William Mershon Lanning

Education

Born in Ewingville, New Jersey (in what is now Ewing Township, New Jersey), Lanning graduated from the Lawrenceville School in 1866. He studied law, was admitted to the bar in 1880 and commenced practice in Trenton, New Jersey.

Career

He became a Counselor in 1883. Lanning was elected city solicitor for Trenton in 1884. He was appointed judge of the city district court in 1887 and served until 1891, when legislated out of office.

He served as president of the Mechanics" National Bank of Trenton in 1899.

Lanning was elected as a Republican to the Fifty-eighth Congress and served from March 4, 1903, to June 6, 1904, when he resigned to accept an appointment as a judge on United States District Court for the District of New Jersey. He served in that capacity until May 18, 1909, when he was appointed United States circuit judge for the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, which position he held until his death in Trenton, New Jersey, February 16, 1912.

An elementary school built on Pennington Road (New Jersey 31) in Ewing in 1914 was named in Lanning"s honor. The school was closed and the building sold to a private institution in the mid-1990s, but as of 2014, is still standing and continues to bear Lanning"s name.

Works

• book

  • Help for township officers,: Containing an orderly arrangement of those statutes and parts of statutes of New Jersey which relate to township ... township officers need most frequently to use
  • HELP FOR TOWNSHIP OFFICERS (1893) Statutes & Parts of Statutes of New Jersey Which Relate to Township Officers
  • Help for township officers,: Containing an orderly arrangement of those statutes and parts of statutes of New Jersey which relate to township ... of legal forms for use by township officers

Membership

He served as member of a commission to frame township laws and of the constitutional commission of 1894.

Connections

Spouse:

Jennie Hemenway