Josiah Dennis Coleman (born November 3, 1972) is an associate justice of the

Supreme Court of Mississippi The Supreme Court of Mississippi is the highest court in the state of Mississippi. It was established in the first constitution of the state following its admission as a State of the Union in 1817 and was known as the High Court of Errors and Appe ...

Early life and education

Coleman grew up in Choctaw County, near

Ackerman Ackerman may refer to: Surname *Ackerman (surname), people with the surname Ackerman *Ackerman is a family name for singer Barlin Ackerman Places *Ackerman, Mississippi, town in Choctaw County, Mississippi, US *Ackerman, West Virginia, former un ...

, and graduated valedictorian from Ackerman High School. He graduated cum laude from the

University of Mississippi The University of Mississippi (byname Ole Miss) is a public research university that is located adjacent to Oxford, Mississippi, and has a medical center in Jackson. It is Mississippi's oldest public university and its largest by enrollment. ...

with a Bachelor of Arts degree in history and philosophy. He earned his

Juris Doctor The Juris Doctor (J.D. or JD), also known as Doctor of Jurisprudence (J.D., JD, D.Jur., or DJur), is a graduate-entry professional degree in law and one of several Doctor of Law degrees. The J.D. is the standard degree obtained to practice law ...

degree from the

University of Mississippi School of Law The University of Mississippi School of Law, also known as Ole Miss Law, is an ABA-accredited law school located on the campus of the University of Mississippi in Oxford, Mississippi. The School of Law offers the only dedicated aerospace law curr ...

. In 2020, Coleman received his

Master of Laws A Master of Laws (M.L. or LL.M.; Latin: ' or ') is an advanced postgraduate academic degree, pursued by those either holding an undergraduate academic law degree, a professional law degree, or an undergraduate degree in a related subject. In mos ...

in judicial studies from

Duke Law School Duke University School of Law (Duke Law School or Duke Law) is the law school of Duke University, a private research university in Durham, North Carolina. One of Duke's 10 schools and colleges, the School of Law is a constituent academic unit th ...

Career

After law school, he served for almost two years as a law clerk for U.S. Magistrate Judge S. Allan Alexander of the

United States District Court for the Northern District of Mississippi The United States District Court for the Northern District of Mississippi (in case citations, N.D. Miss.) is a federal court in the Fifth Circuit with facilities in Aberdeen, Greenville, and Oxford. Appeals from cases brought in the Northern Di ...

Oxford Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...

. Before joining the Supreme Court of Mississippi, he practiced law for 12 years, first in Tupelo, then in Oxford. His practice concentrated on defense litigation and appellate advocacy in the areas of insurance, product liability and professional malpractice. Coleman is the grandson of

James P. Coleman James Plemon Coleman (January 9, 1914 – September 28, 1991) was an American judge and the 52nd Governor of Mississippi and a United States federal judge, United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. ...

, who served as

Governor of Mississippi A governor is an administrative leader and head of a polity or political region, ranking under the head of state and in some cases, such as governors-general, as the head of state's official representative. Depending on the type of political r ...

, as a judge on the

United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit The United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit (in case citations, 5th Cir.) is a federal court with appellate jurisdiction over the district courts in the following federal judicial districts: * Eastern District of Louisiana * M ...

, and briefly as a justice of the Mississippi Supreme Court, resigning to accept appointment as state attorney general. Thomas Coleman, Josiah Coleman's father, was one of the original members of the Mississippi Court of Appeals when the intermediate appellate court began in 1995.

Supreme Court of Mississippi

Coleman, who was endorsed by the Republican Party, won his election to the Mississippi Supreme Court comfortably in 2012. On November 3, 2020, voters elected him to a second term. In 2021, Coleman wrote the majority decision that struck down a voter-approved medical marijuana ballot initiative. Coleman argued that the ballot initiative because the state constitution said ballot initiatives had to have a certain number of signatures from Mississippi's five districts; however, Mississippi lost one of its districts in the 2000 census, so ballot signatures were only collected in the four remaining districts. Coleman wrote that the drafters of the constitutional provision "wrote a ballot-initiative process that cannot work in a world where Mississippi has fewer than five representatives in Congress." The implications of the decision is that the Supreme Court effectively rolled back the ability to conduct ballot initiatives; at the time, ballot initiatives on allowing early and expanding Medicaid were being considered.

References

External links

Official biography from Supreme Court of Mississippi
{{DEFAULTSORT:Coleman, Josiah D. 1972 births Living people Justices of the Mississippi Supreme Court University of Mississippi School of Law alumni Place of birth missing (living people) University of Mississippi alumni People from Ackerman, Mississippi 21st-century American judges