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An Examined Life:
Interview with Perry Cockerell
By Carin Chea
The last time I spoke with accomplished litigator Perry Cockerell, he had just completed the last installment of his three-part fictional series A Private War.
Since then, the author has begun his foray into historical non-fiction work. Already an avid writer contributing over 50 judicial profiles to the Tarrant County Bar Journal, this was a natural and seamless transition for Cockerell.
His latest work, Texas Jurist: The Life, Law and Legacy of B. D. Tarlton, closely examines the journey Fort Worth's first chief justice of the Second Court of Civil Appeals as he navigated through judicial politics and harrowing life and death circumstances.
As with all his endeavors, Cockerell leaves no stone unturned in this biography that reads like a historical drama.
It's been a while since we've chatted. Are you still practicing law? I hear you established a publishing house?
I own Alliance Publishing LLC that publishes and markets works from new authors. One of my authors, Risa Brown is working on her second book for the company. The book is “Best Equipped and Most Loved” and comes out later this year. It is about the second decade of Texas Wesleyan University in Fort Worth.
Her first book, called “Polytechnic Days” came out in 2020 and is about the first ten years of the same university. The books are now part of a series. She is now on her third traditional book contract with my company.
Tom Fegan is another author who wrote “Panther City: Stories of Crime Set in Fort Worth, Texas” and published through Alliance. The book is really interesting and has 14 ratings on Amazon.
You are now on your fourth book, correct? Tell us about Texas Jurist: The Life, Law and Legacy of B. D. Tarlton. Is this your first non-fiction work?
Texas Jurist is my first non-fiction book. This is a biography of B.D. Tarlton, the first chief justice of the Second Court of Civil Appeals in Fort Worth
His granddaughter was Sissy Farenthold, who ran for governor in 1972 and was nominated for Vice President of the United States that same year. She was a well-known social activist. She passed away last fall.
I had interviewed her for two years working on the book. Sissy read the manuscript before she passed away and gave an endorsement for it.
The book is a fascinating story about the Texas appellate justice who became a law professor at UT Law School after his term in the court of appeals. He also served on the Texas commission of appeals for one year.
The book explores his family life growing up in Grand Coteau, Louisiana during the Civil War. The book explores why Tarlton withdrew from the democratic primary race in 1898 while pursuing a second term.
He ran when the delegates voted the nominee at a primary convention. His opponent, Truman Conner, a district judge in Eastland county, Texas secured more delegates than he needed to win, prior to the convention. Tarlton withdrew from the primary race allowing Conner to secure the nomination.
In 1904 Tarlton became a law professor at the University of Texas until his death. In 1919, he was visiting his son in Corpus Christi when a category 3 hurricane smashed into city destroying much of the city.
Tarlton helped in the rescue efforts but died a few days after catching pneumonia. The University of Texas named the law library after him. His mother died at a young age, too, in her 50s of pneumonia. Pneumonia was very dangerous back then.
It's a fascinating family because they came from Louisiana through the Civil War, and then moved to Texas after losing one of their plantations. Tarlton grew up in Louisiana and attended a Catholic school.
There was a nearby academy for girls who wanted to become nuns. One of the girls became very sick and claims that she was miraculously cured by John Berchmans, who appeared to her. Berchmans was later canonized as a saint.
It is believed that two of the Tarlton boys, B.D. and his brother, Toulmin were influenced and greatly impacted by these events and became Catholic. Their family was Episcopalian.
Sissy believed that her grandfather was defeated because he was Catholic. She believed that the democratic delegates were prejudiced against Catholics. I spent 4 years researching Tarlton's life trying to sort out why Truman Conner, ran against him. The book explores the campaign in 1898 and the theories behind Conner's win.
I didn't see anything in the newspapers that showed Conner expressing anti-Catholicism. I researched the cases that were appealed to the Second Court of Civil Appeals from Conner's court and I noticed that Conner was frequently reversed by the higher court.
There were more than 50 cases appealed to the higher court and his cases were reversed at least fifty percent of the time. Tarlton wrote at a third of the opinions reversing Conner. Conner must not have liked this.
Conner was able to secure more than enough delegates to be elected by arguing that the outlying counties in the court's jurisdiction had no representation on the court and that the city of Fort Worth had dictated who would be appointed to the court. Judicial politics can be unfair.
How did this book come about?
I write a monthly judicial profile for the Tarrant County Bar Journal and began writing about the chief justices. B.D. Tarlton was my first profile of a chief justice. I found his life so fascinating that I decided to pursue him further.
I spent 4 years working on the book. My wife and child traveled to Louisiana to look for the plantations and to Grand Coteau where he went to school.
Do you see yourself transitioning into full-time writing?
I would like to, and I think I'm reaching that point where I will practice less litigation in court and more writing.
If they were to make your book into a movie, who would play the titular character?
Josh Brolin could play an age-progressed Tarlton. The book has some Gone with the Wind vibes, too.
For more information on Perry's latest publication, please visit alliancepublishingllc.com/texas-jurist-b-d-tarlton
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