Judges

The judges who presided over the St. Louis freedom suits, as well as those brought in other parts of a young Missouri, showed the importance of the Rule of Law in the administration of justice. Even though there were more than 300 St. Louis freedom suits, it was a relative handful of judges who presided over those cases. We may need to be reminded that judges are also people and, as such, they may have their own personal biases on issues and disputes which come before them. The cases also demonstrate that judges followed the Rule of Law in presiding over the cases, fully realizing it could separate a freedom seeker from an enslaver, despite the judges themselves being enslavers.

Under both the 1807 freedom statute and those that followed in 1824 and later, the judge was given the role of “gatekeeper”. That is, a potential freedom seeking plaintiff had to first file an application with the court, to set out facts showing they were wrongly held in slavery. The judge would make a determination, kind of like a “probable cause” determination that the facts, if true, could mean the person was entitled to be legally a free person. Sometimes that initial determination would be later found to be in error by an appellate court.

CIRCUIT COURT JUDGES
The number of judges in the Circuit Court level, who presided over the trials, was relatively small. Because this was a formative time for Missouri, which was a territory from 1812 until it achieved statehood in 1821, the Circuit Court based in St. Louis would also have jurisdiction over cases in other counties in addition to St. Louis County. This still common in outstate Missouri counties. Twelve judges had terms in sequence for the years of 1814-1860, meaning there was one judge in office at time. Legal matters in those early days were such that the Circuit Court of St. Louis County had three terms per year, such as March, July, and November (but the designated months could change).

As part of his meticulous work for the Missouri State Archives on the St. Louis Circuit Court Records project – which evolved into the rediscovery of the St. Louis freedom suits court files – archivist Michael Everman researched to create this list of the St. Louis Circuit Court judges and their terms in office:

David Barton (1815-1817)
Nathaniel B. Tucker (1817-1820)
Alexander Gray (1820)
Nathaniel B. Tucker (1821-1822)
Alexander Stuart (1823-1826)
William C. Carr (1826-1834)
Luke E. Lawless (1834-1841)
Bryan Mullanphy (1841-1844)
John M. Krum (1844-1847)
Alexander Hamilton (1847-1857)
James R. Lackland (1857-1859)
Samuel M. Breckinridge (1859-1863)

APPELLATE COURT JUDGES
The Supreme Court of Missouri, formed in 1820, had three members from its inception until 1872, when the number was increased to five. It was the sole appellate court for the time period of 1814 to 1860. The judges during that time period were:

Mathias McGirk (1820-1841)
John Dillard Cook (1820-1823)
John Rice Jones (1820-1824)
Rufus Pettibone (1823-1825)
George Tompkins (1824-1845)
Robert Wash (1825-1837)
John Cummins Edwards (1837-1839)
William Barclay Napton (1839-1849)
William Scott (1841-1849)
Priestly Haggin McBride (1845-1849)
John Ferguson Ryland (1849-1857)
James Harvey Birch (1849-1851)
William Scott (1851-1862)
Hamilton Rowan Gamble (1851-1855)
Abiel Leonard (1855)
John Crowley Richardson (1857-1859)
Ephraim Brevard Ewing (1859-1861)

Source: Missouri State Archives/Missouri Secretary of State website (Jan 2026)

[In the future, this segment of the Virtual Learning Center will be enhanced and added to later with profiles on the judges.]