Richard Joseph Hopkins

Richard Joseph Hopkins (April 4, 1873 – August 28, 1943) was an American attorney and judge who served on the Kansas Supreme Court and as a United States federal judge.

Born in Jefferson City, Missouri, Hopkins received an LL.B. from Northwestern University School of Law in 1901. He was in private practice in Chicago, Illinois from 1901 to 1906, and in Garden City, Kansas from 1906 to 1913. He was a member of the Kansas House of Representatives in 1909, and was thereafter the 19th Lieutenant Governor of Kansas, as a Republican from 1911 to 1912 serving under Governor Walter R. Stubbs. Hopkins was a city attorney of Garden City from 1913 to 1918. He was the state attorney general of Kansas from 1919 to 1923. He was an Associate Justice of the Kansas Supreme Court from 1923 to 1929.

On October 17, 1929, Hopkins was nominated by President Herbert Hoover to a seat on the United States District Court for the District of Kansas vacated by George Thomas McDermott. Hopkins was confirmed by the United States Senate on December 19, 1929, and received his commission the same day. Hopkins served in that capacity until his death.

Sources

• Richard Joseph Hopkins at the Biographical Directory of Federal Judges, a public domain publication of the Federal Judicial Center.