Dick Haney Biography


	This biography appears on pages 441-442 in "History of Dakota Territory" 
	by George W. Kingsbury, Vol. IV (1915) and was scanned, 
	OCRed and edited by Maurice Krueger, mkrueger@iw.net.

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				HON. DICK HANEY. 

	Hon. Dick Haney, an attorney of Mitchell, was born in Lansing, 
Iowa, November 10, 1852. His father, John Haney, was a pioneer of that 
state and became the owner of the land on which the city of Lansing was 
built. There for many years he was engaged in the operation of saw and 
flour mills. His father, James Haney, was a native of Ireland and on 
coming to America in 1775 settled in Pennsylvania. The earlier 
ancestors were of Scotch birth, removing from the land of hills and 
heather to Ireland in the first part of the eighteenth century. John 
Haney was born in Pennsylvania and in 1830 became a resident of 
Illinois, where he resided until 1848, when he cast in his lot with the 
pioneer settlers of Iowa. His wife, who bore the maiden name of Fanny 
Toll, was a native of Massachusetts and in their family were eleven 
children, of whom the subject of this review is the youngest. 

	Liberally educated, Dick Haney attended a private school at 
Lansing, Iowa, and afterward pursued a classical course in the Iowa 
Wesleyan University at Mount Pleasant. He next entered the Law College 
of the Iowa State University and was graduated therefrom with the class 
of 1874. He then began practice in Lansing, Iowa, where he remained 
until 1885, and for several years during that period filled the office 
of city attorney. On leaving Lansing in 1885 he came to Dakota 
territory, settling at Plankinton, Aurora county, where he was elected 
district attorney, which position he filled until 1889. He was then 
elected to the circuit bench, presiding over the circuit court until 
February, 1896, when he was appointed a member of the South Dakota 
supreme court by Governor Sheldon. He remained a member of the court of 
final appeal until 1913 and during three years of that period was 
presiding judge. He proved himself the peer of the ablest members who 
have sat upon the supreme court bench, his course being distinguished 
by the highest legal ability. To wear the ermine worthily it is not 
enough that one possess legal acumen, is learned in the principles of 
jurisprudence, familiar with precedents and thoroughly honest, Many 
men, even when acting uprightly, are wholly unable to divest themselves 
of prejudice and are unconsciously warped in their judgments by their 
own mental characteristics or educational peculiarities. This 
unconscious and variable disturbing force enters more or less into the 
judgments of all men, but in the ideal jurist this factor becomes so 
small as not to be discernible in results and loses its potency as a 
disturbing force. Judge Haney was exceptionally free from all judicial 
bias. His varied legal learning and wide experience in the courts, the 
patient care with which he ascertained all the needed facts bearing 
upon every case which came before him, gave his decisions a solidity 
and exhaustiveness from which no member of the bar could take 
exception. 

	In 1913 Judge Haney removed to Mitchell and entered into 
partnership with Timon J. Spangler under the firm name of Spangler & 
Haney, constituting what is now one of the most favorably known law 
firms of the state. 

	On the 22d of January, 1876, Judge Haney was united in marriage 
to Miss Roxie Doe, and they became the parents of two children, John D. 
and Harriet H. The mother died August 7, 1907, and on the 14th of 
September, 1909, Judge Haney wedded Florence Tredway, by whom he has a 
daughter, Elinor. 

	In his political views Judge Haney has always been a stalwart 
republican and fraternally he is connected with the Masons and the 
Modern Woodmen of America. He also belongs to Beta Theta Pi, a college 
fraternity, while his religious faith is that of the Episcopal church. 
He is a prominent member of the state bar association, which honored 
him with election to the presidency in 1914. His superior legal 
training and his long service on the circuit and supreme bench, 
aggregating nearly a quarter of a century, place him easily among the 
most distinguished lawyers of the state, his name being inscribed on 
the keystone of the legal arch of South Dakota.