Yang Ti-liang
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Yang Ti-liang (楊鐵樑) (born 1928) is a retired judge in Hong Kong and a former Chief Justice of Hong Kong (1988-1997). He was the first ethnic Chinese to hold the office under British colonial rule.
Yang was born in Shanghai, into a middle-class family. Little was known about his early years, except that he attended law school at the age of 17 at Soochow University. After his law studies was interrupted by the Chinese Civil War (1946-1949), he moved with his family to Hong Kong, which was then under British colonial rule.
He then continued his studies at University College London, graduating with honors from its faculty of law (LLB, 1953). After passing his bar finals in 1954, he entered into private practice briefly and joined the Colonial Legal Service of Hong Kong in 1956 as a temporary magistrate.
He rose through the ranks and was appointed Principal Magistrate in 1963, District Judge of the Victoria District Court in 1968, and Puisne Judge of the Supreme Court of Hong Kong (later Judge of the High Court) in 1975. He was elevated to the Court of Appeal in 1980, and became Vice President of that Court in 1987.
In 1988, Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom, upon the recommendation of Sir David Wilson, then Governor of Hong Kong, appointed Yang Chief Justice of Hong Kong and Knight Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire.
Sir Ti-Liang Yang, aside from discharging his judicial duties, also served as chairman of the council of the University of Hong Kong between 1985 and 2001. In 1996, he resigned his Chief Justiceship and his knighthood to run for the office of the first Chief Executive of Hong Kong, and lost the bid to Tung Chee-Hwa, a shipping magnate. Yang was subsequently appointed to the Executive Council, the cabinet of Tung, where he served for a five-year term as an at-large member (1997-2002).
Currently Yang serves as Chairman of the Executive Committee of the Chinese University of Hong Kong School of Law. He is also Honorary Professor of Chinese at the University of Hong Kong and adjunct lecturer in rhetoric and literature both at that institution and at YMCA, Hong Kong. Over the years, he has been honored by various institutions, being elected Fellow of University College London and Honorary Bencher of the Honourable Society of Gray's Inn.
Yang is a renowned translator and has translated numerous Chinese classics into English, including General Yue Fei, Peach Blossom Fan and Officialdom Unmasked. He is also a connoisseur of Chinese antiques and art.