Charles W. Scrutchin was the first black lawyer in Minnesota to practice outside of Minneapolis. He worked as a Pullman porter and hotel waiter in St. Paul, Detroit and Buffalo before setting his sights on a law career. He attended the University of Michigan which was the first publicly supported university to admit African Americans. He graduated from the Michigan Law School in 1894. He moved to Chicago and then to St. Paul in 1898 and befriended Frederick McGhee. He suggested that Scrutchin establish his practice in a place like Bemidji. Taking that advice, Scrutchin visited Bemidji and opened his legal practice here. There were only four blacks in Bemidji in 1898, including Scrutchin.
In 1899, Scrutchin helped draft the Minnesota constitutional rights law with McGhee, Wheaton and Morris. This landmark law prohibited race or color-based exclusion from any public accommodation or entertainment. In 1902, he used the law to sue a white barber in Blackduck who refused to give him a haircut and share. He won.
Scrutchin’s legal talent was apparent from the beginning. During his first year of practice, he won the acquittal of a man charged with stealing 10 tons of hay. He grounded his practice in criminal law. He also built a strong clientele of lumberjacks who were mostly recent immigrants. Unlike most of the citizens of Bemidji, they sought him out because of his ability and didn’t care much about the color of his skin. Representing lumberjacks against the large lumber companies was not financially beneficial at the time, but Scrutchin accepted this challenge. From 1899 to 1910, he built an impeccable reputation as one of northern Minnesota’s finest criminal lawyers.
One of the most dramatic cases involved his representation of William Miller, one of the 11 accused black circus workers who were charged with the rape of a white woman in Duluth. Three of Miller’s fellow workers were lynched in downtown Duluth on the night of June 14, 1920. Scrutchin won an acquittal for Miller that resulted in the dismissal of the charges against the other defendants. Another high profile case was that of Jim Godette, a black man from Nymore who was found guilty of the murder of in Koochiching County. Scrutchin took up the case and was able to get the decision reversed.
Scrutchin held the most advanced law degrees of any lawyer in the eleven law offices in Bemidji during his stay here. His skills were highly respected and he easily gained entry into the Beltrami County bar Association, serving as its vice president in 1904. His burgeoning practice allowed him to purchase two homes and an office building in Bemidji. His opinion was sought on political and racial issues. He died in Bemidji on July 14, 1930 after more than 30 years of practice in Minnesota.
His wife Laura Scrutchin, died in Aug 1928. Both are buried in Greenwood Cemetery.