Thomas M Reavley

Thomas Morrow Reavley was born June 21, 1921 in Quitman, Texas. He earned a B.A. from The University of Texas in 1942. He served as a lieutenant in the U.S. Navy during the Second World War from 1942 to 1946. Following the war he entered Harvard Law School, earning a J.D. in 1948. Reavley served as an assistant district attorney in Dallas from 1948 to 1949, and then went into private practice in Nacogdoches from 1949 to 1951. In 1951 he served as the county attorney for Nacogdoches County before returning to private practice in Lufkin from 1951 to 1952 and Jasper from 1952 to 1955. In 1955 he became Texas secretary of state, serving until 1957. He then went into private practice in Austin from 1957 to 1964. He was a judge for the 167th Judicial District in Austin from 1964 to 1968. In October 1968 Reavley was appointed an associate justice of the Texas Supreme Court by Gov. John Connally when James R. Norvell retired. He was subsequently elected to the position the following month and reelected in 1974. He resigned his seat on the bench in 1977 to return to private practice. In 1979 President Jimmy Carter nominated Reavley to a newly created judgeship on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. He served in the position for a number of years, assuming senior status in 1990. Reavley married Fifth Circuit chief judge Carolyn Dineen King in 2004; they became the first married couple ever to serve together on a federal appellate court. They live in Houston.