All rise for the honorable justices of the Supreme Court of the State of Minnesota
Please be seated.
Well, good morning and welcome to everyone
to this very special session of the Minnesota Supreme Court.
We convene this morning to honor our past through the formal acceptance
of the papers of the Honorable Edward C Stringer,
associate justice of the Minnesota Supreme Court.
To my mind, this is one of the most significant events
in the life of our court as an institution.
And so we stop today to pay tribute
to one whom tribute is due.
Tribute is due for his service
to this court and to the state of Minnesota.
And it is right that we do so, for it has been said
that if we do not honor our past, we lose our future.
If we destroy our roots, we cannot grow.
We pay respect to that principle
today, through this ceremony and with this amazing collection
of memorabilia assembled from Justice Stringer's service to the court
and to the people of Minnesota,
we have a short program today to help us with this important task.
And I will very briefly introduce our speakers now
and then ask them to just proceed in order.
First, making remarks on behalf of the Court
will be the senior member of our Court, Associate Justice G. Barry Anderson.
Justice Anderson has served on the Court since 2004.
Following Justice Anderson will be Justice Paul Anderson,
who served on the court with Justice Stringer.
Justice Paul Anderson served on the court from 1994 until 2013.
And then following Justice Paul Anderson will be
Justice Sam Hansen.
Justice Hansen served on the court from 2000 to until 2008.
Before I turn
to the speakers, I do want to acknowledge and thank Justice Stringer’s family
for sharing him with us all of these years.
It is not always easy to be the family of a judge
because a judge, a judge's life requires
sacrifices of you as well.
And so I want to recognize the family
for your service for all of these years.
I also want to thank the State Law Library,
the State Law Librarian, Liz Reppe, and the Minnesota
Supreme Court Historical Society for their work in getting us to this day.
So thank you so much to everyone.
And actually, before I turn things over
to Justice Anderson, I forgot to introduce myself.
I'm Justice Natalie Hudson, and I have the privilege and honor
of being the court's new chief justice.
And so, again, welcome.
And now I turn the podium over to
Justice G. Barry Anderson, for remarks on behalf of the court.
Thank you, Chief Justice.
It's my privilege and honor to, on behalf of the court,
accept the papers and records of Justice Edward Stringer.
I've been asked to make a few remarks here,
and I'm going to divide them into three parts
a personal observation and some discussion of Justice Stringer's work.
And finally,
Justice Stringer doesn't know this, but I'm going to close with his own words.
So let me start with a personal observation.
I first met Justice Stringer as a practicing lawyer in McLeod County,
and I met him through the work of the legendary
amiable and avuncular Saint Paul lawyer Mike Galvin.
Mike wanted me to
people know what's coming here because they know the story.
But Mike wanted me to take Justice Stringer out
to Greater Minnesota and introduce him to the good folk of McLeod County.
And we spent the better part of a day in in Glencoe
at the courthouse and then at the Hutchinson Rotary Club.
And poor Justice Stringer was then dragged by me,
a practicing lawyer around the community, introducing him to various
buildings and sites and so forth.
And I'm sure he had more important things to do, but he
he tolerated the experience well.
And it was a it was a great day
visiting the folks in McLeod County.
Let's talk just briefly about his work on behalf of the court.
These proceedings, like the one we have today, are important
because they remind us that the work that we do builds
on the work of those who came before us and served on the court.
And so it is with Justice Stringer,
the seat that he occupied
during his time on the court
was previously occupied by Minnesota legal luminaries including Rosalie
Wahl and Harry McLaughlin and actually those that followed him.
It's taken a while to get this book together.
So there've been some people who have followed Justice Stringer
include, one of our speakers today, Sam Hanson,
Justice Dietzen and our current member of the court
who occupies the seat that Justice Stringer served so well for so many years,
Justice McKeig. Justice McKeig sends her greetings.
Justice Stringer, she could not be here today, but joins
the court in thanking you for your service.
Now what does that service consist of?
It consists, of course, writing opinions
and and participating in the work of the court.
And during Justice Stringer's time on the court, he wrote 126
majority opinions, 30 dissenting opinions, and a dozen or so hard to categorize
opinions, concurring in part, dissenting in part, whatever.
That work didn't end when Justice
Stringer's time on the court ended because like all of us,
it's a permanent record of our service
and is cited by the lawyers that follow.
His opinion
in Martin's vs Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Company,
question about a unilateral contract of employment
has been cited over 2000 times.
Those of you who've been paying attention to the recent work of the court,
without getting into the specifics and I know all of you here every day
that we have oral argument
you're watching our live stream to see how the arguments are going.
And if you've been doing that, you would note that Ly vs Nystrom
another case that dealing with the consumer fraud act
that was authored by Justice Stringer was much discussed
and has been cited over 1500 times.
And there is also a
recycling bond litigation case.
I didn't understand it, but it's been cited 1300 times,
so it's pretty significant, I guess.
These are all examples of the work that a member of the court does,
and it continues after that work is completed.
Now, finally, I told you I wanted to close
with what Justice Stringer himself has said.
I was going to quote from one of his many opinions,
and then I decided, no, let's let's have a good time today,
and we're not going to talk about the law, so to speak.
But we are going to talk a little bit about the institution of what we do here.
And Justice Stringer addressed this in a foreword that he wrote
to a William Mitchell Law Review article in 2002 and he had this
to say about the work of the court in crafting opinions.
“Crafting opinions begins to feel like
“how an artist or a composer must feel in approaching a new creation.
“It must clearly and fully express the point being made
“without saying too much that the parts must interrelate and they
“and that it must have enduring meaning.
“It begins as a concept in the minds of the justices.
“We work through the process and finally, the decision
“before the opinion is filed, each member of the court
“has an opportunity to contribute, and when it is filed
“and emerges into the sunlight, it takes its own life.”
That is a remarkably, almost poetic way to describe the work of the court.
The book that we receive today of the papers and records of Justice
Edward Stringer is a permanent memorial to the work that he did
as a member of this court.
In his written work and in his work going around the state
and visiting with not only lawyers, but ordinary citizens
who are served by the work that the court does.
It is my great pleasure,
Justice Stringer, on behalf of the Court to accept your papers and records.
Thank you very much.
Thank you very much, Justice Anderson.
And now Justice Paul Anderson.
If it pleases the court, I’d like to yield
my place on the agenda
to my colleague Sam Hanson. We're doing
things in chronological order.
OK
That is fine with the with the court. Justice Hanson, welcome.
May it please the court, counsel and guests.
My name is not Anderson.
When I was on the court with three Anderson's, I always introduced
myself as the Scandinavian diversity
on the court.
I'm here today to express my appreciation
for and admiration of the man and the legal career
of my good friend and mentor, Justice Edward C Stringer.
I'm going to discuss the first three decades of his career,
which, if to do it justice, will be here till Friday probably,
but this will be the trailer.
So this will encourage you to read the book, get the whole story.
We'll begin in the
1960s when Ed began practice and then in Saint Paul
and then I began also in the mid-sixties in Saint Paul.
The legal landscape was quite different back at that time.
In some ways, good and in some ways not so good.
But one of the good things was that in Saint Paul,
every lawyer knew every other lawyer,
and every lawyer went to the Ramsey County Bar events.
It was just something you did.
I'm not sure that happens today, but.
But that was the level of familiarity and collegiality.
So it was a it was a great time in Saint Paul.
Ed started practice with his father's
firm, Stringer Donnelly, and Sherood,
a very well known personal injury defense
firm that focused particularly on railroad cases.
His father, Philip Stringer,
created awe in our younger in the younger lawyers like myself,
when I entered the practice. He was a tall, erect man
with a shock of white hair, just the picture of dignity.
And Ed was kind of his classy,
younger prototype.
Ed was an excellent trial lawyer,
which I learned the hard way.
He and I had a case together in about 1968.
My client had been injured by a railroad car
at the Chestnut Street Crossing, which is right
where the Saint Paul Science Museum is now.
When I came to this court, I always had to drive Shepherd Road
past the Chestnut Street Crossing and call to mind this case.
Ed persuaded the jury
that my client had run into the train
as opposed to the train running into my client.
And of course, he prevailed.
And I realized right then it would be better to be
on the same side as Ed rather than opposing him.
Little did I know
that was about to happen. Within months of that trial,
Ed had decided this now 1969
that that the insurance
defense and Railroad Practice was too narrow for him.
He wanted to broaden his practice area
and he had a particular interest in antitrust law
and as luck would have it, my partner
David Raudenbush died unexpectedly.
He was our antitrust expert in the firm,
and Ed was invited to join us and did join us
and became an antitrust expert.
And it was great to be on the same side as Ed.
He progressed in leadership in the firm became a member of the board of directors.
Led several initiatives,
one of which became, for a time,
a common practice when he joined the Supreme Court.
He introduced on one of the annual dinners of the firm
the idea that the associates should provide the entertainment.
And they did if they were talented, they did their talent.
If they weren't, they did skits which turned out to be a little bit irreverent
and for
a time, the Supreme Court followed that same practice with law clerks.
I don't know if you still do or not.
Well, I think that was Ed's initiative
to get that idea started.
As he progressed in the firm,
he and some other, we'll call “young turks,” wondered
if Saint Paul was the entire universe for the practice of law.
For Briggs and Morgan, it had been for a hundred years.
And if you ask Jay O'Neill Martin, who was our senior states
person at that time, he would say Briggs is a Saint Paul firm.
Well, in about 1979, Ed and a small group
suggested that we open an office in Minneapolis,
this was the unthinkable.
At that time,
I don't know that is true so much now, but it was surely true then.
The rivalry between the two cities was
rampant.
Saint Paul businesses
didn't go to Minneapolis for their lawyers, and I don't think
Minneapolis businesses even thought there were lawyers in Saint Paul.
So it was something you you didn't think about.
And Ramsey County District Court,
on occasion, a Minneapolis law firm
would hire a Saint Paul firm as local counsel to come all the way
across the Mississippi River to appear here in Saint Paul.
There were six judges then sitting in Ramsey County,
and they were seen to be a little parochial by the Minneapolis lawyers.
So this was a radical idea
and it took some debate.
And finally, the compromise was you can go to Minneapolis
with a small group, ended up being six of us,
but there should be no fanfare or there's going to be
no announcement in the media.
In other words, we were to enter
Minneapolis by the dark of night,
and we did so.
In Minneapolis,
Ed’s practice flourished, his desire to broaden was obviously accomplished.
He did major antitrust work.
Interesting to think that one of his major
cases was the S&H green stamps against gold
bond stamps, a relic of the past, but then really major enterprises
both in Minnesota and around the country.
But he got the attention of corporate Minneapolis
being then a minneapolis lawyer, and he was recruited to join Pillsbury.
And in 1980 did decide after ten or so years with Briggs
that he would go to Pillsbury as their general counsel.
And he was there for about another ten years.
He lives his life in these neat decades.
It makes it easy to describe the phases.
And he progressed in leadership there not only general counsel,
but executive vice president and the chief administrative officer
until 1989,
when Pillsbury was acquired in a hostile takeover,
and they brought their own general counsel, the new buyers.
And so he decided he would embark on a public service, which
was was part of his family history.
His grandfather, who was a lawyer in New York
and then came to relocate in Minnesota, first in Hastings, and then Saint Paul
had been also the US attorney, which then was a part time job.
So he had a practice, but he was U.S.
attorney on the side.
So public service history,
Ed was offered several positions, considered
several positions in the administration of President H.W.
Bush, and he landed as general counsel to the Department of Education
and had a wonderful career there.
He liked to tell the story of talking
to one of the permanent lawyers in the department
how they viewed these presidential appointees
coming in from time to time, changing with each election.
And this person said, we view them as Christmas help.
Now, he knew Ed was modest and had a good sense of humor.
Otherwise he would not have ventured that statement.
I'm going to invade the next decade.
Just for one personal note, when I was on the Court of Appeals
for about a year and a half, Ed decided to retire from the Supreme Court,
and our mutual friend Michael Galvin called me
and said, Sam, you'd better apply for that position,
because when Ed goes to see the governor for his exit
interview, he's going to recommend you to replace him.
Well, I couldn't be more proud
to be able to say that I am the successor on the Supreme Court
to Edward C Stringer. Thank You.
Thank you so much, Justice Hanson for those wonderful remarks.
Justice Anderson
May it please the Court,
Justice Stringer, members of the family gathered.
Yes, I just got past the most difficult part of my speech,
remembering to say, may it please the court.
You know, we hear it all the time, but you don't when you're in this position,
you know, it's it's not something that just comes naturally anyway.
It is my privilege and honor today here to honor my esteemed colleague,
Justice Edward Stringer.
He is a very special person in my mind.
And I had the privilege of serving with him on this court
for eight years, and those are very good years.
But I get ahead of myself because I got to talk first about his
service, as in the office of the governor, Arne Carlson's chief of staff.
After Ed left Washington, he came back to Minnesota.
He had had experience in private practice.
But the thing you got to understand about Ed, he's an Amherst man.
Yes, he is.
And there's something special.
I mean, Sandy Keith shared that trait with you,
but there's something special about being an Amherst man.
It is normally mainly attributed to John May Coy,
who was distinguished career in government and in private practice.
But it's very special that you blend those two,
but you have within the fiber of your being,
a willingness and a dedication to be a public servant.
Now, Ed nearly got appointed to the federal district bench, and that
came close
I know the story it was very close at, but that was foreclosed.
So he had to figure out another alternative.
And so he decided he would seek out a position with Governor Arne Carlson.
Ed was not here during that tumultuous
election of 1990, and it was tumultuous.
And Arne was treated as an aberration.
He referred to him as Governor Lazarus.
Those who did it derogatorily said, is, he's an accidental governor.
So his first two years were very, very difficult, a number of mistakes,
he admits that, and his staff was not as good as it could be.
His first chief of staff could not deal with Arne’s style and kind of retreated.
Second chief of staff was dying of a brain tumor.
So after that first year, the office was in chaos.
And then I wasn't going to say this.
But you arrived like a
gallant man on a white horse
to save Arne's office,
because Ed had the demeanor
and he had the ability to cool things down.
And Arne can be a little bit, Barry
knows this well, a little bit confrontational a bit
combative.
But Ed had a way of mellowing that tendency.
So smoothing over things with the staff, the best example is,
is how he, there was another large personnel in the office.
Cyndy Brucado.
Yes, he laughs.
She's a large personality, but they got along.
And so the result of that was that Arne's
administration was set on a very good path forward.
He is now remembered as one of Minnesota's better governors.
He got reelected in 94,
and so much of that is due to Ed Stringer.
He showed up at the right time.
He was just, and so from my mind,
Ed Stringer was by considerable measure
the best chief of staff that Arne Carlson had.
And we owe him a debt for having
served so well.
He was appointed to the court September
94, two months after I was.
And I'm going to digress a little bit and talk about Ed in the context
of what is required to be a member of this court.
As you enter this building, you look up, there are six virtues
wisdom, courage, prosperity,
truth and integrity and prudence.
Cass Gilbert and Donald French.
Chester French put those up there because that's what they deemed.
What they saw in the people of Minnesota and what
they expected of people who served here.
And I must say that Ed has lived up to those virtues that are
there post are there.
And so what are some of the other things you need? A passion for the law.
Yes, Ed has a passion for the law and how the law is supposed to work for people.
I mean, you get that sense when you sit down and you know what
it's like.
You sit with a colleague and you talk through a case
and you feel that passion on the part of another person.
Now, Ed also has what is very necessary.
They said this about Learned Hand, very distinguished
is that he had a big ego, but that ego was tempered by humility.
Ed is modest.
Ed, you said he's modest.
He's got humility.
And that is oh first I got to back up.
You gotta have a strong ego to be where you folks are.
You don't do the things you do without having a strong ego.
And Ed, you have a strong ego.
But that ego is tempered by a sense
of humility because you have to have the courage
to continually question yourself whether you're making the right decision.
You have to have the courage to put yourself out there,
be willing to make mistakes and to listen to your colleagues.
Well, Ed had that ability.
I know that because we had many, many exchanges with each other.
So he has the ego
tempered with humility.
And also importantly, he has empathy.
Now, when Sotomayor was appointed, they kind of criticized that concept.
I see that Justice Amy Coney Barrett talked about it.
Well, because if you're on this court, you need to know
that there is somebody on the other side of every case in front of you,
and you have to be able to put yourself
in the shoes of the person who's in front of you.
And Ed had that empathy.
He did. Now,
I'm going to tell
one little story that shows how his humility showed itself.
So Sandra Gardebring was leaving the court.
She was a valued colleague and we were saying our goodbyes.
And I can remember those so clearly when Ed Stringer came,
he said, well, Sandra, the thing I appreciated most about you
is that you could say what I was thinking
in half the words and with more clarity.
Now I'm not sure that was true.
You remember you saying there is that, but that is the humility
that comes came through him. Now
on this court
you have a wide range of issues and so you need to have a full
understanding of the concept of judicial power.
I mean, we had a case,
tobacco case
after we the day after we issued it.
It went worldwide, had worldwide impact,
and we had other cases, divorce or other.
And he even decided a case about a judicial ditch
in Murray County.
But you have to have an understanding about what judicial power is
and what the scope of those judicial powers.
And I want to say, you know, when Ed came to the court,
there was a lot of the chattering class said, oh,
the court is headed towards doom and gloom.
Rosalie Wahl is being replaced by this
fancy guy from downtown.
No, Ed is in the tradition of this court,
a centrist, a moderate, in today's world,
they’d probably say he's left of center, right?
But anyway, I won't go there.
But I mean, he brought to the court the tradition and he understood something,
the role of the court from Alexander Hamilton
is that courts should act cautiously,
but courts are to serve as a bulwark
against the ill humors that sometimes emerge from the people themselves.
And you see that in his jurisprudence with respect to the criminal law
and how he protected individuals rights.
And so I'm going to say that another thing about justice is
I was a little disappointed when Amy Coney
Barrett said that she didn't enjoy being on the court.
I enjoyed being on this court.
I mean, don't get me wrong, you got to be careful how you say it,
because people might think it's easy.
It's not easy, but this is a good court.
The people like each other and they get along with each other.
And serving, I'm reminded of it today as I walked in this courtroom,
put my arm around, the fun that we had working together as justices.
So we had tough issues, but we shared a lot.
One of those being running for election together
in 1996, traveling the state of Minnesota.
Ice storms up in Fergus Falls around, but you had a chance to talk about the law,
about the other and about family. Ed loves his family.
Ginny, he would- Oh, there I got to turn this way.
He would tell so many good stories about you, you know, really, he loves you.
And, you know, Ed and Ginny were such a team.
And is that he loved his children
and I'm going too long, but I'm going to take just a little bit.
Do you realize his daughter when she got married up on Madeline Island,
Brad and Jennifer showed up.
That's Jennifer Aniston and Brad Pitt.
I mean, that's a big deal.
But it wasn't a big deal to Ed.
He he took it in stride.
The thing he enjoyed most about that was telling other people
how people reacted to them, not how he did, but he was accustomed to that.
And I'll tell one story about what it's like to work with Ed.
It was on a Native American case criminal, punitive, civil, regulatory.
We had a disagreement.
I had been in the minority on the first three cases.
The fourth case, Justice Blatz was joining me. Now
it was four-three. Russ Anderson dissented.
Justice Page didn't like that dissent that well.
So he dissented.
And lo and behold, I got a third dissent from Stringer.
What more was there to say?
And he used some kind of inflated language.
One his second draft,
I referred to the language as being dramatic, and he revised it.
And so I took dramatic out.
And I thought that his language in the third draft was a little harsh,
maybe a bit injudicial.
I'm not sure if I referred to that way, but when Judge Stringer read
that he came into my office, I don't think I was being harsh or injudicious.
But Paul, if you say so, I'll take that language out.
And here's the fun part I said to him, But, Ed,
you want me to put the words dramatic back in?
Because with the words dramatic, you can use your quote
from Shakespeare that the play's the thing.
It's how to get the conscience of the king.
What he's trying to do is get Blatz’s attention.
And he wanted to do that.
And I said, well, I’ll put the words dramatic back in and I'm going to tell you
in two weeks, that'll be the quote that you'll see in Minnesota Lawyer.
And sure enough, two weeks later.
And so we were very good colleagues.
We had differences.
Some areas of the law.
But, you know, Ed was to the manor born.
You know, he's his silk stocking. Grandfather,
U.S. Attorney, father [unintelligible]
I'm a farm kid who grew up milking cows.
But we had this bond that we established as colleagues,
but there is one area
that is irreconcilable between us.
Ed Stringer wears clothes
well, very, very well.
I, on the other hand, look at him. I on the other hand
I occupy clothes.
and we we never it never the twain shall meet.
Now there are some people on the court
that are competing to be a successor for his sartorial splendor.
But I must concede my mantle has passed to Barry Anderson.
Sorry, Barry.
Take that shot at you. But you know, it's
it's true.
You and I are so alike in that regard.
Well, as I end,
I have cherished the opportunity to work
and be a colleague of Ed Stringer, he has served the state well.
And is that the states should be grateful for his service.
I was at Caribou the other day and my colleague, I'm
writing a book about the 1990 election and my colleague,
a co-writing colleague, a student saw someone she recognized and talked to them.
And then I went over and talked to her.
She was somebody who knew Ed from when they were very, very young.
And we talked about him.
And she used a term that I would not normally use for him, that I probably is
not all that comfortable, but when she said it, I knew it was spot on.
She said to me, You know,
Ed Stringer is such a lovely human being.
Think of that,
he said, Ed Stringer is such a lovely human being
and I can't leave without saying that she was spot on and right.
Ed, you are indeed a lovely human being
and thank you for your service.
Thank you so much.
I know I went too long, but how often do you get
a chance to praise someone you like so well?
Absolutely.
And thank you Justice Anderson and Justice Hanson,
for both both of you, for your wonderful comments,
you really gave us a deeper insight into Justice Stringer and who he was,
both as a justice, but also as a friend and a colleague and a man.
And it is much appreciated, particularly since we're recording these proceedings.
I think it will stand the test of time.
So thank you to both of you.
And now I'd like to recognize our State
Law Librarian, Liz Reppe, who will formally present the papers
to the court.
May please the court.
Thank you, Chief Justice Hudson, members of the Minnesota Supreme Court.
Justice Stringer Everybody who has gathered today to
to share in this event with us,
there's a lot of work and time and people,
people's efforts that go into these materials.
And they're really of the
thousands of items that we house at the State Law Library,
they are really among the most precious to us.
The justice series was designed to provide histories of the justices and their work,
and they're an incredibly valuable piece of history
for the court and for Minnesota.
The volume entitled The Legal
and Judicial Career of Justice Edward C Stringer
is the 18th volume that we've compiled at the State Law Library.
It has been cataloged is now available to researchers at the State Law Library.
We have two additional copies that have been printed
and will be donated, one to the Historical Society
and the other to the University of Minnesota Law Library.
First and foremost, I want to be sure to thank Justice Stringer for
sharing materials about his life and work that make this
such a special book.
Thank you, Justice Anderson and Justice
Justice Hanson,
for your remarks today that that really helped
tell the story of Justice
Stringer's work and time on the court.
I want to thank and acknowledge two members of the Law Library staff.
Leslie Greenwood was the primary editor of the book.
She worked through ten drafts to get us to the point that we're at now.
It was a it was a it was a great undertaking for her.
And I'm very thankful.
And our head of technical services, Erica Nutzman, is here somewhere.
Oh, there she is.
She provided wonderful
proofreading efforts, photo editing,
and also coordinated the professional
binding of the book.
Finally, I just want to thank the people that contributed to the book
colleagues, friends, former law clerks of Justice Stringer’s
who gave us some extra insight on the life and career of Justice Stringer.
So it is my pleasure to offer to you for inclusion
in the libraries under the Supreme Court's jurisdiction,
The Legal Judicial Career of Justice Edward C Stringer. May it serve
as a written record of his commitment to shaping law in Minnesota
and his eight years serving the state of Minnesota on the Supreme Court.
May I approach the bench?
Yes, you may.
May it please the court.
Justice Stringer, would you come forward
on behalf of the State Law Library?
I'd like to present you your book.
Thank you, Liz.
And thank you for all your work and and the work of your assistants.
You did an amazing job.
You're so welcome. Yes. Okay.
Thank you. Justice Stringer,
But before you speak, I want to say just a few words, if I might.
So please have a seat and then we'll have you come up.
Just thank you.
Thank you.
On on behalf of the Supreme Court, I accept this book,
The Judicial Career of Justice Edward C Stringer.
It is a tremendous addition to the history of our court,
and it is so important that we record our history.
It is the history of our institution and the people who serve it
here today and in the past,
this tradition preserves the commitment and dedication of the people.
And in this instance, the justices who help
hold this institution together for the people of Minnesota.
And in accepting these papers, we provide a link to our past,
but also a guide for our future.
So thank you, Justice Stringer, and thank you again to the State
Law Library and to the Minnesota Supreme Court Historical Society.
For the many hours that you have put into this important project.
I had a chance to glance
through the book before we came out, and it is just a wonderful compilation
of stories and pictures and news articles, and your opinions,
Justice Stringer.
It is just a wonderful addition and something
that you should rightly be very, very proud of.
And we are just delighted to have this become a part of our library as well.
And so with that Justice Stringer,
we'd love to hear from you.
May I please the Court
I want to start, Madam Chief
Justice, with my deepest congratulations to you on your recent appointment.
It's just terrific.
It will be a mark
on our judicial excellence in this state.
I also want to thank the Court
for its support of the former justice
career book program that we're engaged in right at the moment.
It's an opportunity to
have a a a context for the personal flavor
that we have as justices,
as the years go on.
Thanks also to the State Law Library, Liz Reppe, Erica Nutzman
Leslie Greenwood for their help in putting my career book together.
You came up with pictures and articles that I did not know existed.
And finally, thanks to
Sam Hansen and Paul Anderson for their remarks,
I kept wondering who you were talking about
all those gracious comments. With each of you,
I had many, many years of of
fun and good, solid work on the court.
Paul and I ran our first year together
for we had to run for reelection almost right away.
And and we traveled this state
and just had a hoot.
He got elected by 95%.
And I squeaked by because my my opponent was
Mr. Peterson. Justice Stringer,
I'm going to ask you to move that mic towards you a little bit more.
We want everybody in the viewing audience to make sure they hear you.
And I also want to thank Sam Hansen,
who I practiced law with, with for years.
And I enjoyed so much.
I often thought that if I ever got in a jam, he's the guy he'd go to.
So thank you to you two.
I'm going to use my time here to do a quick overview
of my career and you'll get to hear it again.
I guess
because I was as I was writing my book,
I realized how events oriented it was
and in my route to the Supreme Court and how often events offered me
opportunities that I wouldn't have had without them.
Starting at the beginning of my career
and Sam covered
some of this.
I started in 1960
and and for the first ten years,
I clerked at the very beginning,
one of my colleagues as a clerk was David Durenberger.
Interesting.
And I and I began practicing law
in my father's small but excellent firm
in general practice law firm Saint Paul learning litigation.
My father was a litigator.
His father was a litigator and doing defense work,
as Sam pointed out, with railroads and insurance defense clients,
but building a small practice on my own.
Then ten years later, in 1970, with my father's
full support, I joined the Briggs and Morgan Firm.
As Sam also mentioned, a much larger firm in Saint Paul, where I could focus on
my field of greatest interest corporate law,
principally trade regulation and antitrust litigation.
Briggs had a fast-growing
business clientele. In 1980, four of
my Briggs colleagues and I were delegated to open the Minneapolis office
to service its growing business
on, quote, the other side of town.
Soon after our opening,
a headhunter had contacted me
to discuss a senior corporate counsel position
in a local Fortune 500 company.
I assumed that it was one of my colleagues, and I thought
Sam was probably the one,
and I wasn't at all happy about that.
But in any event,
I met with this Headhunter, and
to my surprise, it was me that he was interested in.
I was not looking for a career change and this would have been a very big change
for me, having only one client no longer litigating
on the front line and a life in the business world.
My family strongly supported it
however. Why not?
After 20 years as a litigator, try something new.
I went for it.
They also said
that it was an opportunity to meet the Doughboy,
which I put a great deal of emphasis on.
And on January 1, 1980, I became the first senior vice
president and general counsel of the Pillsbury Company.
The early years of the 1980s
were a period of rapid growth corporately.
In addition to my general counsel responsibilities
in the transaction and litigation work, I represented the company in its
financial contributions to the education
and public service agencies
the company supported, and I often joined their boards.
I enjoyed this work very much.
In the second half of the eighties, a business
downturn brought corporate stocks down significantly.
Pillsbury's included and Grand Metropolitan,
a British conglomerate, made a hostile takeover bid for Pillsbury stock
at a price our outside counsel
characterized as preemptive.
We fought the legal battle, but
by 1988 year end, Grand Met
owned Pillsbury, and I was out of a job.
My first inclination was to check out
the Corporate Council world for opportunities.
Texaco was the most interesting.
Fresh out of bankruptcy and looking for a new general counsel,
its legal system was worldwide,
but due to the bankruptcy, it was in complete disorder.
In early 1989, I interviewed
at Texaco headquarters and was offered the job.
But I had a very big environmental concern about the oil business
and the recent sinking the recent sinking of the Exxon Valdez
in Alaska, destroying miles of coastal shoreline.
My family, as dispersed countrywide
as they were united in opposition.
It also hit me hard that I really didn't
want the battlefield life of a corporate council any more,
an association with an education system and other public service institutions
were much more interesting and I think important.
And that is where I wanted to go.
I turned down the Texaco offer. Soon after,
a friend, a friend who had been on the Pillsbury
board of directors inquired about my plans.
I discussed them with him, and he responded
that he was a friend of George H.W.
Bush, the newly elected president, and he would make some inquiries.
A few days later, he reported that the general counsel position
at the Department of Education,
a Cabinet agency, was open,
and would I be interested?
Absolutely, I responded.
I was interviewed at the White House, was offered the general counsel position
and was Senate confirmed in early 1989.
I bought a townhouse and settled in
for the four year term at the Department of Education.
The legal staff of the Education Department, about 50 career attorneys,
were some of the finest, most dedicated lawyers
I had worked with, knowledgeable in their specialty,
completely committed to the work of the department
and for the next two years, my job was split
between facilitating their work
as litigators, investigators, regulation drafters.
Basically whatever they needed.
And my work for the Cabinet secretary
was the other part of my responsibilities, and those were special projects,
particularly in the student loan program, which was really just emerging.
And the default, the rapid rate of defaults.
Meanwhile, back in Minnesota in the fall of 1990,
Arne Carlson had been elected governor after a
only a 16 day campaign.
Paul Anderson commented on this.
Because of the shortness of the campaign,
no nucleus of an election team had formed to later
become a pool for his staff appointments, as was customary,
and he took office with only a skeleton staff.
Senator David Durenberger made some calls seeking help, including to me,
but I declined because of my commitments at the Education Department.
Almost as if it were on cue,
however, only a few days later, I was notified
that Secretary Cavazos was leaving the Office
of Education and Lamar Alexander
would be appointed to the new secretary.
I was also advised that it was protocol
for all appointed senior staff to tender their resignations
so that the incoming secretaries could have their own team.
I did so, and within a few days, once again,
I was free to choose what would be next in my career.
I had been in D.C.
for two years and missed my Minnsota connections.
Senator Dave Durenberger's pleas for help for the Governor
Carlson administration rang in my ears and I decided
to move back to Minnesota to do what I could do to assist the new governor.
I joined his staff, continuing my interest in the field of education
but also working with him and his staff and building his team.
As Paul mentioned, Paul Anderson mentioned,
within a few months, his chief of staff fell fatally ill.
And I accepted the governor's request that I take over as chief of staff.
Over the next few months, we assembled an excellent team
of specialists in the legislative fields the legislature would be active in
in the 1992 session.
By the close of 1992, the governor's office was fully staffed
with excellent personnel who knew their jobs and got them done.
One morning in the spring of 1993, I was in my office
and the governor knocked on the door to ask me a question.
Rosalie- Justice Rosalie Wahl was retiring
from the court in the summer of 1994, and
would I be interested in being appointed to help to fill her vacancy?
I was truly astonished as the more common
route to the Supreme Court was through the lower court system.
I responded, Let me think about it.
I just thought about it.
Yes, absolutely. Yes.
The governor was pleased, said that my background as a litigator
and general counsel in the corporate world,
as well as in the federal and state agencies, might bring some interesting
points of view to the court's deliberations.
I was sworn in in September 4, 1994,
and all I can say in a wrap
is that I feel very honored and fortunate to have served on this great court.
Thank you.
Thank you so much,
Justice Stringer, and congratulations to you.
It's always good to see you.
We we happened to run into each other periodically.
And I always enjoy those meetings.
So it's really good to see you. Good to see your family.
Thank you.
And thank you for just a stellar career.
Thank you.
If I could take just a few more minutes to introduce my family.
Absolutly. And friends who are here.
I have four children.
Two of them are here, Lucy and Charlie.
And they are sitting together right back here.
You guys have to do something. Yeah. Wave your hands. Yeah.
Did you recognize any common characteristics?
Good to have you here with us.
Lucy's children are here.
Lucy, would you like to introduce your children?
Just one.
Eleanor. Eleanor and her husband.
Eleanor. -Welcome.
Eleanor and her husband, Dan, were married a week ago.
Congratulations.
In Wheeling, West Virginia.
And my, let's see,
my son in law, Brian, is here with his wife, Mary.
Hello.
Welcome Welcome. Yes.
Oh, over on this side, we have
Ellie and go.
Oh, I got I got Ellie and Gordon, Dan and Mack and Lily
and AJ.
All right.
Well, children and Amelia,
a friend of.
And did I miss anybody?
Linda okay.
Linda is the wife of my oldest son, Philip,
who is somewhere in the Caribbean on a sailboat.
Oh, not bad.
But then
my youngest daughter is in Olympia, Washington,
and she could not be here today.
So that is it.
Thank you, Madam Chief Justice.
Thank you. It’s been a great honor.
Thank you very much, Justice Stringer.
And on behalf of the court, once again, I just want to
thank you, Justice Stringer, for your service to the court.
Thank you to all of your family.
Thank you to our speakers here today.
And this was just an important event for the court.
Thank you to Liz for coordinating all of this.
This is a lot of work, but so important to the history of the court.
So thank you to everyone.
We are adjourned and I believe we have a small reception afterwards here.
We can clap.
Yes, yes.
[Applause]
Thank you.
Very nice, very nice.
Thank you for that, Justice Thissen.
So we are adjourned.