Viewing Consul Willshire Butterfield: "Bench and Bar of Duluth." (1889)Consul Willshire Butterfield: "Bench and Bar of Duluth." (1889) According to Judge Ozora P. Stearns, holding court in the Eleventh Judicial District as late as the 1870s was a makeshift affair, resulting in "a rough kind of justice." There were no courthouses. Lawyers and judges had few law books, and there was not a complete set of the Minnesota Reports "west of Duluth." Lawyers in his district did not "know enough to take an appeal" to the state supreme court. These are a few of the reminiscences of Judge Stearns which were recorded by Consul Willshire Butterfield, author of this article.
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