In July 1858, after Minnesota became a state, the opinions of the Territorial Supreme Court were collected by Harvey Officer, a St. Paul lawyer, and published as the first volume of Minnesota Reports. He also prepared a useful chronology of the Supreme Court's sessions and included in an Appendix the complete Rules of the Practice before the District Courts and the Supreme Court adopted in July 1852, under Chief Justice Jerome Fuller. Officer's Volume One of Minnesota Reports is posted here in its entirety.
In an advertisement at the beginning of Volume One, Officer describes how he compiled the Court's rulings. He included those previously published by court reporters William Hollinshead and Isaac Atwater as well as those subsequently reported by John B. Brisbin and Michael Ames, the last two court reporters. He also took pains to track down missing or lost opinions by speaking to retired justices and even placing notices in local newspapers requesting their return to the Clerk of Court.
Minnesota Territory existed from 1849 to May 1858. Although the Territorial Legislature in 1851 required the Supreme Court to hold two terms each year, it did not do so. In fact the decisions of the Court that comprise the following volume were written and issued during only seven sessions: in July, 1851, under Chief Justice Aaron Goodrich, in July 1852, under Chief Justice Jerome Fuller, and in January 1854, January 1856, July 1856, January 1857, and January 1858 under Chief Justice William Welch.
In 1877, James Gilfillan edited Officer's volume and eliminated excerpts from lawyers' briefs and arguments. The condensed result is commonly known as the "Gilfillan Edition" of Minnesota Reports. Officer's volume had 503 pages, Gilfillan's 326.
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