In 1878, the
American Bar Association was founded at
Saratoga Springs, NY. It soon began to encourage its members to form organizations of the legal profession in their respective states. In June 1883,
Woodrow Wilson left his failing law practice on Spring Street in Atlanta. In September of the same year, the General Assembly, meeting at a building that combined the
Atlanta city hall and Fulton County courthouse, appropriated one million dollars to build a new state capitol building on the same site. The next year, 1884, there was a meeting in Atlanta to form the Georgia Bar Association. The initial members of the Georgia Bar Association were all the Georgia members of the ABA. They chose as the first state bar president L. N. Whittle, who was commander of the Macon Militia during the
Civil War.
Macon headquarters In the late 19th century, Macon was the population center of Georgia and was easily accessible to the rest of the state. When the state's legal community formed the Georgia Bar Association in 1883, Macon was chosen as its headquarters location, and it remained so for the next 90 years. L.N. Whittle was the first of 10 Macon lawyers to serve as president of the Georgia Bar Association during its eight decades of existence. He and Walter B. Hill, who served as the first secretary/treasurer, were among 11 petitioners from around the state listed on the association's corporate charter when it was granted by the Superior Court of Bibb County on July 19, 1884. Although membership remained strictly voluntary, the Georgia Bar Association gradually expanded its activities and organizational efforts throughout the state. In 1942, the association set up an office in downtown Macon, utilizing space in the Persons Building offered by the law firm of John B. Harris. Sanders later recalled that, "Up until that time, while a fairly rigorous written Bar exam was required of every applicant, it was not nearly as comprehensive and onerous as the one we have today, and there was no multistate component. Also, the Bar association at the time was a toothless tiger, unorganized, with no right to discipline its members." The governor told Baxter and Cleveland (who later served as State Bar president in 1971-72) that his administration would indeed support the unified Bar proposal. He directed his House of Representatives floor leader, future Attorney General Arthur Bolton, and the lieutenant governor, future Supreme Court Justice George T. Smith, to head up the legislative effort. Thus, the State Bar of Georgia was created pursuant to the authority of the
Supreme Court of Georgia and the Act of the
Georgia General Assembly approved by the Governor on March 11, 1963 (Georgia Laws 1963, page 70). The initial draft of the proposed rules for the new State Bar was discussed and agreed upon in an all-day meeting in the conference room of Frank Jones' law firm in Macon, under the leadership of Newell Edenfield of Atlanta, who chaired the organizational committee, and Holcombe Perry of Albany, who was president of the Georgia Bar Association in 1962-63. Attributing the successful incorporation of the Bar in large part to Perry's leadership as president, Jones said, "Holcombe worked hundreds of hours on this undertaking, and few, if any, other lawyers in Georgia could have achieved the success that he did." In 1968, Jones was elected as the unified Bar's sixth president and the first of three from Macon. He says a highlight of his term was the Supreme Court of Georgia issuing resounding opinions in Wallace v. Wallace and Sams v. Olah, rejecting constitutional challenges to the State Bar of Georgia's existence. Creation of the unified Bar was not without controversy. The only member of the Board of Governors ever "impeached" by the lawyers in his circuit was due to his support of bar unification. Irwin Stolz was informally impeached—as there was no procedure for that—at a meeting of the Lookout Mountain Circuit Bar Association in 1963. He later served as State Bar president and on the
Georgia Court of Appeals, and his law partner,
Norman Fletcher, became Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. In their post-judicial careers, Stolz practices law in Athens and practices law and mediates in Rome.
Move of headquarters to Atlanta During Frank Jones' presidency of the State Bar, the potential benefits of moving the Bar headquarters from Macon to Atlanta started to become obvious to him. In addition to quarterly meetings of the board of governors that were held around the state and the annual meeting that was almost always in Savannah, there were meetings of the executive committee and various general and special committees and other meetings that Jones sought to attend. "The great majority of these meetings were held in Atlanta, with virtually none in Macon, because Atlanta was more convenient to a majority of attendees and the facilities were limited in Macon," Jones said. "
Madrid Williams or Judge Mallory C. Atkinson, our first general counsel, and sometimes both, usually accompanied me in traveling to Atlanta for such meetings and we would talk from time to time about the probable need someday to move the office to Atlanta." Jones also noted that Atlanta was shedding its reputation as what he called "kind of a sleepy metropolis." Starting in the 1960s, there was an explosive growth in the number of lawyers practicing in the Atlanta metropolitan area, and many law firms greatly increased in size. And adjoining the lobby is a small museum depicting a nineteenth-century law office near the site of the Bar Center, where Woodrow Wilson labored until he gave up the "dreadful drudgery" of law practice and boarded a northbound train in 1883.
Past Presidents Past presidents of the former Georgia Bar Association and the State Bar of Georgia include the following.
Georgia Bar Association This was the voluntary bar that existed in Georgia until 1964. • 1884 L. N. Whittle, Macon • 1885 William M. Reese, Washington • 1886 Joseph B. Cumming, Augusta • 1887 Clifford Anderson, Macon • 1888 Walter B. Hill, Macon • 1889 Marshall J. Clarke, Atlanta • 1890
George A. Mercer, Savannah • 1891 Frank H. Miller, Augusta • 1892 John Peabody, Columbus • 1893 Washington Dessau, Macon • 1894 Logan E. Bleckley, Atlanta • 1895 William H. Fleming, Augusta • 1896 John W. Park, Greenville • 1897 Henry R. Goetchius, Columbus • 1898 John W. Akin, Cartersville • 1899 Hamilton McWhorter Lexington • 1900
Joseph Rucker Lamar, Augusta • 1901 H. W. Hill, Greenville • 1902 Charlton E. Battle, Columbus • 1903 Burton Smith, Atlanta • 1904 Peter W. Meldrim, Savannah • 1905 A. P. Persons, Talbotton • 1906 T. A. Hammond, Atlanta • 1907 A. L. Miller, Macon • 1908 Samuel B. Adams, Savannah • 1909 Jos. Hansel Merrill, Thomasville • 1910 T. M. Cunningham Jr., Savannah • 1911 Joel Branham, Rome • 1912 Alex W. Smith, Atlanta • 1913 Andrew J. Cobb, Athens • 1914 Robert C. Alston, Atlanta • 1915 Sam S. Bennet, Albany • 1916 George W. Owens, Savannah • 1917 William H. Barrett, Augusta • 1918 Orville A. Park, Macon • 1919 Samuel H. Sibley, Atlanta • 1920 Luther Z. Rosser, Atlanta • 1921 Alexander R. Lawton, Savannah • 1922 Arthur G. Powell, Atlanta • 1923 Z. D. Harrison, Atlanta • 1924 William M. Howard, Augusta • 1925 H. H. Swift, Columbus • 1926 Leo W. Branch, Quitman • 1927 Warren Grice, Macon • 1928 Millard Reese, Brunswick • 1929
John M. Slaton, Atlanta • 1930 Rembert Marshall, Atlanta • 1931 A. W. Cozart, Columbus • 1932 Hatton Lovejoy, LaGrange • 1933 Marion Smith, Atlanta • 1934 H. F. Lawson, Hawkinsville • 1935 Graham Wright, Rome • 1936 A. B. Lovett, Savannah • 1937 Alexander W. Smith Jr., Atlanta • 1938 William C. Turpin Jr., Macon • 1939 Joseph B. Cumming, Augusta • 1940 John L. Tye Jr., Atlanta • 1941 William Y. Atkinson, Newnan • 1942 Frank D. Foley, Columbus • 1943 John B. Harris, Macon • 1944 Marvin A. Allison, Lawrenceville • 1945 Charles J. Bloch, Macon • 1946 Charles L. Gowen, Brunswick • 1947 Robert B. Troutman, Atlanta • 1948 Vance Custer, Bainbridge • 1949
Albert J. Henderson, Canton • 1950 Alexander A. Lawrence, Savannah • 1951 A. Edward Smith, Columbus • 1952 F. M. Bird, Atlanta • 1953 William Butt, Blue Ridge • 1954 Edward A. Dutton, Savannah • 1955 John J. Flynt Jr, Griffin • 1956 Henry L. Bowden, Atlanta • 1957 Howell Hollis, Columbus • 1958 Carl K. Nelson, Dublin • 1959 Robert M. Heard, Elberton • 1960 Newell Edenfield, Atlanta • 1961 H. C. Eberhardt, Valdosta • 1962 Maurice C. Thomas, Macon • 1963 H. H. Perry Jr., Albany • 1964 Hugh M. Dorsey Jr., Atlanta • 1965 Will Ed Smith, Eastman
State Bar of Georgia The current mandatory bar was instituted in 1965. • 1964 Hugh M. Dorsey Jr., Atlanta • 1965 Will Ed Smith, Eastman • 1966 Henry P. Eve, Augusta • 1967 Omer W. Franklin Jr., Valdosta • 1968 David H. Gambrell, Atlanta • 1969 Frank C. Jones, Macon • 1970 Howell C. Erwin Jr., Athens • 1971 Irwin W. Stolz Jr., LaFayette • 1972 A. Gus Cleveland, Atlanta • 1973 Frank W. Seiler, Savannah • 1974 F. Jack Adams, Cornelia • 1975 Cubbedge Snow Jr., Macon • 1976 W. Stell Huie, Atlanta • 1977 Harold G. Clarke, Forsyth • 1978 Wilton D. Harrington, Eastman • 1979 Charles H. Hyatt, Decatur • 1980 Kirk M. McAlpin, Atlanta • 1981 Robert Reinhardt, Tifton • 1982 J. Douglas Stewart, Gainesville • 1983 Frank Love Jr., Atlanta • 1984 Richard Y. Bradley, Columbus • 1985 Duross Fitzpatrick, Macon • 1986 Jule W. Felton Jr., Atlanta • 1987 Robert M. Brinson, Rome • 1988 Littleton Glover Jr., Newnan • 1989 A. James Elliott, Atlanta • 1990 Gene Mac Winburn, Athens • 1991 Evans J. Plowden Jr., Albany • 1992 Charles T. Lester Jr., Atlanta • 1993 Paul Kilpatrick Jr., Columbus • 1994 John C. Sammon, Decatur • 1995 Harold T. Daniel Jr., Atlanta • 1996 Robert W. Chasteen Jr., Fitzgerald • 1997 Ben F. Easterlin IV, Atlanta • 1998 Linda A. Klein, Atlanta • 1999 William E. Cannon Jr., Albany • 2000 Rudolph N. Patterson, Macon • 2001 George E. Mundy, Cedartown • 2002 James B. Franklin, Statesboro • 2003 James B. Durham, Brunswick • 2004 William D. Barwick, Atlanta • 2005 Rob Reinhardt, Tifton • 2006 Robert Ingram, Marietta • 2007 Vincent Cook, Athens • 2008 Gerald M. Edenfield, Statesboro • 2009 Jeffrey O. Bramlett, Atlanta • 2010 Bryan M. Cavan, Newnan • 2011 S. Lester Tate III, Cartersville • 2012 Kenneth L. Shigley, Atlanta • 2013 Robin Frazer Clark, Atlanta • 2014 Charles L. Ruffin, Macon • 2015 Patrise M. Perkins-Hooker, Atlanta • 2016 Robert J. "Bob" Kauffman, Douglasville • 2017 Patrick T. O'Connor, Savannah • 2018 Brian D. "Buck" Rogers, Atlanta • 2019 Kenneth B. Hodges III, Albany • 2020 Darrell Sutton, Marietta • 2021 Elizabeth L. Fite, Atlanta ==References==