Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography/Cooley, Thomas McIntyre

COOLEY, Thomas McIntyre, jurist, b. in Attica, N. Y., 6 Jan., 1824; d. in Ann Arbor, Mich., 12 Sept., 1898. He began the study of law, and, removing to Michigan, completed his legal studies at Adrian, where he was admitted to the bar in January, 1846. He practised his profession for the two following years at Tecumseh, after which he settled in Adrian. For a time he edited a newspaper, “The Watch-Tower,” and in 1857 the state senate assigned to him the work of compiling the general statutes of Michigan, which were published in two volumes. In 1858 he was appointed reporter of the supreme court, an office which he retained for seven years, during which time he published eight volumes of reports. In 1859 he was made professor of law in the University of Michigan. In 1864 he was elected a justice of the supreme court of the state to fill a vacancy, and in 1869 was re-elected for the full term of eight years. In 1868-'9 he was chief justice, and in 1885 retired permanently from the bench. In 1881 a School of political science was established in the University of Michigan, and he assumed the professorship of constitutional and administrative law. He long occupied the chair of American history in the University of Michigan, and was lecturer on constitutional law, and dean of the School of political science. He published a “Digest of Michigan Reports” (1866); “The Constitutional Limitations which Rest upon the Legislative Power of the States of the American Union” (Boston, 1868; enlarged ed., 1871); and editions, with copious notes, of Blackstone's “Commentaries” (1870) and Story's “Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States,” with additional chapters on the “New Amendments” (1873); “The Law of Taxation” (1876); “The Law of Torts” (1879); “General Principles of Constitutional Law in the United States” (1880); and “Michigan: A History of Governments” (Boston, 1885).