John Adams Courthouse

The Suffolk County Courthouse, also known as the "John Adams Courthouse", is a historic courthouse building on Pemberton Square in Boston, Massachusetts. It is home to the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court (the state's highest court) and the Massachusetts Appeals Court. The six-story granite courthouse was built in 1893 to a design by Boston city architect George Clough. Stylistically the building was described at the time as "German Renaissance"; it is now viewed as transitional between the monumental Second Empire style of Boston's Old City Hall and the Classical Revival. From 1893 to 1938, the Supreme Judicial Court and the Social Law Library occupied the building, known then as the Suffolk County Courthouse. In 2002, the Supreme Judicial Court, the Massachusetts Appeals Court, and the Social Law Library returned to the restored building, which was renamed the John Adams Courthouse. The building was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1974.