John Marshall coinage offered

Chicago attorney Jerold S. Solovy of Jenner & Block has called on members of the Illinois State Bar Association to support a funding project for the U.S. Supreme Court Historical Society.

Solovy, an ISBA Senior Counsellor and Laureate of the ISBA Academy of Illinois Lawyers, is a trustee of the society.

The project involves purchase of newly minted commemorative silver dollars that honor the career of John Marshall, who was born in 1755 and was chief justice of the Supreme Court from 1801 until he died in 1835.

Congress authorized the U.S. Mint in August 2004 to produce up to 400,000 of the coins, the first ever to honor a Supreme Court justice, and the Historical Society endowment will receive $10 for each one sold before Dec. 31.

“I can assure you that the funds received from the coins will be put to good use in preserving the history of the court,” Solovy said, “providing educational programs for students and other programs which the court's limited budget does not provide for.”

The 2005 Chief Justice John Marshall Silver Dollar has a portrait of the justice on the obverse and a view of the old Supreme Court chamber in the U.S. Capitol on the reverse.

To obtain information about pricing and to order coins, call (800) USA-MINT or access the Web site, www.usmint.gov.

For a summary of the historic justice's life and career, see “250th birthday of John Marshall, author of Marbury decision, to be marked in fall” that was published in the April 2005 issue of the ISBA Bar News.