Burr W. Jones

Burr W. Jones (March 9, 1846 – January 7, 1935) was an American lawyer, jurist, and Democratic politician from Dane County, Wisconsin. He served one term in the U.S. House of Representatives, representing Wisconsin's 3rd congressional district for the 48th Congress (1883–1885). Later in life, he served five years as a justice of the Wisconsin Supreme Court, from 1920 through 1925. He was a prominent law professor in Wisconsin, working for more than 30 years at the University of Wisconsin Law School; he also served on the Wisconsin Tax Commission and was president of the State Bar of Wisconsin, and authored a three-volume legal treatise known as Jones on Evidence.

Biography

Born in the Town of Union, in Rock County, Wisconsin Territory. His father and mother had migrated to the Wisconsin Territory from Western Pennsylvania and Western New York, respectively. His father, William Jones, died in 1855, and his mother then married Levi Leonard, a pioneer of Rock County.

Jones was raised on a farm and attended the Evansville Seminary, in Evansville, Wisconsin. He then taught at the school for three years to pay for his university education. He graduated from the literary department of the University of Wisconsin in 1870, and then from the law department in 1871. After leaving the university, he studied law in the office of William Freeman Vilas and was admitted to the State Bar of Wisconsin that year. Near the end of 1871, he began practicing law in Portage, Wisconsin, but within a year moved to Madison. While in Madison, he went through a series of partnerships, with Alden Sprague Sanborn, A. C. Parkinson, F. J. Lamb, and E. Ray Stevens.

Legacy One of the Kronshage dormitories at the University of Wisconsin–Madison is named after him, as well as a Madison city park on the Yahara River, and Burr Jones Road in the historic Leonard Leota Park in Evansville, WI.

The television series Profiles in Courage did an episode in 1964 titled "Richard T. Ely" about the "sifting and winnowing" incident. Jones was played by Leonard Nimoy.

Electoral history

U.S. House (1882, 1884)

Wisconsin Supreme Court (1922)