.

Supreme Court of Florida and its Predecessor Courts by Walter W. Manley, E. Canter Brown, Jr, and Eric W. Rise Reviewed by James M. Denham

Nearly a decade ago Chesterfield Smith, Robert M. Ervin, Mark Hulsey, and a number of other legal and judicial leaders in Florida set out to bring into being a history of the Florida Supreme Court. Subsequently, Florida State University Professor Walter W. Manley organized a team of researchers, authors, and editors. The ensuing work was very much a collective effort and reflects a solid partnership between professor and legal practitioner of Manley, noted scholar of Florida history, Brown, an attorney, and legal history scholar Rise. The result is a book that is more than just a history of Florida's highest court; it also constitutes the best legal history of the state available.

Five neatly crafted sections: Florida Territory, Antebellum Statehood, Civil War and Reconstruction, Redemption and the Bourbons, and Before the Great War, organize 19 chapters which chronicle the story of Florida's highest court to 1917. Carefully woven into each chapter are lengthy biographical sketches of justices noting their previous legal experience, the route each took to the highest court, and the social and cultural milieu in which they operated. The sketches also shed light on members of the court whose contributions to the state's constitutional and political development are practically unknown today.

One striking but not unexpected conclusions is the court's continuing struggle to remain free of political interference. During Florida's territorial years, federally appointed superior court judges which presided over five judicial districts formed a Court of Appeals which met once a year After statehood the pattern continued as circuit judges, elected by the state legislature, constituted the state's first...