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16. The Calvert Court
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The CalverT CourT Late in Hickman’s tenure, two more important justices joined the Court. James Rankin Norvell, fifty-four, had the distinction of being the first nonnative to come east to Texas instead of west from the Old South. Born and raised in Colorado, he obtained his law degree from the University of Colorado before settling in the Rio Grande Valley in 1926. There the lack of legal work led him into detours, one with a title company and one with a railroad, before starting his own law firm in 1930. He had no judicial experience when Governor “Pappy” O’Daniel placed him on the Fourth Court of Civil Appeals in San Antonio a decade later. On that bench, though, he not only distinguished himself but also taught at St. Mary’s School of Law for his entire sixteen-year tenure. Norvell ran for and won an open seat on the Court in 1956.1 (Abner McCall, who had been appointed associate justice by Governor Shivers when Will Wilson resigned in June to run for attorney general, declined to run to hold the seat.)2 In 1959 the distinguished Justice Garwood retired from the Court, soon after moving the institution into the new building that he had advocated for. He was only sixty-four, and had plenty of good service left in him: eight years heading the Texas Civil Judicial Council while teaching at the University of Texas and Southern Methodist University and engaging in private practice. No wonder he supported a mandatory retirement age of seventy-five forTexas judges; he wouldn’t have had time to do everything else. Winning the vacant seat was Robert William Hamilton, only three years younger than the retiring Garwood but destined for twelve productive years on the high bench. A native of the verdant Tyler area, he worked his way through law school by dividing his time: teaching and coaching in the Panhandle town of Plainview during the school year, then removing to Austin for summer classes at the University of Texas. It took eight years, but Hamilton ’s ability to hew to a method and see jobs through was his bedrock. He settled in Stanton in 1929, serving as county and then district attorney before sixTeen 197 THe CaLverT CourT moving to nearby Midland for sixteen years in private practice. That region’s booming oil industry gave Hamilton a background in mineral law that served him well in later years. Two years as judge of the Seventieth Judicial District preceded his appointment as chief justice of the Eighth Court of Civil Appeals in El Paso. There he proved himself a workhorse, authoring more than 350 opinions in five years.3 Chief Justice Hickman was around long enough to get the Supreme Court moved into its new temple, but at seventy-seven he declined to run for another term in 1960. He stepped down in January 1961, after an appellate career of thirty-three years, sixteen of them on the Supreme Court and thirteen of those as chief. He had written more than four hundred opinions, received numerous awards and honorary degrees, and was the first Texan to chair the National Conference of State Chief Justices. He lived a year more in retirement, and died in April 1962, shortly after turning seventy-nine.4 In private consultations, Hickman had indicated his preference that either Griffin or Calvert should run for his seat.5 Griffin declined, although he remained on the Court until 1968. Calvert’s eleven years on the Court had earned him an enormous reservoir of respect that swept him to victory in the election by a margin of almost two to one. Governor Daniel filled Calvert’s empty associate’s chair with his secretary of state, Zollie Coffer Steakley, Jr. He was fifty-three, wiry, bantamweight but perhaps the best athlete in the Court’s history: while various justices had been coaches, Steakley had once been offered a professional baseball contract after graduating from Baptistaffiliated Simmons University in Abilene in 1929. He went to law school instead , then went into private practice in Sweetwater while helping his father at his auto dealership. After returning to Austin, his tenure as assistant attorney general was interrupted by a stint in naval intelligence during the war, followed by a decade in private practice. Interestingly, the religious instruction that had been lost with Hickman’s retirement was regained with Steakley. Whereas Hickman’s Bible classes had to be held in the Tower Theater to...