Martin F. Morris (1834 - ?) was a Georgetown alumnus and a lawyer, judge, and professor at Georgetown University Law School. Along with another Georgetown alumnus, Richard T. Merrick, he formed the law firm of Merrick & Morris in 1868.1 He entered Georgetown in 1850, attended both its preparatory and college programs, and received an A.B. in 1860. In 1877, he received an honorary LL. D. degree from Georgetown.2
Morris was born in Washington, DC on December 3, 1834 to John F. and Joan Lawton (née Colbert) Morris. He graduated from Georgetown College in 1854 and was admitted to the bar in Baltimore, Maryland in 1863. In 1867 or 1868, he moved to Washington to form Merrick & Morris. He worked with Richard T. Merrick on the defense case of John H. Surrat, who was accused of conspiracy in the plot to assassinate President Abraham Lincoln. In 1870 he was one of the founders of Georgetown University Law School and was a professor there from 1875 until his retirement in 1906.3 In 1887 he was offered the position of chief justice of the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia, but declined.4 From 1891 to 1896 he was the dean of the faculty at Georgetown. In 1893, when the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit was formed, he was appointed to it as associate judge. He held that position until he retired. He never married.5
Morris established the Morris Historical Medal, which is still given by the University's Department of History to the best undergraduate thesis in that discipline.6
- 1Georgetown College Journal, July 1877, Vol. V No. 10, p. 117. http://hdl.handle.net/10822/1044303
- 2Martin F. Morris, "College Training and the Legal Profession," Georgetown College Journal, June 1903, Vol. XXXI No. 9, p. 450. http://hdl.handle.net/10822/1049784
- 3James S. Easby-Smith, Georgetown University in the District of Columbia, 1789-1907, its founders, benefactors, officers, instructors and alumni. Vol. 2, New York: Lewis, 1907, pp. 56 - 57. https://hdl.handle.net/2027/nyp.33433076015860?urlappend=%3Bseq=72
- 4Georgetown College Journal, April 1887, Vol. XV No. 7, p. 78. http://hdl.handle.net/10822/1044399
- 5James S. Easby-Smith, Georgetown University in the District of Columbia, 1789-1907, its founders, benefactors, officers, instructors and alumni. Vol. 2, New York: Lewis, 1907, pp. 56 - 57. https://hdl.handle.net/2027/nyp.33433076015860?urlappend=%3Bseq=72
- 6"Award of Prizes," Georgetown College Journal, June 1895, No. 9, p. 100. http://hdl.handle.net/10822/1044481
