 He attended the common schools and the Fairfax, Vermont Preparatory School and graduated from the Vermont Methodist University at Montpelier in 1871 and from the law department of Columbian College (now The George Washington University Law School), Washington, D.C., in 1875.Corliss settled in Detroit, Michigan, in 1875 and was admitted to the bar the same year and commenced practice there.On December 5, 1877, in Barnard, Vermont, he wedded Miss Elizabeth N. Danforth, who died in 1886.