Jesse Smith Henley was born May 18, 1917, to Benjamin H. Henley and Jesse G. Henley and grew up in St. Joe, Ark. He earned a Bachelor of Laws at the University of Arkansas in 1941, graduating with honors and entering the practice of law at Fayetteville the same year. He married Dorothy Eloise Ingram on Sept. 30, 1938.
The family later moved to Harrison by 1950 and among other cases that Henley worked on was the plight of the residents of Midway, Arkansas, which lost its primary road from the town to Harrison when Bull Shoals Dam was finished and the waters covered over the road, stranding more than 40 families on the far side from their usual travels.
Henley was nominated by President Eisenhower on August 18, 1959, to a joint seat on the U.S. District Courts for the Eastern District and Western District Court of Arkansas after having filled a recess appointment presiding over the Eastern District.
In 1975, President Gerald Ford nominated Henley to the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals and he was confirmed by the U.S. Senate on March 13, 1975.
Henley took senior status, a semi-retirement that allowed him to continue hearing cases at a reduced workload, and died at Harrison on Oct. 18, 1997, while still serving the 8th District.
On April 28, 1999, U.S. Rep. Asa Hutchinson introduced H.R.1605, which designated the federal building and U.S. courthouse in Harrison as the “J. Smith Henley Federal Building and United States Courthouse.”
Judge who ruled that prisoners were treated too harshly dies
HARRISON, Ark. (AP) – J. Smith Henley, a federal judge who once ruled that prisoners’ treatment in Arkansas prisons constituted cruel and unusual punishment, died at his Harrison home Saturday [Oct. 18, 1997]. He was 80.
Henley got his law degree at the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville in 1941 and was in private practice through 1954.
He worked at the Federal Communications Commission and the Justice Department before being appointed U.S. district judge for the Eastern and Western districts of Arkansas in 1958.
He was appointed to the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in St. Louis in March 1975 by President Gerald Ford. He took senior judge status, or semi-retirement, in May 1982.
A case that Henley handled led to significant changes in the Arkansas prison system.
In 1970, Henley ruled that treatment of prisoners at Tucker Intermediate Reformatory and Cummins Prison Farm constituted cruel and unusual punishment. The ruling came after a federal grand jury Henley had convened indicted 15 officials for brutality at four correctional facilities.
That case was dismissed in 1982 by U.S. District Judge G. Thomas Eisele, who found that the prison system had evolved from what Henley had described as a “dark and evil world” into a model institution.
Richard Arnold of Little Rock, currently chief judge of the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, said Henley worked for many years after he had taken senior status and was not required to work any longer.
“He had a great sense of dedication to duty, and was well known for a wonderful sense of humor,” Arnold said.
— Batesville Guard, Associated Press, Monday, Oct. 20, 1997, Page 3