Edmund H. Bennett
Encyclopedia
Edmund Hatch Bennett was an American lawyer
, judge
, the first Mayor of Taunton, Massachusetts
, and Dean of Boston University
School of Law
.
, Connecticut
, and was a graduate of Yale College
in 1811. He studied at the Litchfield Law School
, then lived in Burlington, Vermont
, and finally settled in Manchester. He served as the State attorney and was also judge of probate
. In 1838 Bennett became judge of the Vermont Supreme Court
, and in 1859 served as a commissioner revising the state's statutes. Conrad Reno in his memoir of New England judges recorded that the Bennett family's ancestors hailed from New England
.
Bennett was educated at the Manchester and Burlington Academies, and then studied at the University of Vermont
where he graduated in 1843 with a Bachelor of Arts degree. He taught for a while in a private school in Virginia
, but abandoned this for a career in law. He started that career as an employee in his father's law office and was admitted to the bar of Vermont in 1847. In July 1848 he relocated to Massachusetts
and was admitted to the Suffolk
bar. He then moved to Taunton
as a partner in the firm of Nathaniel Morton, Henry Williams, Henry J. Fuller and Fred S. Hall. In 1853 Bennett married Sally Crocker, the daughter of the congressman Samuel Leonard Crocker. She outlived him and died in 1911. They had four children: Caroline, Edmund Neville, Samuel and Mary. The first two children died in infancy, while Samuel Bennett later became the Dean of Boston University Law School.
In 1872 the University of Vermont
conferred the Doctor of Laws degree (LL. D.) on Bennett.
, and he held that post until he resigned from it in 1883. In 1864 the city of Taunton was formally incorporated, and Bennett was elected the city's first mayor, he was inaugurated on January 2, 1865. Bennett was re-elected mayor in 1866 and 1867, he served until his resignation on June 19, 1867. In his political career he began as a supporter of the Whig Party
and then as a founding member of the Republican Party
.
From 1870-1872 he held the post of a lecturer in the Dane Law School
at Harvard University
. In the fall of 1872 he was appointed as the inaugural Dean of Boston University
's Law School but due to ill health had to decline the appointment. He did however teach the law at Boston University, and then in 1875 assumed the post of Dean of the Law School. He held that position until his death in 1898. He lectured in many areas of the law such as contracts, constitutional law, and probate. As an experienced practitioner, judge and law school lecturer Bennett wrote a number of legal textbooks concerning agricultural law, business law, constitutional law, fire insurance, and collated various volumes of English law reports and cases in equity. He also edited and revised a number of existing legal textbooks written by earlier authorities such as Joseph Story's Conflict of Laws (1857), Story's Agency (1862), Blackwell's Tax Titles (1864), and Indermaur's Principles of the Common Law (1878). According to Jones' Index of Legal Periodical Literature (1888), Bennett is listed as the author of fifty-nine articles in various legal periodicals such as the Harvard Law Review
, Law Quarterly Review
and American Law Register. He also acted as an editor of various legal journals.
In 1891 Governor William Russell
appointed Bennett as chairman of the Board of Commissioners for the Promotion of Uniformity of Legislation in the USA. In 1896 he was appointed by Governor Roger Wolcott
as chairman of the Commission on the Revision of the Public Statutes.
Bennett was also interested in early colonial history and belonged to the Old Colony Historical Society. In 1889 he delivered the society's historical address on the occasion of the 250th anniversary of settlement in Taunton. Bennett is remembered and honored in Taunton with a public school named after him.http://profiles.doe.mass.edu/home.asp?mode=so&ot=5&o=1648&so=1651-6 He was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
in 1892.
Bennett served as a warden at St. Thomas's Episcopal church. He also served as a delegate to the Episcopal church's Diocesan Convention in 1874, 1877, 1880 and 1883, and he was a member of Diocesan Board of Trustees. He was one of the trustees of the Episcopal Theological School in Cambridge, Massachusetts
, and served as the school's president from 1895-1898.
Bennett also delivered talks about his faith. One of his lectures was in the field of Christian apologetics
. His apologetic work, which was published posthumously, was The Four Gospels from a Lawyer's Standpoint. In this text Bennett argued that the New Testament
gospels were trustworthy sources for the life and teachings of Jesus Christ. He accepted the traditional authorship of the gospels - Matthew
, Mark
, Luke
, and John
- and applied legal principles of reasoning in examining their accounts about Christ. Bennett opened his lecture by stating:
Bennett believed that the distinctive content and perspectives about Jesus that appear in the four gospels points to the independence of each writer. He held to the common literary and juridical principle of harmonization when looking at the differences and apparent discrepancies in details as recounted in parallel accounts. Bennett was convinced that the gospels were not forged documents but rather could be depended on as primary sources.
In the late twentieth century Bennett's book was reprinted in the inaugural edition of The Simon Greenleaf School of Law Review (1981–82). His work was also appraised in Ross Clifford
's Leading Lawyers' Case for the Resurrection (1996). Bennett's apologetic text is now categorized as belonging to the "juridical" or "legal" school of thought in Christian apologetics. http://www.trinitysem.edu/journal/philjohnsonpap.html
Lawyer
A lawyer, according to Black's Law Dictionary, is "a person learned in the law; as an attorney, counsel or solicitor; a person who is practicing law." Law is the system of rules of conduct established by the sovereign government of a society to correct wrongs, maintain the stability of political...
, judge
Judge
A judge is a person who presides over court proceedings, either alone or as part of a panel of judges. The powers, functions, method of appointment, discipline, and training of judges vary widely across different jurisdictions. The judge is supposed to conduct the trial impartially and in an open...
, the first Mayor of Taunton, Massachusetts
Taunton, Massachusetts
Taunton is a city in Bristol County, Massachusetts, United States. It is the seat of Bristol County and the hub of the Greater Taunton Area. The city is located south of Boston, east of Providence, north of Fall River and west of Plymouth. The City of Taunton is situated on the Taunton River...
, and Dean of Boston University
Boston University
Boston University is a private research university located in Boston, Massachusetts. With more than 4,000 faculty members and more than 31,000 students, Boston University is one of the largest private universities in the United States and one of Boston's largest employers...
School of Law
Boston University School of Law
Boston University School of Law is the law school affiliated with Boston University, and is ranked #22 among American law schools by US News and World Report magazine. It is the second-oldest law school in Massachusetts and one of the first law schools in the country to admit students regardless...
.
Family and education
Bennett was born in Manchester, Vermont. His father was Milo Lyman Bennett and his mother was Abigail Hatch. Milo Bennett came from SharonSharon, Connecticut
Sharon is a town located in Litchfield County, Connecticut, in the northwest corner of the state. It is bounded on the north by Salisbury, on the east by the Housatonic River, on the south by Kent, and on the west by Dutchess County, New York...
, Connecticut
Connecticut
Connecticut is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, and the state of New York to the west and the south .Connecticut is named for the Connecticut River, the major U.S. river that approximately...
, and was a graduate of Yale College
Yale College
Yale College was the official name of Yale University from 1718 to 1887. The name now refers to the undergraduate part of the university. Each undergraduate student is assigned to one of 12 residential colleges.-Residential colleges:...
in 1811. He studied at the Litchfield Law School
Litchfield Law School
The Litchfield Law School of Litchfield, Connecticut, was the first formal school offering training for the legal profession in the United States. It was established in 1784 by Tapping Reeve, who would later became the Chief Justice of the Connecticut Supreme Court...
, then lived in Burlington, Vermont
Burlington, Vermont
Burlington is the largest city in the U.S. state of Vermont and the shire town of Chittenden County. Burlington lies south of the U.S.-Canadian border and some south of Montreal....
, and finally settled in Manchester. He served as the State attorney and was also judge of probate
Probate
Probate is the legal process of administering the estate of a deceased person by resolving all claims and distributing the deceased person's property under the valid will. A probate court decides the validity of a testator's will...
. In 1838 Bennett became judge of the Vermont Supreme Court
Vermont Supreme Court
The Vermont Supreme Court is the highest judicial authority of the U.S. state of Vermont and is one of seven state courts of Vermont.The Court consists of a chief justice and four associate justices; the Court mostly hears appeals of cases that have been decided by other courts...
, and in 1859 served as a commissioner revising the state's statutes. Conrad Reno in his memoir of New England judges recorded that the Bennett family's ancestors hailed from New England
New England
New England is a region in the northeastern corner of the United States consisting of the six states of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut...
.
Bennett was educated at the Manchester and Burlington Academies, and then studied at the University of Vermont
University of Vermont
The University of Vermont comprises seven undergraduate schools, an honors college, a graduate college, and a college of medicine. The Honors College does not offer its own degrees; students in the Honors College concurrently enroll in one of the university's seven undergraduate colleges or...
where he graduated in 1843 with a Bachelor of Arts degree. He taught for a while in a private school in Virginia
Virginia
The Commonwealth of Virginia , is a U.S. state on the Atlantic Coast of the Southern United States. Virginia is nicknamed the "Old Dominion" and sometimes the "Mother of Presidents" after the eight U.S. presidents born there...
, but abandoned this for a career in law. He started that career as an employee in his father's law office and was admitted to the bar of Vermont in 1847. In July 1848 he relocated to Massachusetts
Massachusetts
The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. It is bordered by Rhode Island and Connecticut to the south, New York to the west, and Vermont and New Hampshire to the north; at its east lies the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2010...
and was admitted to the Suffolk
Suffolk County, Massachusetts
Suffolk County has no land border with Plymouth County to its southeast, but the two counties share a water boundary in the middle of Massachusetts Bay.-National protected areas:*Boston African American National Historic Site...
bar. He then moved to Taunton
Taunton, Massachusetts
Taunton is a city in Bristol County, Massachusetts, United States. It is the seat of Bristol County and the hub of the Greater Taunton Area. The city is located south of Boston, east of Providence, north of Fall River and west of Plymouth. The City of Taunton is situated on the Taunton River...
as a partner in the firm of Nathaniel Morton, Henry Williams, Henry J. Fuller and Fred S. Hall. In 1853 Bennett married Sally Crocker, the daughter of the congressman Samuel Leonard Crocker. She outlived him and died in 1911. They had four children: Caroline, Edmund Neville, Samuel and Mary. The first two children died in infancy, while Samuel Bennett later became the Dean of Boston University Law School.
In 1872 the University of Vermont
University of Vermont
The University of Vermont comprises seven undergraduate schools, an honors college, a graduate college, and a college of medicine. The Honors College does not offer its own degrees; students in the Honors College concurrently enroll in one of the university's seven undergraduate colleges or...
conferred the Doctor of Laws degree (LL. D.) on Bennett.
Judicial, political and academic career
Bennett maintained an active legal practice in Taunton for many years. In May 1858, he was appointed judge of probate and insolvency in Bristol CountyBristol County, Massachusetts
-Demographics:As of the census of 2000, there were 534,678 people, 205,411 households, and 140,706 families residing in the county. The population density was 962 people per square mile . There were 216,918 housing units at an average density of 390 per square mile...
, and he held that post until he resigned from it in 1883. In 1864 the city of Taunton was formally incorporated, and Bennett was elected the city's first mayor, he was inaugurated on January 2, 1865. Bennett was re-elected mayor in 1866 and 1867, he served until his resignation on June 19, 1867. In his political career he began as a supporter of the Whig Party
Whig Party (United States)
The Whig Party was a political party of the United States during the era of Jacksonian democracy. Considered integral to the Second Party System and operating from the early 1830s to the mid-1850s, the party was formed in opposition to the policies of President Andrew Jackson and his Democratic...
and then as a founding member of the Republican Party
Republican Party (United States)
The Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the GOP . The party's platform generally reflects American conservatism in the U.S...
.
From 1870-1872 he held the post of a lecturer in the Dane Law School
Harvard Law School
Harvard Law School is one of the professional graduate schools of Harvard University. Located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, it is the oldest continually-operating law school in the United States and is home to the largest academic law library in the world. The school is routinely ranked by the U.S...
at Harvard University
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...
. In the fall of 1872 he was appointed as the inaugural Dean of Boston University
Boston University
Boston University is a private research university located in Boston, Massachusetts. With more than 4,000 faculty members and more than 31,000 students, Boston University is one of the largest private universities in the United States and one of Boston's largest employers...
's Law School but due to ill health had to decline the appointment. He did however teach the law at Boston University, and then in 1875 assumed the post of Dean of the Law School. He held that position until his death in 1898. He lectured in many areas of the law such as contracts, constitutional law, and probate. As an experienced practitioner, judge and law school lecturer Bennett wrote a number of legal textbooks concerning agricultural law, business law, constitutional law, fire insurance, and collated various volumes of English law reports and cases in equity. He also edited and revised a number of existing legal textbooks written by earlier authorities such as Joseph Story's Conflict of Laws (1857), Story's Agency (1862), Blackwell's Tax Titles (1864), and Indermaur's Principles of the Common Law (1878). According to Jones' Index of Legal Periodical Literature (1888), Bennett is listed as the author of fifty-nine articles in various legal periodicals such as the Harvard Law Review
Harvard Law Review
The Harvard Law Review is a journal of legal scholarship published by an independent student group at Harvard Law School.-Overview:According to the 2008 Journal Citation Reports, the Review is the most cited law review and has the second-highest impact factor in the category "law" after the...
, Law Quarterly Review
Law Quarterly Review
The Law Quarterly Review is an academic legal periodical published by Sweet & Maxwell. It was first published in 1885...
and American Law Register. He also acted as an editor of various legal journals.
In 1891 Governor William Russell
William Russell (governor)
William Eustis Russell was a U.S. political figure. He served as the 37th Governor of Massachusetts between 1891 and 1894, becoming the state's youngest ever elected Governor at age 34.-Family:...
appointed Bennett as chairman of the Board of Commissioners for the Promotion of Uniformity of Legislation in the USA. In 1896 he was appointed by Governor Roger Wolcott
Roger Wolcott (Massachusetts)
Roger Wolcott was the son of Joshua Huntington Wolcott and Cornelia Wolcott, and was the brother of Huntington Frothingham Wolcott. He graduated from Harvard University in 1870, and from Harvard Law School in 1874...
as chairman of the Commission on the Revision of the Public Statutes.
Bennett was also interested in early colonial history and belonged to the Old Colony Historical Society. In 1889 he delivered the society's historical address on the occasion of the 250th anniversary of settlement in Taunton. Bennett is remembered and honored in Taunton with a public school named after him.http://profiles.doe.mass.edu/home.asp?mode=so&ot=5&o=1648&so=1651-6 He was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
American Academy of Arts and Sciences
The American Academy of Arts and Sciences is an independent policy research center that conducts multidisciplinary studies of complex and emerging problems. The Academy’s elected members are leaders in the academic disciplines, the arts, business, and public affairs.James Bowdoin, John Adams, and...
in 1892.
Religious beliefs
Bennett was a lifelong Episcopalian. During his residency in Taunton, MassachusettsTaunton
Taunton is the county town of Somerset, England. The town, including its suburbs, had an estimated population of 61,400 in 2001. It is the largest town in the shire county of Somerset....
Bennett served as a warden at St. Thomas's Episcopal church. He also served as a delegate to the Episcopal church's Diocesan Convention in 1874, 1877, 1880 and 1883, and he was a member of Diocesan Board of Trustees. He was one of the trustees of the Episcopal Theological School in Cambridge, Massachusetts
Cambridge, Massachusetts
Cambridge is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States, in the Greater Boston area. It was named in honor of the University of Cambridge in England, an important center of the Puritan theology embraced by the town's founders. Cambridge is home to two of the world's most prominent...
, and served as the school's president from 1895-1898.
Bennett also delivered talks about his faith. One of his lectures was in the field of Christian apologetics
Christian apologetics
Christian apologetics is a field of Christian theology that aims to present a rational basis for the Christian faith, defend the faith against objections, and expose the perceived flaws of other world views...
. His apologetic work, which was published posthumously, was The Four Gospels from a Lawyer's Standpoint. In this text Bennett argued that the New Testament
New Testament
The New Testament is the second major division of the Christian biblical canon, the first such division being the much longer Old Testament....
gospels were trustworthy sources for the life and teachings of Jesus Christ. He accepted the traditional authorship of the gospels - Matthew
Matthew the Evangelist
Matthew the Evangelist was, according to the Bible, one of the twelve Apostles of Jesus and one of the four Evangelists.-Identity:...
, Mark
Mark the Evangelist
Mark the Evangelist is the traditional author of the Gospel of Mark. He is one of the Seventy Disciples of Christ, and the founder of the Church of Alexandria, one of the original four main sees of Christianity....
, Luke
Luke the Evangelist
Luke the Evangelist was an Early Christian writer whom Church Fathers such as Jerome and Eusebius said was the author of the Gospel of Luke and the Acts of the Apostles...
, and John
John the Evangelist
Saint John the Evangelist is the conventional name for the author of the Gospel of John...
- and applied legal principles of reasoning in examining their accounts about Christ. Bennett opened his lecture by stating:
"It is, as you know, a part of the lawyer's profession to examine and cross-examine witnesses, to detect their errors, and expose their falsehoods; or, on the other hand, to reconcile their conflicting statements, and from seeming discord to evolve and make manifest the real truth. And this paper is the result of an effort, on my own part, to ascertain whether or not, independently of divine revelation, independently of the exercise of a devout Christian faith, independently of any appeal to our religious sentiments, the truth of the story told in the four Gospels could be satisfactorily established by a mere reasoning process, and by applying the same principles and the same tests to the Gospel narratives that we observe in determining the truth or falsity of any other documents, or any other historical accounts." (pp 1-2)>
Bennett believed that the distinctive content and perspectives about Jesus that appear in the four gospels points to the independence of each writer. He held to the common literary and juridical principle of harmonization when looking at the differences and apparent discrepancies in details as recounted in parallel accounts. Bennett was convinced that the gospels were not forged documents but rather could be depended on as primary sources.
In the late twentieth century Bennett's book was reprinted in the inaugural edition of The Simon Greenleaf School of Law Review (1981–82). His work was also appraised in Ross Clifford
Ross Clifford
Ross Clifford is an Australian Baptist theologian, political commentator, radio personality and author. A former lawyer who later joined the ministry, Clifford became a campaigner on moral issues while a suburban Sydney pastor in the 1980s...
's Leading Lawyers' Case for the Resurrection (1996). Bennett's apologetic text is now categorized as belonging to the "juridical" or "legal" school of thought in Christian apologetics. http://www.trinitysem.edu/journal/philjohnsonpap.html
Biographical sources and references
- Benjamin Curtis, "Honorable Edmund Hatch Bennett," New England Magazine and Bay State Monthly, Vol. 4, no. 3 (March 1886), pp. 225–228. http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/ndlpcoop/moahtml/title/lists/bays_V4I3.html
- Bacon, George A. Bostonia: The Boston University Alumni Magazine, Vol. VII, no. 5 (February 1934).
- Clifford, Ross. Leading Lawyers' Case for the Resurrection, (Edmonton: Canadian Institute for Law, Theology and Public Policy, 1996), pp. 15–27. ISBN 1-896363-02-4
- Curtis, Benjamin R. "The Boston University Law School,"New England Magazine and Bay State Monthly, Vol. 4, no. 3 (March 1886), pp. 218–225. http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/ndlpcoop/moahtml/title/lists/bays_V4I3.html
- Johnson, Philip. "Juridical Apologists 1600 - 2000 AD: A Bio-Bibliographical Essay," Global Journal of Classical Theology, Vol. 3, no. 1 (March 2002)http://www.trinitysem.edu/journal/philjohnsonpap.html
- Reno, Conrad. Memoirs of the Judiciary and the Bar of New England for the Nineteenth century, with a History of the Judicial System of New England, Vol. 1 (Boston: Century Memorial Publishing, 1900).
Select bibliography of Bennett's writings
- English Reports in Law and Equity: Containing Reports of Cases Heard in the House of Lords, Privy Council, courts of equity and common law, and in the Admiralty and Ecclesiastical courts, (Boston: C. C. Little and J. Brown, 1851–1858).
- Farm Law: a treatise on the legal rights and liabilities of farmers, reprint edition, (Littleton: Fred B. Rothman, 1996). ISBN 0-8377-1981-X
- "Forebearance to Sue," Harvard Law Review, vol. 10, no. 2 (May 25, 1896), pp. 113–118.
- The Four Gospels from a Lawyer's Standpoint, (Boston and New York: Houghton, Mifflin & Co, 1899).
- The Four Gospels from a Lawyer's Standpoint reprinted in The Simon Greenleaf Law Review, Vol. 1 (1981–82), pp. 15–74.
- Hints About Business: A Manual of Business Law, Customs and Methods, (Portland, Me: Hoyt, Fogg and Donham, 1881).
- "Is Mere Gain to a Promisor a Good Consideration for His Promise?" Harvard Law Review, Vol. 10, no. 5 (December 26, 1896), pp. 257–264.
- Selection of Leading Cases in Criminal Law, second edition (Boston: Little, Brown & Co, 1869).
External links
- Edmund Hatch Bennett Elementary School, Taunton, Massachusetts http://profiles.doe.mass.edu/home.asp?mode=so&ot=5&o=1648&so=1651-6
- Boston University Law School Historical Timeline http://www.bu.edu/law/about/timeline.html
- Taunton, Massachusetts Home Page http://www.ci.taunton.ma.us/