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Murray, William, first Earl of Mansfield (1705-1793)
Son of the fifth Viscount Stormont, educated at Perth Grammar school, Westminster School and Christ Church, Oxford, he was called to the English bar. He appeared for Edinburgh when it was threatened with disenfranchisement after the Porteous Riots. He was appointed Solicitor General in 1742, Attorney General in 1754, and Lord chief justice in 1756. A member of the Cabinet for fifteen years, he was created Earl of Mansfield in 1776, and acted as Speaker of the House of Lords in 1783. His considerable legal reforms gave rise to some lines attributed to Burns as an answer to his criticism of the Stewarts on a Stirling inn window. "Rash mortal, and slanderous Poet, thy name
Shall no longer appear in the records of fame:
Dost not know that old Mansfield who writes like the Bible,
Says the more 'tis a truth, Sir, the more 'tis a libel?"
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