NORTH CAROLINA GENERAL ASSEMBLY
1971 SESSION

CHAPTER 1031
HOUSE BILL 624

AN ACT TO APPROPRIATE FUNDS FOR THE PRESERVATION OF THE HOME OF JUSTICE RICHMOND M. PEARSON, KNOWN AS "RICHMOND HILL".

Whereas, one of the greatest legal minds ever produced by this State was that of Richmond Mumford Pearson, who served on the North Carolina bench longer than any other man in its history, serving as a Superior Court Judge from 1837 to 1848, as Justice of the North Carolina Supreme Court from 1848 to 1858, and as Chief Justice of that court from 1858 to 1878; and
Whereas, Pearson's home, established in the period between 1847-48 above the Yadkin River and called "Richmond Hill", still stands; and
Whereas, at Richmond Hill, Justice Pearson conducted from 1848 until 1876 one of the most famous private law schools ever established in the United States, educating their three governors, six supreme court justices, more than a dozen superior court judges, three congressmen of the United States, one confederate congressman, numberless State Legislators, and various ambassadors, cabinet officers, and lesser luminaries; and
Whereas, Richmond Hill ought to be preserved as a monument to a great jurist and a great teacher as well as to a tumultuous and formative period of our State's history; Now, therefore,

The General Assembly of North Carolina enacts:

Section 1.  There is appropriated for the 1971-73 biennium out of the General Fund of North Carolina to the Department of Archives and History, the sum of $15,000 to be used for the restoration of the home of Richmond M. Pearson, known as "Richmond Hill" in Yadkin County, North Carolina, subject to the availability of an equal amount of non-state matching funds.
Sec. 2.  This act shall become effective upon ratification.
In the General Assembly read three times and ratified, this the 20th day of July, 1971.