Although Mr Justice Liam Hamilton has presided over a number of groundbreaking judgments of the Supreme Court, it is likely he will be associated in the minds of most people with the beef tribunal.
He was President of the High Court in 1990, and tipped to go to the European Court of Justice, when he was asked to become chairman and sole member of the Tribunal of Inquiry into the Beef Processing Industry.
This arose from a number of allegations made about the relationship between members of the Fianna Fail government and various figures in the beef industry, notably Mr Larry Goodman, who, it was alleged, had received favourable treatment.
The tribunal ran for three years and cost the taxpayer millions of pounds in legal costs. Its reverberations still resound.
Mr Justice Hamilton's report quashed any allegation that Mr Albert Reynolds, the then Taoiseach, who at the time referred to in the allegations was responsible for guaranteeing insurance cover for beef exports to certain countries, acted from improper motives.
It also found that the Goodman companies had not deducted tax and PRSI from some £8.6 million in payments to employees. However, it found no evidence that the Revenue Commissioners turned a blind eye to this, as alleged.
Although the Dail voted to thank Mr Justice Hamilton for his handling of the tribunal, his report was criticised by some of its members.
Mr Pat Rabbitte, who had made certain allegations relating to the Goodman group in the Dail, said: "It appears to be the case that, having made his findings of fact, the chairman of the tribunal does on occasion . . . refrain from allocating blame."
Mr Des O'Malley, who had also alleged improprieties in the relationship between Mr Goodman and certain members of the government, was critical of aspects of the report, including the finding that Mr Reynolds was unaware that export credit insurance was used to cover intervention beef, for which it was not intended.
He said in the Dail that the report itself recorded the fact that the Irish Embassy in Baghdad had sent a telex to Mr Reynolds telling him that intervention cover given by him was used to cover a shipment of intervention beef to Iraq by a French company called CED.
Other commentators were critical of the report's apparent reluctance to draw conclusions from the facts, as well as the length the tribunal took and its inordinate cost.
One senior counsel said the politicians deserved some of the blame for the inadequacies of the beef tribunal because of the breadth and vagueness of the terms of reference.
However, five years later Mr Justice Hamilton won nothing but praise for another report, on the so-called "Sheedy affair", where he was asked to examine the role of two judges in the early release of a Dublin architect convicted of drunk-driving, where a woman was killed. According to an Irish Times headline, his report "drew clarity from confusion".
This required of the Chief Justice that he scrutinise the actions of a close friend and colleague on the Supreme Court, Mr Justice Hugh O'Flaherty, and of a High Court judge, Mr Justice Cyril Kelly. Despite the personal difficulty it must have caused him, he did not shrink from saying Mr Justice O'Flaherty's actions were "inappropriate and unwise", and that Mr Justice Kelly's handling of the matter compromised the administration of justice.
He had been appointed Chief Justice in September 1994, and in that capacity presided over a number of landmark judgments. These included the "Right to Die" case, where the court ruled it was permissible to withdraw assisted feeding from a woman who had been in a near-vegetative state for over 20 years.
Mr Justice Liam Hamilton travelled a long way to the highest legal office in the State. He stands out from most of his colleagues in the extent of the obstacles he had to overcome to enter the legal profession.
When, as the eldest of five children, he left the Christian Brothers school in Mitchelstown, Co Cork, there was no question of him going to university in those pre-grant days. He got a job in the Civil Service, from where he moved to the High Court as a clerk. There he was able to get time off to study law in UCD and the King's Inns, where he eventually won the prestigious Brooke's prize, a sign of distinction to come.
He was called to the Bar in 1956, and to the Inner Bar 12 years later. He was appointed to the High Court in 1974, and became its president in 1985.
Throughout the mid-1980s he also frequently sat on the Special Criminal Court, where his cases included the Sallins mail train robbery. Two of the three convicted, Mr Osgur Breathnach and Mr Brian McNally, had their convictions set aside in the Court of Criminal Appeal, and the third, Mr Nicky Kelly, won a presidential pardon.
As High Court President, and later Chief Justice, he had a reputation as a highly effective administrator, an essential part of the job.
While he is now leaving the Four Courts, he is not leaving judicial inquiries. He has already been nominated to inquire into the Dublin and Monaghan bombings of 1974, along with the bombing of a pub in Dundalk in 1975. His inquiry will report to the Oireachtas Committee on Justice, Equality and Women's Rights.
He is also not quite free of controversy. Two cases against the Government and involving him have gone to the European Court of Human Rights, both concerning undue delays in processing judgment. One has been settled on the basis that the Government pays compensation, which has gone to arbitration. The other has not concluded.
But this in no way diminishes the affection in which he is held by those who have had to deal with him in the course of his long career. "Very personable", "affable", "witty" are among the many positive adjectives which spring to the lips of those asked about him.