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State’s Highest Court Gets History Lesson from BC Law’s Coquillette

By Reid Oslin | Chronicle Staff

Boston College Law professor and former dean Daniel R. Coquillette recently gave the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court a little bit of history -- its own.

Coquillette, the J. Donald Monan, SJ, University Professor of Law, presented Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court Chief Justice Margaret H. Marshall with copies of his recently published volumes Portraits of a Patriot -- which detail the court's first reports -- at a June 8 ceremony at the John Adams Courthouse in Boston.

The works, of which Coquillette was chief editor, include the law reports originally written by Josiah Quincy Junior (1744-1775), recording the cases of continental America's oldest court, the Superior Court of Judicature of the Province of Massachusetts Bay, direct ancestor of today's Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, which has been in continuous existence since 1692.

Marshall called Coquillette a "brilliant, thoughtful, learned and ethical" lawyer and scholar as she accepted the books. "The constitution of these volumes is exceptional. This body of work is due to the work of two individuals -- Josiah Quincy Junior and Daniel R. Coquillette. I am extremely honored to accept this remarkable set of books. Your work is a great contribution to our collective education."

Quincy's court reports offer a rare legal insight into life in the American colonies prior to the American Revolution, and cover such wide-ranging topics as trials by jury, statutory construction, slavery, women's rights, early consumer protection and piracy. Some of the legal decisions from colonial times still have importance as precedent today.

"These books are the living spirit of the rule of law and the heritage of this great court," Coquillette told the audience that filled the Superior Court chamber for the ceremony. "Josiah Quincy Junior, at age 18, had the vision that if America was going to be a great legal country, it needed to have its own legal reports."

Chief justices from the US Appellate Court, US District Court, Massachusetts Superior, Family and Probate and District courts also attended the presentation event.