Emil Stang (jurist)
Emil Stang Jr. (22 September 1882 – 21 December 1964) was a Norwegian jurist and politician who later became the 13th Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Norway, serving from 1946 to 1952.
He was born in Kristiania (now Oslo) to Emil Stang, a former prime minister, and Adelaide Berg. He finished secondary school in 1900 and earned the cand.jur. degree in 1905. From 1911 he worked as a barrister in Kristiania. He joined the Labour Party in 1911 and became its vice chairman in 1918; he was acting leader from 1922 to 1923 after Kyrre Grepp’s death.
In 1919 he attended the Founding Congress of the Communist International in Moscow. He helped form the Communist Party of Norway in 1923 and joined its Central Committee, but left the party in 1928. He served on Kristiania City Council from 1917 to 1928 and was a substitute member of Parliament from 1922 to 1924, while also taking part in various law reform committees.
From 1928 he focused on his legal career and was appointed a Supreme Court judge in 1937. During Nazi occupation of Norway, he was arrested and imprisoned at Møllergata 19 in Oslo and later at Sachsenhausen in Germany. After World War II, he became Chief Justice and led the court until 1952. In the post-war legal purge, he was one of the few judges who voted to execute his cousin Axel Heiberg Stang for treason.
He married twice, first to Fredrikke Elise Nicoline Bøckman Otto (1907–1920) and then to Sigrid Friis (from 1925). He came from a prominent family: he was the son of Emil Stang, grandson of Frederik Stang, brother of Fredrik Stang, and uncle of Christian Schweigaard Stang, with several other notable relatives.
This page was last edited on 3 February 2026, at 02:05 (CET).