Frank X. Gordon Jr. (January 9, 1929 – January 6, 2020) was a justice of the

Supreme Court of Arizona The Arizona Supreme Court is the state supreme court of the U.S. state of Arizona. Sitting in the Supreme Court building in downtown Phoenix, the court consists of a chief justice, a vice chief justice, and five associate justices. Each justice i ...

from September 16, 1975, to February 3, 1992. He served as chief justice from January 1987 to December 1992. Gordon was the first Supreme Court appointment under the new merit selection system, he was appointed by Governor

Raul Castro Raul, Raúl and Raül are the Italian, Portuguese, Romanian, Spanish, Galician, Asturian, Basque, Aragonese, and Catalan forms of the Anglo-Germanic given name Ralph or Rudolph. They are cognates of the French Raoul. Raul, Raúl or Raül may re ...

. Born in

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

Illinois Illinois ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern United States. Its largest metropolitan areas include the Chicago metropolitan area, and the Metro East section, of Greater St. Louis. Other smaller metropolita ...

, in 1929, Gordon received a

Bachelor of Arts Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four years ...

from

Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...

in 1951, and an

LL.B. Bachelor of Laws ( la, Legum Baccalaureus; LL.B.) is an undergraduate law degree in the United Kingdom and most common law jurisdictions. Bachelor of Laws is also the name of the law degree awarded by universities in the People's Republic of Chi ...

from the University of Arizona School of Law in 1954. He was an associate with the law firm of Gordon and Gordon in

Kingman, Arizona Kingman is a city in, and the county seat of, Mohave County, Arizona, United States. It is named after Lewis Kingman, an engineer for the Atlantic and Pacific Railroad. It is located southeast of Las Vegas, Nevada, and northwest of Arizona's ...

from 1954 to 1962, and became a judge of the Superior Court of Mohave County in 1962. He served in that office until his appointment to the Arizona Supreme Court in 1975. As Chief Justice of the Arizona Supreme Court, Gordon presided over the impeachment trial of then-Governor

Evan Mecham Evan Mecham ( ; May 12, 1924 – February 21, 2008) was an American businessman and the 17th governor of Arizona, serving from January 5, 1987, until his impeachment conviction on April 4, 1988. A decorated veteran of World War II, Mecham was a ...

in 1988. In 1990, Gordon received an

American Bar Association The American Bar Association (ABA) is a voluntary bar association of lawyers and law students, which is not specific to any jurisdiction in the United States. Founded in 1878, the ABA's most important stated activities are the setting of acad ...

Pro Bono Publico Award for his efforts on behalf of the poor through his stewardship of the Volunteer Lawyers Program of Phoenix. Following Gordon's retirement from the court in 1992, United States District Judge Paul Gerhardt Rosenblatt appointed Gordon to mediate a dispute between various Native American tribes and the government of Arizona. In February 1993, Gordon ruled in favor of a proposal put forth by the tribes to allow them to operate

slot machine A slot machine (American English), fruit machine (British English) or poker machine (Australian English and New Zealand English) is a gambling machine that creates a game of chance for its customers. Slot machines are also known pejoratively a ...

casinos in their territories. He died on January 6, 2020, in Phoenix.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Gordon, Frank X., Jr. 1929 births 2020 deaths Chief Justices of the Arizona Supreme Court James E. Rogers College of Law alumni Justices of the Arizona Supreme Court Lawyers from Chicago Stanford University alumni

Further reading

References