Home County: Cooper
Term of service at the Supreme Court of Missouri: January 1898 – December 1898
Judge William Muir Williams was born February 4, 1850, in Boonville, Missouri. Williams attended Kemper Military Academy in Boonville, graduating in June 1867. He studied law in the office of Draffen & Muir and was admitted to the bar in 1873. When William Muir (after whom Williams was named) died in 1874, Williams and J.W. Draffen (who previously served as a special judge in Cooper County) formed a law partnership named Draffen & Williams. They practiced law together until Muir died in 1896.
When Chief Justice Shepard Barclay resigned from the Supreme Court of Missouri on January 29, 1898, then-Governor Lon V. Stephens appointed Williams to complete the remainder of Barclay’s term, which was to conclude December 31, 1898. After his Court term ended, Williams decided to return to private legal practice.
In 1902, William was elected president of the Missouri Bar Association. He previously had been a vice president, and he served as president in 1903. In 1904, he served as a delegate for the Missouri Bar Association at the Universal Congress of Lawyers and Jurists. That same year, when his son, Roy D. Williams, was admitted to the bar, they formed the legal firm of Williams & Williams.
In 1913, Williams served as special counsel to then-Attorney General John T. Barker in lawsuits involving multiple railroad companies and excess charges. In May 1914, then- Governor Elliott W. Major selected him to be a member of the commission to revise the civil and criminal court procedure codes in Missouri Westminster College in Fulton conferred to Judge Williams an honorary doctor of letters of law degree in 1914.
Judge William Muir Williams died September 18, 1916, in Boonville. He was 66 years old.
Biographical information by Grace Cunningham, 2024, University of Missouri-Columbia.
Sources used (a copy of each is on file at the Supreme Court of Missouri Law Library):
Alexander A. Lesueur, compiler, Alexander A. Lesueur, Secretary of State, Official Manual of the State of Missouri For The Years 1897-98, (Jefferson City, MO: Tribune Printing Company State Printers and Binders, 1898), 164.
Alexander A. Lesueur, compiler, Alexander A. Lesueur, Secretary of State, Official Manual of the State of Missouri For the Years 1899-1900, “State Officers of Missouri-1820-1900,” (Jefferson City, MO: Tribune Printing Company, State Printers and Binders, 1900), 440.
“Boonville Jurist to Help Sue Roads, Judge W.M. Williams Will Be Special Counsel of Attorney General,” Kansas City Journal, (Kansas City, Missouri), December 23, 1913), SHSMO Digital Newspaper Project, information courtesy of the State Historical Society of Missouri website, accessed June 10, 2024.
Cornelius Roach, compiler, Cornelius Roach, Secretary of State, Official Manual of the State of Missouri For the Years 1913-1914, (Jefferson City, MO: The Hugh Stephens Printing Company, 1914), 36, information courtesy of the Missouri Digital Heritage website, Missouri State Archives, accessed March 18, 2025.
Elizabeth Williams Cosgrove, An Old House Speaks, (St. Louis, MO: Horace Barks Print Co., 1943,) 66, information courtesy of Archive.org, accessed June 4, 2024.
Floyd C. Shoemaker, secretary, editor, “Historical News and Comments,” The Missouri Historical Review, vol. xi October 1916-July 1917, (Columbia, MO: The State Historical Society of Missouri), 1917, 122, information courtesy of Google Books, accessed June 4, 2024.
“Former Judge Dies, End Comes to William M. Williams at His Home in Boonville,” The Salem Post and The Democrat-Bulletin, (Salem, Missouri), September 28, 1916, SHSMO Digital Newspaper Project, information courtesy of the State Historical Society of Missouri website, accessed June 4, 2024.
“Judge Barclay Resigns, W.M. Williams, of Boonville, Appointed to Fill the Vacancy,” St. Louis Daily Globe-Democrat, (St. Louis, Missouri), January 30, 1898, SHSMO Digital Newspaper Project, information courtesy of the State Historical Society of Missouri website, accessed June 10, 2024.
“Judge J. W. Draffen, Obituary of one of Missouri’s Greatest Jurist,” The Tipton Times, (Tipton, Missouri), April 30, 1896, SHSMO Digital Newspaper Project, information courtesy of the State Historical Society of Missouri website, accessed June 10, 2024.
“Meeting of the Missouri Bar Association,” The Columbia Missouri Herald (Columbia, Missouri), June 6 ,1902, SHSMO Digital Newspaper Project, information courtesy of the State Historical Society of Missouri website, accessed May 28, 2024.
Perry S. Rader, reporter, “In Memoriam,” Reports of Cases Determined By the State of Missouri Between February 2,1917, and June 30, 1917, vol. 270, (Columbia, MO: E.W. Stephens Publishing Co., 1917), iv.
Perry S. Rader, reporter, Reports of Cases Determined in the Supreme Court of the State of Missouri, vol. 142, (Columbia, MO E.W. Stephens Publishing Co., 1898), iii.
Perry S. Rader, reporter, Reports of Cases Determined in the Supreme Court of the State of Missouri, vol. 147, (Columbia, MO: E.W. Stephens, Publisher, 1899), iii.
“Recipients of Advanced and Honorary Degrees,” Westminster College Bulletin, Series 17 No. 29, (Fulton, Missouri), August 1918, information courtesy of Google Books, accessed on May 28, 2024.
“Revision of Code. Judge Nortoni One of a Commission of Fifteen Lawyers to Draft New System,” The Macon Republican, (Macon, Missouri), May 29, 1914, SHSMO Digital Newspaper Project, information courtesy of the State Historical Society of Missouri website, accessed June 11, 2024.
Secretary of the Congress, editor, “List of Delegates,” Official Report of the Universal Congress on Lawyers and Jurists, Held At St. Louis, Missouri, U.S.A., September 28, 29, and 30, 1904, (St. Louis, MO: The Executive Committee, 1905), 295, information courtesy of Google Books, accessed on June 4, 2024.
“Short-Hand Locals,” The Canton Press-News (Canton, Missouri) June 19, 1903, SHSMO Digital Newspaper Project, information courtesy of the State Historical Society of Missouri website, accessed May 28, 2024.
“The McCord Case. Judge Edwards Sick and the Case Goes Over to the May Term,” The Sedalia Weekly Bazoo, (Sedalia, Missouri), Tuesday, January 26, 1892, information courtesy of the SHSMO Digital Newspaper Project, State Historical Society of Missouri website, accessed March 19, 2025.
W.F. Johnson, author, History of Cooper County Missouri, (Topeka, KS: Historical Publishing Company, 1919), 382, information courtesy of Google Books, accessed on June 6, 2024.
“William Muir Williams,” filed September 19, 1916, Missouri State Board of Health, Bureau of Vital Statistics, Certificate of Death, Missouri State Death Certificates, 1910-1973 Collection, courtesy of the Missouri Digital Heritage website, Missouri State Archives, accessed May 28, 2024.