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This is a finding aid. It is a description of archival material held in the Wilson Library at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Unless otherwise noted, the materials described below are physically available in our reading room, and not digitally available through the World Wide Web. See the FAQ section for more information.
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Collection Overview
| Size | About 19,800 items (79.0 linear feet) |
| Abstract | Susie Marshall Sharp (1907-1996) of Reidsville, N.C., attorney and jurist, was elected chief justice of the North Carolina Supreme Court in 1974, becoming the first woman elected chief justice of a state supreme court in the United States. A graduate of the North Carolina College for Women and the University of North Carolina School of Law, Sharp began the practice of law in Reidsville in 1929. She served as Reidsville city attorney, 1939-1949; North Carolina superior court judge until 1962; and as North Carolina supreme court justice, 1962-1979. The collection documents Susie Sharp's professional career and personal life through correspondence, subject files, speeches, and other material, chiefly 1920s-1990s. Subject files contain clippings, memoranda, and correspondence about judicial and personal matters. There are also speeches, chiefly on judicial topics, that Sharp delivered beginning in the 1950s; notebooks in which she defined legal terms and cited precedents; and memoranda, opinions and other materials related to cases she decided. Correspondence, speeches, and other materials document Sharp's 1974 campaign as Democratic Party candidate for the chief justiceship, and there are related letters from friends and associates after her election and her selection as one of twelve 1975 Time magazine Women of the Year. Some of the materials relate to William Haywood Bobbitt, whose retirement as chief justice made way for Sharp's election, and to professors, particularly Albert Coates, and students at the University of North Carolina School of Law and the North Carolina College for Women (now the University of North Carolina at Greensboro). Topics include judicial reform and procedures, particularly relating to discipline of judges; women in the judiciary; women lawyers; women's rights, including the Equal Rights Amendment; and prisoners' rights. Much of the personal correspondence is with Sharp family members and friends. The Additions of 2001 and 2005 chiefly contain materials similar to that of the original deposit. The Additions of April and August 2008 relate chiefly to family and private life, including correspondence between Susie Sharp and her siblings discussing trials and family affairs; postcards from various Sharp family members; a photograph of Sharp's father, James Merrit Sharp; scrapbooks compiled by Sharp's mother, Annie Britt Blackwell Sharp; clippings; a music lesson book; and sewing materials. The Addition of March 2009 includes newspaper clippings and scrapbooks that document Sharp's career and personal correspondence with family and friends, some of which is in Gregg shorthand. There are also family and professional photographs and photograph albums; calendars, diaries, notebooks, and other volumes that record professional and private affairs; and other materials, such as personal scrapbooks that reflect Sharp's interest in various lifestyle topics, clippings relating to the Klenner-Lynch murders, and papers of James Merritt Sharp that concern fundraising for the Near East College Association. |
| Creator | Sharp, Susie, 1907-1996. |
| Language | English. |
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Information For Users
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Subject Headings
The following terms from Library of Congress Subject Headings suggest topics, persons, geography, etc. interspersed through the entire collection; the terms do not usually represent discrete and easily identifiable portions of the collection--such as folders or items.
Clicking on a subject heading below will take you into the University Library's online catalog.
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Biographical Information
Susie Marshall Sharp was born in Rocky Mount, N.C., on 7 July 1907 to James Merritt Sharp and Annie Britt Blackwell Sharp. She was the eldest of seven children who survived to adulthood, including Sally Blackwell, Annie Hill, Thomas Adolphus, Louise Wortham, Florence Abigail, and James Vance.
James Merritt Sharp was born 26 September 1877. In 1900, he established Sharp Institute, a co-educational day and boarding school. The school burned down in 1907. Sharp had been studying law, and the end of his teaching career led to one as a lawyer. Sharp passed the Supreme Court's bar examination in 1908. In 1914, he moved his practice to Reidsville, N.C., where he remained for the next 38 years. He served in the North Carolina State Senate in 1925 and 1927, representing the 17th district.
Annie Britt Blackwell (4 March 1884-9 April 1971), the daughter of John Pomfret Blackwell and Sally Wortham Blackwell, was a teacher at Sharp Institute. She married James Merritt Sharp in 1906.
Susie Marshall Sharp, the couple's first child, was named after her mother's younger sister Susie and her Civil War grandfather, James Marshall Sharp. Susie Sharp attended Reidsville public schools from 1914 to 1924. An excellent student and a champion debater, she was chosen class salutatorian. Following her graduation from high school in 1924 and her entrance to the North Carolina College for Women (now the University of North Carolina at Greensboro), Sharp developed an interest in chemistry. In part because of her debating ability, however, she had been encouraged to become a lawyer, and, in 1926, following an all-night session of wrestling over her decision, she chose law over chemistry.
In 1926, Sharp entered the School of Law at the University of North Carolina, the only woman in her class. She soon encountered the entrenched attitudes of the time that opposed women being lawyers. In spite of the obstacles, Sharp became an editor of the North Carolina Law Review and a member of the Order of the Coif. She received her LL.B. degree with honors in 1929. Sharp passed the bar examination in 1928 while still in school and returned to Reidsville in 1929 to practice law with her father. In the early 1930s, Sharp served as secretary and legal researcher at the University of North Carolina School of Law. As a female lawyer Sharp was a rarity at the time; women were not allowed to serve on juries in North Carolina until 1946.
Sharp was appointed Reidsville's city attorney in 1939. In 1948, her growing influence in the governmental and political affairs of Rockingham County led her father's friend, Kerr Scott, to appoint her as his campaign manager for Rockingham County in the Democratic primary for governor. In the summer of 1949, Governor Scott appointed Susie Sharp to the North Carolina Superior Court bench, making her the first female judge in the history of the state. Judge Sharp's first term established her interest in prison conditions, a concern she maintained for the remainder of her career.
Governor Terry Sanford appointed Sharp to the North Carolina Supreme Court on 9 March 1962. Justice Sharp's appointment made her the first female member of the North Carolina Supreme Court and only the second associate justice from Rockingham County, Thomas Settle having preceded her nearly 100 years earlier in 1868. She was elected in November to fill the remainder of Associate Justice Emory Denny's term, and, in 1966, she was elected to a full eight-year term.
Forced by a newly enacted retirement law to retire in 1974, Chief Justice William Haywood Bobbitt and the rest of the court encouraged Sharp, as the senior associate justice, to seek the chief justiceship. In 1974, she became the first female in the United States to be elected chief justice of a state supreme court, garnering 74 percent of the vote.
During Justice Sharp's seventeen-year tenure on the court, she wrote 459 majority opinions. Her first reported case was Trust Company v. Willis , 257 N.C. 59 (1962), and her last reported case was Pipkin v. Thomas & Hill, Inc., 298 N.C. 278 (1979). In addition, she authored 124 concurring opinions and 45 dissenting opinions.
Sharp's major opinions include: Toone v. Adams, 262 N.C. 403 (1964), about an umpire's right to sue a baseball team and manager who had incited the crowd against him; D & W, Inc. v. Charlotte , 268 N.C. 577 (1966), ruling that brown-bagging in restaurants was not permitted under the law then in existence; Rabon v. Rowan Memorial Hospital, Inc. , 269 N.C. 1 (1967), abolishing hospitals' immunity from liability under the charitable immunity doctrine; Hall v. Board of Elections, 280 N.C. 600 (1972), establishing criteria for college students' eligibility to vote where they went to college; Smith v. State, 289 N.C. 303 (1976), that limited the ancient doctrine of "sovereign immunity"; and In re Peoples, 296 N.C. 109 (1978), the first decision removing a judge for willful misconduct in office.
Chief Justice Sharp successfully advocated for a constitutional amendment, passed in 1980, requiring that all judges be lawyers, after having faced fire extinguisher salesman James Newcomb as her Republican opponent for the chief justiceship.
Sharp received many honors, beginning in 1950 with an honorary LL.D. degree from the North Carolina College for Women. She received an honorary L.H.D. degree from Pfeiffer College in 1960 and honorary LL.D.s from Queens College in 1962, Elon College in 1963, Wake Forest College in 1965, Catawba College in 1970, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1970, and Duke University in 1974. In 1952, the February issue of the Ladies Home Journal recognized her as one of the thirteen outstanding women in public office throughout the country. Twenty-four years later, she was selected by Time magazine in its 6 January 1976 issue as one of twelve women of the year for 1975.
Sharp's accomplishments resulted in a series of awards from women's organizations including the 1959 Achievement Citation from the North Carolina Federation of Business and Professional Women's Clubs, the Distinguished Service Award for Women from the Chi Omega Sorority in 1959, the Alumni Service Award from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro in 1975, and the Special Award for Outstanding Legal Achievement from the New York Women's Bar Association in 1976.
Susie Sharp died in 1996.
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Scope and Content
The collection documents Susie Sharp's professional career and personal life through correspondence, subject files, speeches, and other material, chiefly 1920s-1990s. Subject files contain clippings, memoranda, and correspondence about judicial and personal matters. There are also speeches, chiefly on judicial topics, that Sharp delivered beginning in the 1950s; notebooks in which she defined legal terms and cited precedents; and memoranda, opinions and other materials related to cases she decided. Correspondence, speeches, and other materials document Sharp's 1974 campaign as Democratic Party candidate for the chief justiceship, and there are related letters from friends and associates after her election and her selection as one of twelve 1975 Time magazine Women of the Year. Some of the materials relate to William Haywood Bobbitt, whose retirement as chief justice made way for Sharp's election, and to professors, particularly Albert Coates, and students at the University of North Carolina School of Law and the North Carolina College for Women (now the University of North Carolina at Greensboro). Topics include judicial reform and procedures, particularly relating to discipline of judges; women in the judiciary; women lawyers; women's rights, including the Equal Rights Amendment; and prisoners' rights. Much of the personal correspondence is with Sharp family members and friends, 1920s-1980s, although there are no letters from the 1950s and few from the 1960s. The Additions of 2001 and 2005 chiefly contain materials similar to that of the original deposit. The Additions of April and August 2008 relate chiefly to family and private life, including correspondence between Susie Sharp and her siblings discussing trials and family affairs; postcards from various Sharp family members; a photograph of Sharp's father, James Merrit Sharp; scrapbooks compiled by Sharp's mother, Annie Britt Blackwell Sharp; clippings; a music lesson book; and sewing materials. The Addition of March 2009 includes newspaper clippings and scrapbooks that document Sharp's career and personal correspondence with family and friends, some of which is in Gregg shorthand. There are also family and professional photographs and photograph albums; calendars, diaries, notebooks, and other volumes that record professional and private affairs; and other materials, such as personal scrapbooks that reflect Sharp's interest in various lifestyle topics, clippings relating to the Klenner-Lynch murders, and papers of James Merritt Sharp that concern fundraising for the Near East College Association.
Note that, in some cases, original file folder titles have been retained.
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Series Quick Links
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Series 1. Office Files, 1929-April
1986.
Processing note: See also Additions of January 2001, January 2005, and March 2009.
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Subseries 1.1. General Subject Files, July 1946,
August 1963-July 1985.
Processing note: See also Additions of January 2001, January 2005, and March 2009.
Arrangement: alphabetical by subject.
Letters, memoranda, magazine and newspaper articles, pamphlets, research materials, and other items chiefly documenting Susie Sharp's professional, but with some materials relating to her personal life.
While most of the items date from the late 1960s on, the materials on the Fultz quadruplets, for whom Sharp served as trustee, contain letters from earlier in the decade and a 1946 deed by which Sharp's father sold property to the Fultz family.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation folders document Sharp's involvement in a presidential commission to recommend a successor to FBI Director Clarence M. Kelley. Sharp had initially begged off the assignment when contacted by Vice President Walter F. Mondale but agreed when importuned by Attorney General Griffin Bell, an old acquaintance.
The judicial district files contain information about judges who had been accused of wrongdoing. There is similar material in files under the name of particular judges (e.g., such as Ken Griffin) and in the In re Peoples materials in Series 1.6.
The materials on Albert Coates include correspondence, newspaper clippings, and remarks Sharp made at a ceremony honoring him. Coates was one of Sharp's teachers at the University of North Carolina School of Law and the founder of the Institute of Government at UNC.
Prison letters are from prisoners complaining about prison conditions or about the circumstances of their convictions. Sharp was known to have a long-standing interest in maintaining humane prison conditions.
There is a substantial amount of material, including newspaper clippings and correspondence, on the Equal Rights Amendment. Despite her role as a trailblazer for women lawyers, women judges, and women in government generally, Sharp received criticism from some quarters for her opposition to the Equal Rights Amendment. Sharp believed that, while women must be afforded equal opportunities, their position in society entitled them to certain preferential protections, such as pensions, that a rigorous interpretation of the Equal Rights Amendment would destroy.
Note that Sharp's original folder titles have, for the most part, been retained.
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Subseries 1.2. 1974 Chief Justice Campaign Files, July 1973-November 1974.
Processing note: See also Additions of January 2001 and March 2009.
Arrangement: alphabetical.
Newspaper clippings, magazine articles, correspondence, invoices, and other materials related to Susie Sharp's campaign for election to the position of chief justice on the North Carolina Supreme Court. In 1974, Chief Justice William H. Bobbitt was forced to step down due to a law requiring judges to retire at age 72. Justice Sharp was next in line in seniority, but she had to be elected to the position. She expected that her Republican opponent would be Elreta Alexander, a state district judge. Alexander was defeated in the primary, however, by Jim Newcomb, a businessman without any legal training or experience. Sharp made the importance of legal experience the central theme of her campaign.
Note that Sharp's original folder titles have, for the most part, been retained. See also folder 477 for speeches given during the campaign.
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Subseries 1.3. General Correspondence, October
1972-April 1986.
Processing note: See also Additions of January 2001 and January 2005.
Arrangement: alphabetical by correspondent.
Much of this correspondence is of a professional nature, but there are many personal letters, particularly to and from Sharp family members.
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Subseries 1.4. Chief Justice of the North Carolina Supreme Court and Time Magazine Files, November 1974-January 1976.
Arrangement: alphabetical.
Correspondence offering Sharp congratulations on her 1974 election to the chief justiceship of the North Carolina Supreme Court and her selection as one of Time magazine Women of the Year, 1975.
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Subseries 1.5. Speech Files, April
1959-September 1981.
Processing note: See also Additions of January 2001, January 2005, and March 2009.
Arrangement: alphabetical by speech title or group/occasion.
Texts of various speeches Susie Sharp delivered during her career, most of which relate to the law and her experiences. Please note that a few speeches may be found elsewhere in the collection, particularly in the General Subject Files (Series 1.1).
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Subseries 1.6. Case Files, 1962-1979.
Processing note: See also Additions of January 2001, January 2005, and March 2009.
Arrangement: alphabetical by case name.
Research memoranda and opinions delivered in various cases during Susie Sharp's tenure on the North Carolina Supreme Court. Cases of note include D & W, Inc. v. Charlotte , 268 N.C. 577 (1966), ruling that brown-bagging in restaurants was not permitted under the law then in existence, and In re Peoples , 296 N.C. 109 (1978), the first opinion of this court removing a judge from office for willful misconduct in office.
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Subseries 1.7. Legal Notebooks, 1929-1979.
Arrangement: alphabetical by term defined.
Contents of seven three-ring binders with definitions of legal terms and doctrines. The papers from each binder have been arranged alphabetically, but separated to show the structure of the original seven binders. Some of the binders were clearly begun early in Susie Sharp's legal career, with others started after she was on the bench.
| Folder 514-520 |
A-B #04898, Subseries: "1.7. Legal Notebooks, 1929-1979. " Folder 514-520Folder 514Folder 515Folder 516Folder 517Folder 518Folder 519Folder 520 |
| Folder 521-527 |
C-D #04898, Subseries: "1.7. Legal Notebooks, 1929-1979. " Folder 521-527Folder 521Folder 522Folder 523Folder 524Folder 525Folder 526Folder 527 |
| Folder 528-535 |
E-F #04898, Subseries: "1.7. Legal Notebooks, 1929-1979. " Folder 528-535Folder 528Folder 529Folder 530Folder 531Folder 532Folder 533Folder 534Folder 535 |
| Folder 536-542 |
G-H #04898, Subseries: "1.7. Legal Notebooks, 1929-1979. " Folder 536-542Folder 536Folder 537Folder 538Folder 539Folder 540Folder 541Folder 542 |
| Folder 543-549 |
I-K #04898, Subseries: "1.7. Legal Notebooks, 1929-1979. " Folder 543-549Folder 543Folder 544Folder 545Folder 546Folder 547Folder 548Folder 549 |
| Folder 550-556 |
L-M #04898, Subseries: "1.7. Legal Notebooks, 1929-1979. " Folder 550-556Folder 550Folder 551Folder 552Folder 553Folder 554Folder 555Folder 556 |
| Folder 557-563 |
N-P #04898, Subseries: "1.7. Legal Notebooks, 1929-1979. " Folder 557-563Folder 557Folder 558Folder 559Folder 560Folder 561Folder 562Folder 563 |
| Folder 564-570 |
Q-R #04898, Subseries: "1.7. Legal Notebooks, 1929-1979. " Folder 564-570Folder 564Folder 565Folder 566Folder 567Folder 568Folder 569Folder 570 |
| Folder 571-577 |
S-T #04898, Subseries: "1.7. Legal Notebooks, 1929-1979. " Folder 571-577Folder 571Folder 572Folder 573Folder 574Folder 575Folder 576Folder 577 |
| Folder 578-584 |
U-Z #04898, Subseries: "1.7. Legal Notebooks, 1929-1979. " Folder 578-584Folder 578Folder 579Folder 580Folder 581Folder 582Folder 583Folder 584 |
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Series 2. Personal Correspondence, 1900-1989.
Processing note: See also Additions of January 2001, January 2005, April 2008, and March 2009.
Arrangement: alphabetical by correspondent.
Susie Sharp's personal correspondence with family and friends. The letters begin in the 1920s and continue through the 1980s. There is a noticeable lack of correspondence in the 1950s and only a smattering in the 1960s. Some personal letters that Sharp kept in her office files may be found in Series 1, particularly the Sharp Family folder in the Series 1.1, Series 1.3, and Series 1.4.
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Subseries 2.1. 1900-1929.
Processing note: See also Additions of January 2001, January 2005, April 2008, and March 2009.
Arrangement: alphabetical.
Personal letters written to and from Susie Sharp, mostly in the 1920s. Included are letters from her father and mother, James Merritt Sharp and Annie Britt Blackwell Sharp, as well as from her siblings Annie, Sallie, Tommy, Florence, and Louise. Other correspondents were Sharp's mother's sister Susie Webb Blackwell Garrett, her husband A. Earle Garrett, Sr., and their son A. Earle Garrett, Jr.
Sharp's friends from Reidsville included Margaret Fillman and Janie Sands. The High School Notes folder contains notes passed to Sharp from classmates in her secondary school. Nuion Boulliat was Sharp's pen pal from France, and Constance Gwaltney was a friend from the North Carolina College for Women.
Correspondents connected with the University of North Carolina include law professor Millard Breckenridge and his wife Venitah and students, including Maude Brown, Dorothy Fahs, Lee Kennett, Lina Keller, Howard Gibson Godwin, and Eleanor Torrens. Ruby Ross was a secretary in the law school.
The only letter written before the 1920s is a 1900 love letter to Sharp's mother.
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Subseries 2.2. 1930-1949.
Processing note: See also Additions of January 2001, January 2005, April 2008, and March 2009.
Arrangement: alphabetical by correspondent.
In September 1930, Sharp accepted a position as law school secretary and research assistant from Dean Charles T. McCormick of the University of North Carolina School of Law. This position brought her back into the Chapel Hill orbit early in the 1930s. Law school faculty and staff correspondents in this period include Agnes R. Neville, Charles McCormick, Albert Coates, A. C. McIntosh, and M. T. Van Hecke. Law school students include Hugh Lobdell, William T. Covington, Jr., Allen Langston, and John B. Lewis. Jean Breckenridge Newnam is the daughter of UNC law professor Millard Breckenridge.
In addition to correspondence from the family members identified in Series 2.1, there are also letters from Sharp's younger brother James Vance Sharp, also known as Kits.
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Subseries 2.3. 1960-1989.
Processing note: See also Additions of January 2001, January 2005, April 2008, and March 2009.
Arrangement: alphabetical by correspondent.
Correspondence from family members includes letters from Susie Sharp's sister Annie Hill Sharp Klenner and her children Fredrick Klenner, Jr., and Gertrude Klenner Wilkerson; Sharp's sister Florence Sharp Newsom and her children Susie Sharp Newsom Lynch and Robert Newsom, Jr.; Sharp's brother James Vance Sharp and his wife Gwen Sharp; Sharp's sister Louise Sharp, who had moved back into the family residence in Reidsville; Sharp's brother Thomas Sharp, his wife Bobbie Sharp, and their daughter Tyrell Sharp; and Larry Taylor and Barbara Taylor, the son and daughter-in-law of Sharp's deceased sister Sallie.
Other correspondents include Judge Bobbitt's sister, Mary Potts, and Sharp's secretary, Virginia Lyons.
Louise Sharp's correspondence is particularly voluminous. She kept in touch with many family members and wrote long Christmas letters detailing the activities of many family members.
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Additions
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Addition of January 2001 (Acc. 98825), 1906-1997 and undated.
The Addition of January 2001 is arranged in the same way as, but has not been incorporated into, the original deposit of materials.
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Subseries 1. Office Files, 1910, 1923-1996
and undated.
Chiefly correspondence, clippings, financial records, campaign materials, notes, legal documents, and other papers documenting Susie Sharp's professional interests and activities. Included are articles about Sharp's judical career and accomplishments; records of the Sharp family properties in Rockingham County, N.C.; speeches; and case files.
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Subseries 1.1. General Subject Files, 1910, 1923-1996, and undated.
Arrangement: alphabetical by subject.
Chiefly letters, clippings, financial records, reports, research materials, and other papers documenting Susie Sharp's professional interests and activities. Included are articles about Sharp's judical career and accomplishments as well as information about her colleagues. Also included are records of the Sharp family properties in Rockingham County, N.C.