| DATE: July 19, 2006 | CONTACT: |
Laura Kiernan
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Rollinsford resident led efforts to reform court in mid-1800s
CONCORD—The campus of the Supreme Court and the Administrative Office of the Courts has been renamed Charles Doe Place in honor of the longest serving member of the state Supreme Court who was hailed for his efforts, more than 100 years ago, to simplify court procedures to make the process more efficient and less expensive. The road leading to the campus will also be renamed Charles Doe Drive.
Chief Justice Doe, who served on the Supreme Court for 35 years, has been described as a brilliant jurist and a modest, kindhearted family man devoted to the principal of equal rights. An inexhaustible researcher and hard worker, Chief Justice Doe died in 1896, at the age of 65 as he waited at the Rollinsford railroad station for the morning train to take him to the court in Concord, according to his biographer, John Phillip Reid.
“He was the unselfish scholar, the dedicated public servant in the best and richest traditions of civilized society,” Reid wrote in his book “Chief Justice, The Judicial World of Charles Doe,” published in 1967.
The renaming of the road and campus for Chief Justice Doe, which was approved by the legislature and signed into law by Governor John Lynch, is effective July 21, 2006. Chief Justice John T. Broderick Jr. expressed his thanks to Senate Majority Leader Robert Clegg, Representative Gene Chandler and to Transportation Commissioner Carol A. Murray for their support of the court’s effort to rename the road in honor of Chief Justice Doe.
“The Supreme Court, in its ongoing efforts to recognize the contributions of those who have served in the Judicial Branch of New Hampshire, thought it most appropriate to rename the entrance way to the Supreme Court 'Charles Doe Drive,' ” Broderick said.
The new address of the Supreme Court will be One Charles Doe Drive. The address of the Administrative Office of the Courts will be Two Charles Doe Drive.
A graduate of Dartmouth College, Charles Doe worked as a lawyer in Dover and as Strafford County solicitor prior to his appointment to the state’s highest court as an associate justice in 1859 at the age of 29. He returned to private law practice in 1874, during a period of court reorganization, and returned in 1876 as Chief Justice of the state Supreme Court, a position he held until his death 20 years later. During his time on the bench, members of the Supreme Court presided at trials in different counties and then sat together to decide appeals. The New Hampshire Supreme Court as it is constituted today was established in 1901, and at the same time the separate trial court, known as the Superior Court, was formed.
A memoir published after his death by his close friend and judicial colleague, Jeremiah Smith, described Justice Doe as a reformer from the beginning of his judicial career who “insisted on having cases tried civilly, expeditiously and upon the merits.” Smith borrowed a metaphor from a profile of an English judge to characterize Doe’s presence in the courtroom as a “healthy breeze in an overladen atmosphere.” Justice Doe's commitment to equal rights and reform is also seen in his authorship of the Supreme Court's unanimous opinion in the 1890 case of Ricker's Petition, which allowed women to be admitted to the practice of law in New Hampshire.
Chief Justice Broderick, commenting on Doe’s legacy, said he remains “a revered chief justice from the 19th Century, whose contributions to the administration of justice were legion and whose judicial decisions remain vital even in this new century.”
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