Carpet Slippers and Flying Inkwells: The Texas Supreme Court 100 Years Ago
Sponsored by the Texas Supreme Court Historical Society
The third floor of the Texas Capitol houses a treasure of the restorer’s art, and the original chamber of the Texas Supreme Court, which heard arguments and issued opinions here from 1888 until they moved to the new Supreme Court building in 1959.
Oh! If these walls could talk, they would hearken back to a time when the Supreme Court consisted of three justices, decorous legal scholars whose thunderbolt opinions preserved homesteads from being seized for debt, preferred the rights of small landowners over giant cattle operations, forced corporations to take responsibility for their negligence and misdeeds, and enhanced the legal position of women, even to granting wives the power to have a drunkard husband’s bar tab cut off.
Among these remarkable men were the elderly T. J. Brown, who took his nightly walk with a lantern on his staff, like Diogenes looking for an honest man, and Chief Justice Reuben Reid Gaines, known for his faultless demeanor — when he wasn’t flying into a Jovian rage over unexpected opposition.
Also essential to the Court’s operation were the long-time porter, Alex Phillips, who also served as cook when the justices went camping together, and clerk H. L. Clampp, a Latin scholar who realized that they had long been misinterpreting the motto emblazoned in gold on their ornate walnut bench.
Their like and their day will never be seen again.
Learn more by registering for the Save Texas History Symposium.
About the Speaker
By luck of the draw, the last time James. L Haley had a “day job,” he worked (a few levels down) for the previous speaker, Ali James, as a Capitol Tour Guide. One of the Tour Guides’ tasks every morning is to go up to the third floor and unlock the old Supreme Court room, which is open to visitors — although tours are not regularly scheduled.
When he left that job, by further luck of the draw, it was to write a history of the Texas Supreme Court, on a commission from the Supreme Court’s Historical Society. It was produced by the University of Texas Press two years ago and is considered as close to definitive as anyone is likely to publish.
Haley’s current main occupation is “novelist,” having finished the first and now working on the second of a series of early American, tall-ship sailing navy adventures for G. P. Putnam’s Sons. He is the author of eighteen books. He has won the Spur Award of the Western Writers of America and the T. R. Fehrenbach Book Award of the Texas Historical Commission, twice each. He is a fellow of the Texas State Historical Association and a member of the Texas Institute of Letters. He is best known for his biography, Sam Houston, which won nine historical and literary awards, but he is also a good sport about signing copies of ROOTS for people who don’t know that he isn’t Alex Haley.
About the Symposium
The Save Texas History Symposium: In the Shadow of the Dome: Austin by Day & Night, will take a look at the history of Austin in a whole new light, and examine diverse aspects of Austin’s history in the 19th century. You can register for the symposium here.
Symposium Sponsors & Exhibitors
Sponsors:
Additional Symposium Sponsors:
Texas Society of Professional Surveyors (TSPS)
Dolph Briscoe Center for American History
Texas School for the Deaf
TCU Press
University of Texas Press
David A. Furlow, P.C.
Hillco Partners
Crinkstuff Vintage Texana & Rare Books
Dorothy Sloan Rare Books, Inc.
The Witte Museum
Exhibitors:
Texas Historical Foundation
Houston Aeronautical Heritage Society
Austin History Center Association
Texas A&M University Press
Brush Square Museums — The City of Austin
Harry Ransom Center, The University of Texas at Austin
Save Austin’s Cemeteries
Society of Southwest Archivists (SSA)
Austin Genealogical Society
