John Joseph McNaught
Appointed by President Jimmy Carter in 1979 and confirmed by voice vote, John Joseph McNaught was a Judge on the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts. He earned a law degree from Boston College Law School in 1949. Rulings & record ↓ Sources ↓
- Lived
- 1921–1994
- Appointed by
- Jimmy Carter, 1979
- Confirmed
- by voice vote
- Education
- Boston College 1943 · Boston College Law School 1949
- Succeeded by
- Richard Gaylore Stearns
Federal judicial service
| Year | Court | Appointed by | Vote |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1979 | District of Massachusetts | Carter (D) | Voice vote |
Party letters show the appointing president’s party, not the judge’s own. A voice vote means the chamber approved aloud. No senator-by-senator tally is recorded.
Confirmation vote
Voice vote
The Senate approved this confirmation aloud, with no senator-by-senator tally recorded. Recorded roll-call votes begin in 1989.
Education
| Boston College | B.A. | 1943 |
| Boston College Law School | J.D. | 1949 |
Judicial Record
Caseload & case types
In our data, McNaught was assigned 569 district-court cases (1981–1990). Median time from filing to termination: 448 days across 569 closed cases.
Case assignment is from CourtListener’s PACER-derived docket records: a partial sample, not a complete caseload, reflecting the judge last assigned each case. How we count.
In our data, McNaught authored 74 published opinions for the court (1979–1991). Most cited: Paone v. Schweiker (161 citations).
A selective record from published opinions in the CourtListener corpus, not every ruling; most unpublished district orders are not included. Counts and rankings are objective and recomputable: how we count. We describe the record, not the judge.
Recent & notable rulings
| Year | Case | Citation | Cited |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1982 | Paone v. Schweiker | 530 F. Supp. 808 | 161 |
| 1982 | Backman v. Polaroid Corp. | 540 F. Supp. 667 | 21 |
| 1990 | Jones v. City of Boston | 738 F. Supp. 604 | 19 |
| 1981 | Holtzman v. Proctor, Cook & Co., Inc. | 528 F. Supp. 9 | 16 |
| 1983 | Dedham Water Co. v. Cumberland Farms Dairy, Inc. | 588 F. Supp. 515 | 15 |
| 1988 | Morgan v. Financial Planning Advisors, Inc. | 701 F. Supp. 923 | 11 |
| 1983 | Pinshaw v. Monk | 565 F. Supp. 44 | 9 |
| 1982 | Manella v. Brown Co. | 537 F. Supp. 1226 | 9 |
| 1979 | United States v. D'Annolfo | 474 F. Supp. 220 | 9 |
| 1985 | Finn v. Consolidated Rail Corp. | 622 F. Supp. 41 | 8 |
| 1983 | Northeast Theatre Corp. v. Edie and Ely Landau, Inc. | 563 F. Supp. 833 | 8 |
| 1980 | Creative Environments, Inc. v. Estabrook | 491 F. Supp. 547 | 8 |
| 1988 | Commissioner v. Adcom, Inc. (In Re Adcom, Inc.) | 89 B.R. 2 | 7 |
| 1986 | Dedham Water Co. v. Cumberland Farms, Inc. | 643 F. Supp. 667 | 7 |
| 1982 | Turner v. Johnson & Johnson | 549 F. Supp. 807 | 7 |
Showing the 15 most-cited of 74 authored opinions in our data. “Cited” is inbound citations across the CourtListener corpus. Case links open the ruling’s full text (CourtListener) or its page here; read the methodology and verify against the primary source.
Questions & answers
- Who appointed John Joseph McNaught?
- President Jimmy Carter appointed John Joseph McNaught to the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts in 1979.
- Was John Joseph McNaught appointed by a Democrat or a Republican?
- John Joseph McNaught was appointed by President Jimmy Carter, a Democrat. JudicialFinder records the appointing president's party, not a judge's own politics.
- What was John Joseph McNaught's confirmation vote?
- John Joseph McNaught was confirmed by voice vote on March 21, 1979. No senator-by-senator tally was recorded.
- Which court was John Joseph McNaught on?
- John Joseph McNaught was a Judge on the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts.
Sources
Each fact on this page traces to a primary public record.
- FJC Biographical Directory
- Wikidata
- Portrait: Property and Procurement Office of the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts (Public domain), via Wikimedia Commons
- CourtListener bulk data (Free Law Project): authored opinions & citation counts
How we source & reconcile data → Data & Sources
See something wrong? Report an error. Fixes are logged in the corrections log.
11 years on the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts. Data as of 2026-08-10. Informational only; verify against the primary source before relying. Not a consumer report (FCRA).