James Crawford Biggs | |
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Born |
James Crawford Biggs August 29, 1872 Oxford, North Carolina |
Died | January 30, 1960 | (aged 87)
Occupation | Lawyer, politician |
College football career | |
North Carolina Tar Heels | |
Position | End |
Class | 1892 |
Career history | |
College | North Carolina (1892) |
Personal information | |
Height | 5 ft 9 in (1.75 m) |
Weight | 145 lb (66 kg) |
Career highlights and awards | |
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James Crawford Biggs (August 29, 1872 – January 30, 1960) was an American lawyer and politician, born in Oxford, North Carolina to William and Elizabeth Arlington (Cooper) Biggs.
Biggs was a student at the Horner Military School in Oxford from 1883-1887 before attending the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He was an end on North Carolina's first great football team in 1892. Biggs graduated Summa Cum Laude from the University of North Carolina (UNC) in 1893 with a bachelor's degree in philosophy. He was a member of Zeta Psi Fraternity as well as the scholastic honors fraternity, Phi Beta Kappa. Biggs studied law at University of North Carolina Law School from 1893–1894 and was admitted to the North Carolina bar in 1894. He began a law practice in his hometown of Oxford, while teaching simultaneously as a professor at UNC (1898–1900) and Trinity Law School (1911–1912), in Durham, NC. From 1894-1898, Biggs also served as an adjutant in the North Carolina state guard.
Biggs was elected to serve two terms as the mayor of Oxford in 1897 and 1898. In 1899, he helped found the North Carolina Bar Association, which he served as its first Secretary-Treasurer, and later served as president (1914-1915). He served as a member of the North Carolina House of Representatives from Durham County in 1905. He continued his ascendency in the North Carolina legal system, serving as a state supreme court reporter (1905–1907), and then as a judge of the Superior Court of North Carolina, from 1907-1911. He resigned from this position in 1911 in order to resume private law practice in Raleigh, NC. From 1917-1918, Biggs was given an opportunity to litigate on the federal level when he was chosen to be a special assistant to the U.S. Attorney General in charge of oil litigation against the Southern Pacific Railroad in California.