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[[File:John Minor.jpg|thumb|316x316px|Professor Minor, around the time of the [[the University of Virginia during the Civil War|Civil War]].]]
[[File:John Minor.jpg|thumb|316x316px|Professor Minor, around the time of the [[the University of Virginia during the Civil War|Civil War]].]]
'''Professor John Barbee Minor''' (1813-1895) was a law professor at the [[University of Virginia]] for half a century. He taught several notable Americans, including Supreme Court Justice James Clark McReynolds; Edwin M. Stanton, best known as President Lincoln's Secretary of War; and President Woodrow Wilson.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://juel.iath.virginia.edu/node/1925|title=John B. Minor & the Tensions of Mastery|last=Iverson|first=Ian|publishdate=|publisher=the Institute for Advanced Technology in the Humanities|archive-url=|archive-date=|dead-url=|accessdate=}}</ref><ref name=":0" /> He is one of three faculty members who announced Charlottesville’s surrender to the Confederacy on [[Liberation and Freedom Day]].<ref>{{Cite-progress|url=https://dailyprogress.com/entertainment/lifestyles/remembering-150th-anniversary-of-the-surrender-of-charlottesville-uva-to-troops-under-custer-and-sheridan/article_35fc40d0-be04-11e4-82e8-ebb5688788cb.html|title=Remembering 150th anniversary of the surrender of Charlottesville, UVa to troops under Custer and Sheridan|author=David A. Maurer|publishdate=March 1, 2015|accessdate=August 22, 2022}}</ref> Minor Hall on UVA's Grounds is named for him.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://xtf.lib.virginia.edu/xtf/view?docId=2006_07/uvaGenText/tei/bov_19111114.xml;query=minor%20hall;brand=default|title=Board of Visitors minutes: November 14, 1911|last=Rector and Visitors of the University of Virginia|first=|publishdate=|publisher=University of Virginia Library|archive-url=|archive-date=|dead-url=|accessdate=August 2, 2022}}</ref>  
'''Professor John Barbee Minor''' (1813-1895) was a law professor at the [[University of Virginia]] for half a century. He taught several notable Americans, including Supreme Court Justice James Clark McReynolds; Edwin M. Stanton, best known as President Lincoln's Secretary of War; and President Woodrow Wilson.<ref name=":1">{{Cite web|url=http://juel.iath.virginia.edu/node/1925|title=John B. Minor & the Tensions of Mastery|last=Iverson|first=Ian|publishdate=|publisher=the Institute for Advanced Technology in the Humanities|archive-url=|archive-date=|dead-url=|accessdate=}}</ref><ref name=":0" /> He is one of three faculty members who announced Charlottesville’s surrender to the Confederacy on [[Liberation and Freedom Day]].<ref>{{Cite-progress|url=https://dailyprogress.com/entertainment/lifestyles/remembering-150th-anniversary-of-the-surrender-of-charlottesville-uva-to-troops-under-custer-and-sheridan/article_35fc40d0-be04-11e4-82e8-ebb5688788cb.html|title=Remembering 150th anniversary of the surrender of Charlottesville, UVa to troops under Custer and Sheridan|author=David A. Maurer|publishdate=March 1, 2015|accessdate=August 22, 2022}}</ref> Minor Hall on UVA's Grounds is named for him.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://xtf.lib.virginia.edu/xtf/view?docId=2006_07/uvaGenText/tei/bov_19111114.xml;query=minor%20hall;brand=default|title=Board of Visitors minutes: November 14, 1911|last=Rector and Visitors of the University of Virginia|first=|publishdate=|publisher=University of Virginia Library|archive-url=|archive-date=|dead-url=|accessdate=August 2, 2022}}</ref>  


== Early Life ==
== Early Life ==
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== Teaching Career ==
== Teaching Career ==
Minor was hired by the University in 1845, when he was thirty-two years old. After 1851, when increased attendance forced the department to hire more staff, Minor began to specialize in common law and statute law.<ref name=":0">{{Cite web|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gXwyAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA356&lpg=PA356#v=onepage&q&f=false|title=University of Virginia: Its History, Influences and Characteristics. Volume 1.|last=Barringer, M.D.|first=Paul Brandon|last2=Garnett, M.A., L.L.D.|first2=James Mercer|publishdate=1904|publisher=Lewis Publishing Company|archive-url=|archive-date=|dead-url=|accessdate=August 2, 2022|last3=Page|first3=Roswell}}</ref> As a professor, Minor deferred fees for students who could not afford to pay them, and established a summer course for those already practicing the law who needed a "refresher." In 1870, Minor published his ''Institutes of Common and Statute Law.'' With Minor's famously rigorous coursework available to the public, he gained a reputation as a legal thinker beyond his institution. He taught at the University for fifty years, retiring several weeks before his death.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://digitalhistory.law.virginia.edu/person/john-barbee-minor|title=John Barbee Minor: Biographical Information|last=|first=|publishdate=|publisher=Arthur J. Morris Law Library Special Collections|archive-url=|archive-date=|dead-url=|accessdate=August 8, 2022}}</ref> Minor became an Episcopalian in his later years, and taught Sunday Schools for his students and for people enslaved at the University. He received two honorary doctorates from Washington and Lee University and Columbia University.<ref name=":0" />  
Minor was hired by the University in 1845, when he was thirty-two years old. After 1851, when increased attendance forced the department to hire more staff, Minor began to specialize in common law and statute law.<ref name=":0">{{Cite web|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gXwyAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA356&lpg=PA356#v=onepage&q&f=false|title=University of Virginia: Its History, Influences and Characteristics. Volume 1.|last=Barringer, M.D.|first=Paul Brandon|last2=Garnett, M.A., L.L.D.|first2=James Mercer|publishdate=1904|publisher=Lewis Publishing Company|archive-url=|archive-date=|dead-url=|accessdate=August 2, 2022|last3=Page|first3=Roswell}}</ref> Despite his high standards-- in his first ten years of teaching, just nine percent of his students passed the exam and earned their law degree-- he was beloved by his students.<ref name=":2">{{Cite web|url=https://libguides.law.virginia.edu/faculty/j-minor|title=Our Former Faculty: Minor, John Barbee|last=|first=|publishdate=October 1, 2021|publisher=UVA Law Library|archive-url=|archive-date=|dead-url=|accessdate=August 9, 2022}}</ref> As a professor, Minor deferred fees for students who could not afford to pay them, and established a summer course for those already practicing the law who needed a "refresher."<ref name=":0" /> In 1870, Minor published his ''Institutes of Common and Statute Law.'' With Minor's famously rigorous coursework available to the public, he gained a reputation as a legal thinker beyond his institution. He taught at the University for fifty years, retiring several weeks before his death.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://digitalhistory.law.virginia.edu/person/john-barbee-minor|title=John Barbee Minor: Biographical Information|last=|first=|publishdate=|publisher=Arthur J. Morris Law Library Special Collections|archive-url=|archive-date=|dead-url=|accessdate=August 8, 2022}}</ref> Minor became an Episcopalian in his later years, and taught Sunday Schools for his students and for people enslaved at the University. He received two honorary doctorates from Washington and Lee University and Columbia University.<ref name=":0" />


== Civil War and Slavery ==
Much like the founder of Minor's institution, Thomas Jefferson, Minor disagreed with slavery in the abstract but never attacked the practice. He was hesitant to call the institution "good," as some of his peers did, but he deemed the forced labor necessary to maintain his preferred standard of living. In the 1840s, Minor helped pass resolutions at the Charlottesville Lyceum which denounced Virginia's particular brand of slavery as “a social and political evil” and debated the merits of gradual emancipation.<ref name=":1" /> In 1850, Minor enslaved five people. In 1860, he enslaved ten. His 1863 tax records show that he enslaved 21.<ref name=":2" /> He frequently "hired out" enslaved people from other locals to supplement the labor being performed in his home in Pavilion X.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://slavery.law.virginia.edu/people-places/places/pavillion-x|title=Slavery and the UVA School of Law: Pavilion X|last=Solomon|first=Ian|publishdate=|publisher=UVA School of Law|archive-url=|archive-date=|dead-url=|accessdate=August 9, 2022}}</ref> He did not free the people he enslaved, and he used his status to intimidate people enslaved by him and around him into submission. Against his son's requests, he threatened to sell a ten-year-old boy to slave traders, separating him from his mother, as punishment for attempting to run away. He "hired out" many of his slaves, gaining wealth even when the labor was not being performed for his direct benefit.<ref name=":1" />
Minor's conflict over the institution of slavery was evident in his legal scholarship. Minor doubted the constitutionality of secession. He also doubted the constitutionality of Vermont nullifying the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, allowing those escaping slavery to stay in Vermont without fear of being tracked down and forced into bondage again. However, he opposed similar fugitive slave laws in Virginia, deeming them inhumane. From his students' notes, Minor might have believed that slavery was necessary because “we could not possibly get along, or exist as a society if slaves were emancipated.” In line with his constitutionality doubts, Minor opposed secession, but eventually loosened his stance when he believed it was necessary to protect "Southern institutions," specifically, slavery.<ref name=":2" /> He strongly supported the main principle of the Compromise of 1850, which would preserve the Union but allow certain states to continue slavery. He believed in a universal desire for liberty, but refused to grant it. He advocated against "unnecessary" physical violence against enslaved people, and hoped that they could achieve "spiritual freedom." Because of these beliefs, Minor considered himself a "moderate" on the topic of slavery. His Unionist beliefs and his distaste for flying the Confederate battle flag led those around him to believe that he was "indifferent to Southern honor." His students attempted to discredit him as an abolitionist. Minor had a falling out with his brother, who supported secession.<ref name=":1" />
Union troops approached Charlottesville in early 1865, arriving on the morning of March 3. Confederate propaganda and fearmongering convinced many white Charlottesvillians that the troops would burn the University of Virginia, which was treating Confederate soldiers in their hospital for battlefield wounds and illnesses and had produced over one thousand soldiers for the pro-slavery effort.<ref name="fly">{{cite web|title=I'll Fly Away|url=http://illflyaway.weebly.com/|author=Ineke La Fleur|work=Website|publisher=|location=|publishdate=March 2019|accessdate=July 7, 2021}}</ref><ref name="maurer">{{cite-progress-bh|title=Remembering 150th anniversary of the surrender of Charlottesville, UVa to troops under Custer and Sheridan|url=https://dailyprogress.com/entertainment/lifestyles/remembering-150th-anniversary-of-the-surrender-of-charlottesville-uva-to-troops-under-custer-and-sheridan/article_35fc40d0-be04-11e4-82e8-ebb5688788cb.html|author=David A. Maurer|pageno=|printdate=|publishdate=March 1, 2015|accessdate=May 18, 2021}}</ref> Nearly 1,000 enslaved Charlottesvillians were impressed into Confederate service.<ref name="Jordan">Jordan Jr., Ervin L. "Charlottesville During the Civil War." Encyclopedia Virginia. Ed. Brendan Wolfe. December 14, 2020. Virginia Foundation for the Humanities. July 7, 2021 <http://www.EncyclopediaVirginia.org/Charlottesville_During_the_Civil_War>.</ref> Over the course of the Civil War, about 22,500 wounded Confederate soldiers and a few captured Union soldiers were tended to at the University-run 500-bed [[Charlottesville General Hospital]].<ref name="Jordan" /> With Mayor Christopher Fowler, chairman of the faculty Socrates Maupin, and Rector [[Thomas L. Preston]], Minor went to meet Sheridan and appealed to their shared love of Founding Father Thomas Jefferson, who designed the University of Virginia, successfully claiming that the school was a benefit to the nation, not just the Confederacy.<ref name="fly" /><ref name="maurer" /><ref name="Jordan" /> Sheridan agreed to not burn the University, and left Charlottesville three days later. March 3 is celebrated in Charlottesville as [[Liberation and Freedom Day]].<ref name="maurer" />[[File:Oldminorhall.webp|thumb|Minor Hall between 1911 and 1921. University of Virginia Press.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.huffpost.com/entry/architecture-at-uvas-law-school_b_595e7663e4b0cf3c8e8d5705|title=Architecture at U.Va.'s Law School|last=Welton|first=J. Michael|publishdate=July 6, 2017|publisher=Huffington Post|archive-url=|archive-date=|dead-url=|accessdate=August 8, 2022}}</ref>]]
== Death and Legacy ==
== Death and Legacy ==
[[File:Oldminorhall.webp|thumb|Minor Hall between 1911 and 1921. University of Virginia Press.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.huffpost.com/entry/architecture-at-uvas-law-school_b_595e7663e4b0cf3c8e8d5705|title=Architecture at U.Va.'s Law School|last=Welton|first=J. Michael|publishdate=July 6, 2017|publisher=Huffington Post|archive-url=|archive-date=|dead-url=|accessdate=August 8, 2022}}</ref>]]
Minor is buried in the University of Virginia Cemetery. Minor Hall, which sits adjacent to Warner Hall and the McIntire Amphiteater, housed the Law School from 1911 until 1932, when it outgrew the space and moved to Clark Hall.     
Minor is buried in the University of Virginia Cemetery. Minor Hall, which sits adjacent to Warner Hall and the McIntire Amphiteater, housed the Law School from 1911 until 1932, when it outgrew the space and moved to Clark Hall.     



Latest revision as of 15:01, 9 August 2022

Professor Minor, around the time of the Civil War.

Professor John Barbee Minor (1813-1895) was a law professor at the University of Virginia for half a century. He taught several notable Americans, including Supreme Court Justice James Clark McReynolds; Edwin M. Stanton, best known as President Lincoln's Secretary of War; and President Woodrow Wilson.[1][2] He is one of three faculty members who announced Charlottesville’s surrender to the Confederacy on Liberation and Freedom Day.[3] Minor Hall on UVA's Grounds is named for him.[4]

Early Life

Minor was born in Louisa County. He studied at Kenyon College in Ohio before returning to the University of Virginia for his law degree. He graduated in 1834, and practiced law for several years before becoming UVA’s Professor of Law.[2] Minor married three times: his first wife was Martha Macon Davis, sister of his law professor, A.G. Staige Davis, his second wife was Anne Colston, and his third wife was Ellen T. Hill.[5]

Teaching Career

Minor was hired by the University in 1845, when he was thirty-two years old. After 1851, when increased attendance forced the department to hire more staff, Minor began to specialize in common law and statute law.[2] Despite his high standards-- in his first ten years of teaching, just nine percent of his students passed the exam and earned their law degree-- he was beloved by his students.[6] As a professor, Minor deferred fees for students who could not afford to pay them, and established a summer course for those already practicing the law who needed a "refresher."[2] In 1870, Minor published his Institutes of Common and Statute Law. With Minor's famously rigorous coursework available to the public, he gained a reputation as a legal thinker beyond his institution. He taught at the University for fifty years, retiring several weeks before his death.[7] Minor became an Episcopalian in his later years, and taught Sunday Schools for his students and for people enslaved at the University. He received two honorary doctorates from Washington and Lee University and Columbia University.[2]

Civil War and Slavery

Much like the founder of Minor's institution, Thomas Jefferson, Minor disagreed with slavery in the abstract but never attacked the practice. He was hesitant to call the institution "good," as some of his peers did, but he deemed the forced labor necessary to maintain his preferred standard of living. In the 1840s, Minor helped pass resolutions at the Charlottesville Lyceum which denounced Virginia's particular brand of slavery as “a social and political evil” and debated the merits of gradual emancipation.[1] In 1850, Minor enslaved five people. In 1860, he enslaved ten. His 1863 tax records show that he enslaved 21.[6] He frequently "hired out" enslaved people from other locals to supplement the labor being performed in his home in Pavilion X.[8] He did not free the people he enslaved, and he used his status to intimidate people enslaved by him and around him into submission. Against his son's requests, he threatened to sell a ten-year-old boy to slave traders, separating him from his mother, as punishment for attempting to run away. He "hired out" many of his slaves, gaining wealth even when the labor was not being performed for his direct benefit.[1]

Minor's conflict over the institution of slavery was evident in his legal scholarship. Minor doubted the constitutionality of secession. He also doubted the constitutionality of Vermont nullifying the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, allowing those escaping slavery to stay in Vermont without fear of being tracked down and forced into bondage again. However, he opposed similar fugitive slave laws in Virginia, deeming them inhumane. From his students' notes, Minor might have believed that slavery was necessary because “we could not possibly get along, or exist as a society if slaves were emancipated.” In line with his constitutionality doubts, Minor opposed secession, but eventually loosened his stance when he believed it was necessary to protect "Southern institutions," specifically, slavery.[6] He strongly supported the main principle of the Compromise of 1850, which would preserve the Union but allow certain states to continue slavery. He believed in a universal desire for liberty, but refused to grant it. He advocated against "unnecessary" physical violence against enslaved people, and hoped that they could achieve "spiritual freedom." Because of these beliefs, Minor considered himself a "moderate" on the topic of slavery. His Unionist beliefs and his distaste for flying the Confederate battle flag led those around him to believe that he was "indifferent to Southern honor." His students attempted to discredit him as an abolitionist. Minor had a falling out with his brother, who supported secession.[1]

Union troops approached Charlottesville in early 1865, arriving on the morning of March 3. Confederate propaganda and fearmongering convinced many white Charlottesvillians that the troops would burn the University of Virginia, which was treating Confederate soldiers in their hospital for battlefield wounds and illnesses and had produced over one thousand soldiers for the pro-slavery effort.[9][10] Nearly 1,000 enslaved Charlottesvillians were impressed into Confederate service.[11] Over the course of the Civil War, about 22,500 wounded Confederate soldiers and a few captured Union soldiers were tended to at the University-run 500-bed Charlottesville General Hospital.[11] With Mayor Christopher Fowler, chairman of the faculty Socrates Maupin, and Rector Thomas L. Preston, Minor went to meet Sheridan and appealed to their shared love of Founding Father Thomas Jefferson, who designed the University of Virginia, successfully claiming that the school was a benefit to the nation, not just the Confederacy.[9][10][11] Sheridan agreed to not burn the University, and left Charlottesville three days later. March 3 is celebrated in Charlottesville as Liberation and Freedom Day.[10]

Minor Hall between 1911 and 1921. University of Virginia Press.[12]

Death and Legacy

Minor is buried in the University of Virginia Cemetery. Minor Hall, which sits adjacent to Warner Hall and the McIntire Amphiteater, housed the Law School from 1911 until 1932, when it outgrew the space and moved to Clark Hall.

For more information on Minor's colleagues during the Civil War era, see our page about the University of Virginia during the Civil War.

References

  1. 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 Web. John B. Minor & the Tensions of Mastery, the Institute for Advanced Technology in the Humanities
  2. 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 Web. University of Virginia: Its History, Influences and Characteristics. Volume 1., Lewis Publishing Company, 1904, retrieved August 2, 2022.
  3. Web. Remembering 150th anniversary of the surrender of Charlottesville, UVa to troops under Custer and Sheridan, David A. Maurer, Daily Progress, Lee Enterprises, March 1, 2015, retrieved August 22, 2022.
  4. Web. Board of Visitors minutes: November 14, 1911, University of Virginia Library, retrieved August 2, 2022.
  5. Web. Genealogies of Virginia Families: from the William and Mary College Quarterly Historical Magazine, Genealogical Publishing Co., 1982, retrieved August 8, 2022.
  6. 6.0 6.1 6.2 Web. Our Former Faculty: Minor, John Barbee, UVA Law Library, October 1, 2021, retrieved August 9, 2022.
  7. Web. John Barbee Minor: Biographical Information, Arthur J. Morris Law Library Special Collections, retrieved August 8, 2022.
  8. Web. Slavery and the UVA School of Law: Pavilion X, UVA School of Law, retrieved August 9, 2022.
  9. 9.0 9.1 Web. I'll Fly Away, Ineke La Fleur, Website, March 2019, retrieved July 7, 2021.
  10. 10.0 10.1 10.2 Web. Remembering 150th anniversary of the surrender of Charlottesville, UVa to troops under Custer and Sheridan, David A. Maurer, Daily Progress, Berkshire Hathaway, March 1, 2015, retrieved May 18, 2021.
  11. 11.0 11.1 11.2 Jordan Jr., Ervin L. "Charlottesville During the Civil War." Encyclopedia Virginia. Ed. Brendan Wolfe. December 14, 2020. Virginia Foundation for the Humanities. July 7, 2021 <http://www.EncyclopediaVirginia.org/Charlottesville_During_the_Civil_War>.
  12. Web. Architecture at U.Va.'s Law School, Huffington Post, July 6, 2017, retrieved August 8, 2022.

External Links

John B. Minor on Wikipedia