February 1, 1977
Page 3046
ON THE DEATH OF ROBERT B. WILLIAMSON
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, Robert B. Williamson, a brilliant jurist and a good friend, died the day after Christmas after more than 30 years of judicial service to his State and the Nation.
Bob Williamson served 4 years on Maine's Superior Court, 6 years as a justice of the Maine Supreme Judicial Court, and 14 years as Maine's Chief Justice. After his retirement from the bench at age 70, he was called upon to serve, and served willingly, on many statewide, and national commissions and panels.
But beyond these facts of his service, his enthusiasm, his boyish manner and his scrupulous fairness won him the respect and admiration of all those who knew him.
As Governor of Maine, I nominated him to be Chief Justice. I knew him as a fairminded man, a man who loved the law, and a good friend. I will miss him, and I know the legal community will feel his loss.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that an article in the Maine Sunday Telegram on Judge Williamson's death be printed in the RECORD.
There being no objection, the article was ordered to be printed in the RECORD, as follows:
[From the Maine Sunday Telegram, Jan. 2, 1977]
MR. JUSTICE
(By Bill Caldwell)
It was snowing heavily in Augusta when hundreds gathered at the South Paris Congregational Church last Wednesday to say goodbye to Robert B. Williamson, for 14 years Chief Justice of the Supreme Judicial Court of Maine.
The snowfall gentled all the sounds, so there was no unnecessary noise when the Chief Justice left us.
And there was in keeping. There was never unnecessary noise around Bob Williamson.
Gentleness: Quietness: Graciousness: Humility: Old world courtesy and courtliness. These were the hallmarks of Robert Williamson, a very gentle gentleman. These qualities made the Chief Justice more than a great judge; he was a much loved man, a warm and compassionate human being, even to the accused standing before his bench.
Edith Hary, State Law Librarian, had been getting reference books for Williamson for over a quarter century. "We knew his voice over the phone, of course. And as Chief Justice, we'd jump to satisfy his every wish. But when he wanted a book, he'd phone himself. And that voice we knew instantly would always begin by saying simply 'This is Robert Williamson . . .' He was a modest man."
A shipping clerk, Norman Pierce, used to bring reference books from the Law Library to the office of the Chief Justice. When Norman Pierce died, the Chief Justice sent to his widow a moving, sincere, hand written note saying how much he had enjoyed knowing Norman Pierce.
These are envelopes upon envelopes of news clippings about Williamson in the Telegram's library. Each is an imprint upon the state left by one of Maine's finest sons.
The smallest is a yellowed, little clipping datelined Augusta, Sept. 2, 1923. It begins "A popular Augusta young man, Robert Byron Williamson, recently took the examination for admittance to the Maine bar and came through with flying colors. Mr. Williamson will soon enter into partnership with Lewis A. Burleigh. Their fathers were also partners in an earlier Williamson and Burleigh firm."
Maybe one reason Robert Williamson carried his high judicial honors with so much grace and modesty, was because he was the fourth in a line of five generations of Williamson lawyers, who began practicing here four years before Maine became a state. His great grandfather Joseph Williamson began his law career in Belfast in 1816.
Williamson's mother was the daughter of Maine Governor Edwin C. Burleigh.
The clippings tell the march of 24 year old lawyer Williamson up the ladders of Maine. The first appointment, three years after Harvard Law School, came in 1926. He was named the U.S. Commissioner for Kennebec County. He resigned in December 1928, after being elected to his first and only term as a Republican representative in the State Legislature. There is a clipping of his marriage June 2, 1925 to Miss Grace Warren Whitney. Grace, his wife for 52 years, went to Cony High, as did her husband and she went to Wellesley College, while he went to Harvard. For a half a century and more, tiny Grace, just topping five feet, stood by his side, the strong dependable support of her long, lanky, topping six feet husband.
At 46, Williamson was named justice of the Maine Superior Court by Governor Horace A. Hildreth, on Aug. 15, 1945. Within four years, Williamson was elevated to become justice of the Supreme Court, named by Gov. Frederick G. Payne on April 28, 1949.
Six years later, on Oct. 4, 1956, Gov. Edmund S. Muskie gave Williamson the oath of office when he became Chief Justice of the Maine Supreme Court. And seven years later, in Sept. 1963, Gov. John Reed named Williamson to his second seven year term as Chief Justice of Maine.
In August 1970, Williamson reached mandatory retirement age. He had served 25 years on the Maine bench, 14 as Chief Justice. But in retirement, his service continued without let up. He served on many nation wide and state wide commissions and panels.
"He was in the Law Library on the Tuesday before he died on Monday, Dec. 26," Edith Hary said.
Edith Hary considers the Law Library kind of a special monument to Williamson. "He helped us beyond measure. When we opened as a special law library in 1970, I asked him to let us hang his portrait here."
This is the portrait by Waldo Pierce. "I like it. It has his special boyishness. Even at 77, Judge Williamson never lost that boyishness . . . He was up beat, enthusiastic. We'd sit through long, dull meetings. But he would come out saying "Don't you agree So and So spoke very well?," and "So and So made several excellent points."
Lawyers and judges know best what great improvements were made in the whole fabric of Maine's judicial systems during the 14 important years Williamson was Chief Justice.
"He made few waves himself. But he had a quality of a special kind which made everyone around him do better work, and more of it, than they ever dreamed they could," says Edith Hary.
To members of the press, Judge Williamson was always helpful, available, and instructive.
"I like newspapering," he said. "I worked once for the Kennebec Journal. And at Harvard, I was an editor of The Crimson. There have been many times I'd rather have been a newspaperman than a jurist."
Ten years ago, Williamson as Chief Justice, wrote two major articles for the Maine Sunday Telegram on the future of the courts in Maine. A seeming conservative, Judge Williamson broke totally with the tradition that a presiding Chief Justice of the Supreme court should not speak out publicly about Court reform.
But he was indeed a rebel, the quiet, the gentle, the modest rebel. A colleague has said that one reason such enormous changes occurred under Williamson, was because of his "gentle, conservative way of doing things." Few realized how much he changed the courts, or they might have opposed him.
Seldom has Maine justice been so well personified as it was by Robert B. Williamson. In him, knowledge and compassion, rectitude and humility, authority and humanity, majesty and modesty commingled into the epitome of a Chief Justice of Maine.