Norman Buck

Norman Buck (April 13, 1833 – August 20, 1909) was an American lawyer and jurist who served as Associate Justice of the Idaho Territorial Supreme Court from 1880 to 1888.

Biography Buck was born on April 13, 1833, in Lancaster, New York, and moved as a child with his family to Batavia, Illinois. He attended a seminary nearby in Warrenville before moving to Sheboygan County, Wisconsin. He attended Lawrence University beginning in 1854, graduating in 1859, and he then received an LL.B. from Albany Law School in 1860. Buck opened a law practice in Winona, Minnesota, before being mustered into the Union Army in 1862 and marrying fellow Lawrence University graduate Francena Medora "Dora" Kellogg, daughter of Wisconsin legislator Chauncey Kellogg, in 1863. They would have four sons.

Buck was elected as county attorney and probate judge of Winona County, Minnesota, before he was nominated by President Rutherford B. Hayes on April 10, 1878, to be U.S. Attorney for the Idaho Territory and he was confirmed by the senate on May 10. In this position, he prosecuted Jay Gould and a son of Brigham Young. After his four-year term expired, President Chester A. Arthur renominated Buck on March 3, 1884, and he was confirmed by the senate eight days later.

Buck was the first judge to establish a court in the mining town of Murray, and it was here that he would render his most famous decision. The lode that led to the Bunker Hill Mine was discovered when it was kicked up by a donkey that had been loaned to prospector Noah Kellogg, for whom the town of Kellogg would be named. Buck overruled the jury in the case, finding that this entitled the donkey's owners to a large share in the resulting mining claims. A settlement was reached awarding the donkey's owners $76,000, the equivalent of over $2 million , before an appeal went to the full territorial supreme court, where much higher sums were potentially in play. The following year, he established a law practice in Spokane, Washington. He was elected as superior judge of Spokane County, and served from 1892 to 1896.