Theophilus Parsons

Theophilus Parsons (b. February 13 1749, Newbury, Massachusetts - d. October 30 1813 Boston, Massachusetts) was an American jurist.

The son of a clergyman, he graduated from Harvard College in 1769, was a schoolmaster in Falmouth (now Portland, Maine) from 1770-1773; he studied law, and was admitted to the bar in 1774. In 1800, he moved to Boston.

He served as Chief Justice of the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts from 1806 until his death in Boston. In politics, he was active as one of the Federalist leaders in the state. He was a member of the Essex County convention of 1778 — called to protest against the proposed state constitution — and as a member of the "Essex Junto" was probably the author of "The Essex Result", which helped to secure the constitution's rejection at the polls.

Parsons was a member of the state constitutional convention of 1779-1780 and one of the committee of twenty-six who drafted the constitution. He was also a delegate to the state convention of 1788 which ratified the Federal Constitution. According to tradition, he was the author of the famous "Conciliatory Resolutions", or proposed amendments to the constitution, which did much to win over Samuel Adams and John Hancock to ratification. His "Commentaries on the Laws of the United States" (1836) contains some of his more important legal opinions.

His son, also named Theophilus Parsons (1797-1882), was Dane Professor of Law at Harvard from 1848 to 1870. Parsons, Jr. is remembered chiefly as the author of a series of useful legal treatises and some books in support of Swedenborgian doctrines. He wrote a life of his father which was published in Boston in 1859.

External links

* [http://www.harvardsquarelibrary.org/UIA%20Online/62parsons.html Brief biography at Harvard Square Library]
* [http://www.law.ua.edu/directory/bio/abrophy/brophy_Parsons.html 1835 address delivered at Harvard]