5th Nevada Attorney General
Term: January 6, 1879 - January
1, 1883
Biography
Shortly after his birth in New York State in
1837, Michael A. Murphy’s family moved to McHenry County, Illinois.
At age 16, Murphy ventured to California to search for gold and at age
26, he moved to Aurora, Nevada (then in Esmeralda County; present day in Mineral
County), to become a miner. He
studied law and entered political life, serving a term as Esmeralda County
Assessor. He gained admittance to
the Nevada State Bar on February 29, 1872[1]. In 1874,
and again in 1876, Esmeralda County voters elected him as their District
Attorney.[2]
Election
of 1878
Elected as Nevada’s fifth Attorney General on
November 5, 1878, Murphy (Republican) received 9,995 (52.7%) of the 18,952 votes
cast, and incumbent Attorney General John R. Kittrell (Democrat) received 8,957
(47.3%) votes.[3]
Murphy became the first lawyer to defeat a sitting Nevada Attorney General.
Office
Administration and Duties
Murphy had no deputies or other support staff
according to the Nevada Attorney General’s budgets for the 1879–1881 and
1881–1883 state biennial fiscal periods:
1879–1881 Budget
|
$7,200
|
|
$7,200
|
Attorney General’s Salary
|
|
|
Office expenses came from an appropriation “[f]or a current expense
appropriation, to defray the telegraphic, postage, and contingent
expenses of the several state officers, Supreme Court, and State
Library, to be expended under the direction of the Lieutenant Governor,
State Controller, and Secretary of State, $9,000”
|
1881–1883 Budget
|
$7,200
|
|
$7,200
|
Attorney General’s Salary
|
|
|
Office expenses came from an
appropriation “[f]or a current expense appropriation, to defray the
telegraphic, postage, and contingent expenses of the several state
officers, Supreme Court, and State Library, to be expended under the
direction of the Lieutenant Governor, State Controller, and Secretary of
State, $8,000”
|
The 1879 and 1881 Nevada State Legislative
sessions did not add any additional duties to the office of the Attorney
General.
[1]
O'Brien, J.P. History of the Bench and Bar of Nevada
(1913): p. 45. Web. 23, Sept. 2015.
[2]
Nevada Reports, Number 22, p. 11.
[3]
Political History of Nevada, 2006, p. 354.
[1] Nevada Reports, Number 22, p.
12.
[2] Nevada Historical Society
Quarterly, Volume XXVII, Spring 1984, Number 1, p. 13.
[3] Political History of Nevada,
2006, p. 357.