Lucas Cornelius Steyn
{{Use dmy dates|date=January 2020}}
{{Infobox officeholder
| name = Lucas Cornelius Steyn
| image =
| order = 12th
| office = Chief Justice of South Africa
| honorific-prefix = The Right Honourable
| appointer = J. G. Strydom
| deputy =
| nominator =
| predecessor = Henry Allan Fagan
| successor = Newton Ogilvie Thompson
| monarch2 = Elizabeth II
| predecessor2 = Ernest George Jansen
as Governor-General
| primeminister2 = Hendrik Verwoerd
| successor2 = Charles Roberts Swart
as Governor-General
| monarch1 = Elizabeth II
| office1 =
| order1 = Officer Administering the Government of South Africa
as Chief Justice of South Africa
| predecessor1 = Charles Roberts Swart
as Governor-General
| primeminister1 = Hendrik Verwoerd
| successor1 = Charles Roberts Swart
as State President of South Africa
| term_start = 1959
| term_end = 1971
| term_start1 = 30 April 1961
| term_end1 = 31 May 1961
| term_start2 = 26 November 1959
| term_end2 = 11 December 1959
| birth_date = 21 December 1903{{cite web|title=Biography of Steyn, Lucas Cornelius|url=http://www.archontology.org/nations/south_africa/sa_gg/steyn.php|publisher=Archontology.org|language=en}}
| birth_place = Geluksdam, District Viljoenskroon, Orange River Colony
| death_date = {{Death date and age|1976|7|28|1903|12|21|df=y}}
| death_place = Pretoria, Transvaal, South Africa|
}}
Lucas Cornelius Steyn, PC, QC (21 December 1903 – 28 July 1976) was Chief Justice of South Africa and, as such, acted as Governor-General on two occasions.
Early life
Steyn was born in 1903 on a farm in the Orange River Colony, shortly after it had fallen under British rule during the Boer War.{{cite journal |last=Cameron|first=Edwin|author-link=Edwin Cameron|url=http://heinonline.org/HOL/LandingPage?handle=hein.journals/soaf99&div=16&id=&page=|title=Legal Chauvinism, Executive-Mindedness and Justice—L C Steyn's Impact on South African Law |journal=South African Law Journal|year=1982|volume=99|page=38}} His parents were Christiaan Louwrens Steyn and Magdalena Josina Maria Kruger. He attended Kroonstad Secondary School and graduated with a law degree from the University of Stellenbosch in 1926, was admitted as an advocate (the South African equivalent of a barrister) in 1928, and obtained a doctorate in law in 1929.South Africa, Biographical Index, 1825–2005
Legal career
There followed an illustrious career as a civil servant under four successive Prime Ministers. He was Attorney-General of South West Africa, which was then under South African administration, from 1931 to 1933, and worked in the Department of Justice from 1933 to 1944. He was appointed a King's Counsel in 1943. He assisted the South African delegation to the United Nations from 1946 to 1949, and was a legal adviser in the 1950 International Court of Justice hearing into South Africa's refusal to give up South West Africa.
Steyn was appointed a judge of the High Court (Transvaal Provincial Division) in 1951. Shortly thereafter, in 1955, he was promoted to the Appellate Division. And soon after that he was appointed Chief Justice, ahead of the noted liberal judge of many years' appellate experience, Oliver Schreiner. This unprecedentedly rapid ascent reflected Steyn's favour with D. F. Malan's Afrikaner nationalist administration. As Chief Justice, Steyn acted ex officio as Officer Administering the Government, i.e. acting Governor-General under a dormant commission, for the period between the death of Dr Jansen in 1959 and the installation of C.R. Swart in 1960, and again between Swart's resignation as the last Governor-General in 1961 and his inauguration as the first State President of South Africa a few weeks later. It was he who administered the oaths of office to Swart on both occasions.
Steyn's tenure as Chief Justice lasted twelve years. True to his appointment by an Afrikaner nationalist government, Steyn's jurisprudence was executive-minded and critical of English influences on South African law. He retired from the bench in 1971.
Personal life
Steyn married Huibrecht van Schoor in 1928. They had two children. He died in 1976.{{cite book|title='Dictionary of South African Biography, Volume V|date=August 2010}}
References and Notes
{{Reflist|group=note|liststyle=lower-roman}}
{{Reflist}}
{{South Africa GG}}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Steyn, Lucas Cornelius}}
Category:20th-century South African judges
Category:20th-century South African lawyers
Category:Chief justices of South Africa
Category:Governors-general of South Africa
Category:South African members of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom
Category:20th-century King's Counsel