Connecticut Supreme Court History
Volume I (2006)

“An Act ... for constituting, and regulating Courts” and the Development of the Connecticut Supreme Court: A Bicentennial Recognition

Abstract

The story of the creation of the Connecticut Supreme Court requires many chapters. The Supreme Court owes its existence to more than a single originating act in 1818, when Connecticut first adopted a written constitution that separated governmental powers and provided for a separate judiciary. Although the 1818 event might qualify as the moment of creation of an independent Supreme Court of Errors (as it was then named), by that time state government had already been functioning, since 1784, with an identically named Supreme Court of Errors sitting atop the court system, even if still subordinate to the legislature. Before statehood, and dating back to the colony’s founding in 1636, Connecticut maintained a legal system for hearing disputes, with appellate tribunals in one form or another existing over time. Each stage in the development of Connecticut’s courts represented a change in governmental power and design toward features that would eventually define the constitutionally identified and independent Supreme Court of Errors. The Constitution of 1818 represents a capstone, then, as much as a creation.

Today, in 2006, it is fully proper to recognize the bicentennial anniversary of one of the most important chapters in the Connecticut Supreme Court’s history. In 1806, the General Assembly enacted a statute that represented the penultimate development prior to the 1818 constitutionalization of the judiciary as an independent department of government. The law, “An Act ... for constituting, and regulating Courts,” provided, in part, for the reorganization of the Supreme Court membership. At the time, the Supreme Court existed by virtue of General Assembly enactment, with no independent basis for its power or authority. More important for assessing the significance of the act, before the 1806 reorganization, the court’s membership consisted of the governor, lieutenant governor, and members of the General Assembly’s Council (the Assembly’s upper chamber). To be clear, these persons were elected officials and at the head of the sole governing institution, the General Assembly. The new legislation replaced these members with the judges of the Superior Court, who were barred from holding elected office. Under the new law, nine Superior Court judges would sit in sets of three across the state to hear various cases; but they would also come together as a group to sit as the Supreme Court. In this way, the Supreme Court for the first time became independent from the direct involvement of the legislature.

Full independence—which meant independence not only from direct involvement but also from monitoring and oversight by the legislature—would come only later, with the 1818 constitution. This essay reviews the 1806 “Act ... for constituting, and regulating Courts” and assesses it in the context of the broader development of the colonial and state court system from 1639 through 1818. First, it briefly reviews important dates in early Connecticut judicial history, to provide an outline of the development of the court system. Next, it recounts calls during the early period of statehood for an independent judiciary. This essay then turns to the 1806 act itself. Finally, it assess the significance of the act in the context of the Court’s development toward full independence. In the end, although other events in the Supreme Court’s development have previously received more attention—such as the 1784 act that first created the Supreme Court—a strong argument supports the conclusion that the 1806 act was the most important pre-1818 event leading to the constitutionally independent Court.

Connecticut Supreme Court History, Vol. I | Publications