Thomas McCawley

Who was Thomas McCawley?

Thomas William McCawley was a chief justice of Queensland.

McCawley was born in Toowoomba, Queensland, Australia. He was of Irish-Catholic background, his father having been born in County Leitrim, Ireland. On his mother's side he had German ancestry, his mother coming from Darmstadt, Germany. He was educated at the Sisters of Mercy's Hibernian Hall and a state school in Toowoomba. Later, McCawley was employed by the Queensland government savings bank, and was successively transferred to the offices of the public service board and the Department of Justice. Studying after hours, he passed the prescribed examinations and was admitted to the Queensland bar on 7 May 1907. In November 1910, at the age of 29 he was appointed crown solicitor, an appointment which was controversial at the time.

McCawley was a staunch Catholic. This, and his links with the Australian Labor Party in Queensland, attracted criticism from some parts of the legal profession in Queensland when he was appointed to a number of senior legal positions in the state There were objections from some quarters, both on political grounds and on the grounds of his lack of experience as practising barrister, when he was appointed as the first president of the Queensland Court of Industrial Arbitration in January 1917, and then puisne judge of the Supreme Court of Queensland in October 1917. Challenges to his appointment to the Supreme Court heard in the Supreme Court of Queensland and the High Court of Australia were successful but were overturned by the Privy Council in London. During the next few years, until his premature death, he had an outstandingly successful legal career.