Download BROWN v. BOARD INTRODUCTIONS OF THE JUSTICES AND

BROWN v. BOARD INTRODUCTIONS
OF THE JUSTICES AND LAWYERS
The United States Supreme Court has nine justices; eight associate justices and a
chief justice. The 1952 and 1953 Brown arguments were heard by ten different
justices because Chief Justice Fred Vinson died between the two arguments and
was replaced by Chief Justice Earl Warren.
Hugo Lafayette Black of Alabama was 66 years old in 1952. A brilliant student,
he attended medical school for two years, but switched to law and graduated with
honors at the age of twenty. He became a very successful lawyer and served in
World War I. He was elected to the U. S. Senate in 1926 and later became a
supporter of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s policies. President Roosevelt
named Black to the Supreme Court in 1937. A leader on the court, he served with
distinction until 1971.
Stanley Reed was 68 years old in 1952. A native of Kentucky and a brilliant
student, he became a successful lawyer and active in politics. He was asked by
President Hoover to come to Washington D. C. to help deal with some of the
severe economic problems caused by the Great Depression. Reed was named by
Roosevelt, Hoover’s successor, to the position of solicitor general. The solicitor
general and his staff argue many cases for the U. S. government before the
Supreme Court. Reed was named to the Supreme Court in 1938, where he served
until 1957.
Felix Frankfurter was born in Vienna, Austria and was 70 years old in 1952. His
parents immigrated to the U. S. when he was 12 years old. He quickly mastered
the English language and was a brilliant student. After finishing Harvard Law
School first in his class he went to New York City where he was one of the first
Jews to be hired by a top rank New York law firm. He became an assistant U. S.
Attorney and chief assistant to the Secretary of War in 1911. Frankfurter’s
reputation for brilliance lead to his becoming a Harvard Law School professor. He
served in World War I and them embarked on an active academic and political
life. He became a trusted advisor to President Roosevelt, who appointed him to
the Supreme Court in 1939 where he served until 1962.
William O. Douglas, a native of the state of Washington, was only 40 years old
when he was appointed to the Supreme Court in 1939. He served for 36 years,
longer than any other Supreme Court justice. Another brilliant student, he
graduated from Columbia Law School second in his class, and practiced briefly as
a Wall Street lawyer. He later became a law professor at Columbia and then at
Yale. His reputation brought him a call from the Roosevelt administration to
come to Washington where he became Chairman of the Securities and Exchange
Commission. He served there until Roosevelt appointed him to the Supreme
Court.
Robert H. Jackson grew up on a farm in New York and became a lawyer at age 21
in 1913. Although he had only one year of formal education after high school, he
was a voracious reader of the classics, biographies and history. He is viewed as
being one of the best writers to have served on the court. Jackson became very
successful as a lawyer and was active in political and bar association activities.
Franklin Roosevelt appointed Jackson as general counsel to the bureau of internal
revenue. He then served in the Justice Department and in 1937 became solicitor
general. He was appointed to the Supreme Court in 1941 and served until 1954.
Harold Burton was 64 in 1952. A native of Massachusetts he excelled in sports
and academics in college. He graduated from Harvard Law School and moved to
Cleveland, Ohio, where he practiced law, taught at a local law school and became
active in politics. He fought and was wounded in World War I. He was a popular
Republican mayor of Cleveland and was elected to the U. S. Senate in 1940. He
became well acquainted with Harry Truman, who was a U. S. Senator from
Missouri at the time. Truman respected Burton as did Burton ’s other colleagues
in the Senate. Truman’s choice of him for the Supreme Court in 1945 was popular
with both parties. He served until 1958.
Fred W. Vinson was appointed Chief Justice of the Supreme Court at the age of 56
in 1946. Another Kentuckian, and a brilliant student, he was a star baseball player
in college. He returned to his hometown to practice law after law school where he
was modestly successful. He became active in politics and served in Congress
where he grew in office and became highly respected. In 1937 Roosevelt
appointed him a judge on the U. S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia,
which is generally regarded as second only to the U. S. Supreme Court in
importance. He then held a high position in the executive branch during World
War II as director of the Office of Economic Stabilization. He then served in
various other high level positions, including Secretary of the Treasury until his
appointment as Chief Justice.
Tom. C. Clark was a 50 years old when he was appointed by Truman to the
Supreme Court in 1949. Clark had been a fairly successful attorney in Texas and
at the national level when he met Harry Truman in 1942.. Clark supported
Truman’s successful bid for the Democratic nomination for Vice President in
1944. When Roosevelt died in 1945 and Truman became President, he asked
Clark to become his Attorney General. Clark served as Attorney General until
Truman appointed him to the Supreme Court. He resigned in 1967, when his son,
Ramsey Clark, became Attorney General of the United States.
Sherman Minton was born in 1890 in Indiana. A fine athlete and student he
served in Europe during World War I. While in France he attended the Sorbonne
University in Paris where he studied international law, Roman law and
jurisprudence to supplemented the legal education he had received at the
University of Indiana and Yale. Minton was elected to the U. S. Senate in 1934
and became friends with Harry Truman. He lost a reelection bid but served in
various high level governmental positions until he was appointed by Roosevelt to
the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. He served there until Truman appointed
him to the Supreme Court in 1949. He retired in 1956.
Earl Warren was born in 1891 in California. An adequate but not outstanding
student, he went through college and law school in California. Warren became
district attorney of Alameda County, the Los Angeles area, in 1925. Warren soon
developed a national reputation as a tough and incorruptible prosecutor. In 1938,
Warren was elected state Attorney General after having been nominated by the
Republican, Democratic and Progressive parties.
Warren was elected Governor of California in 1942 and became so popular with
his many initiatives that he was nominated by both the Republicans and the
Democrats for reelection in 1946. He was the unsuccessful Republican candidate
for Vice President, running with Tom Dewey, in 1948. Warren supported Dwight
D. Eisenhower for President in 1952. Eisenhower nominated him for Chief Justice
after Fred Vinson died unexpectedly in September of that year. The Senate
confirmed him quickly. He served until he retired in 1969. Many momentous
legal changes were brought about by "The Warren Court."
INTRODUCTIONS FOR THE LAWYERS
Twenty-one lawyers would eventually appear before the Supreme Court on the
five segregation cases consolidated under the caption of Brown v. Board of
Education. We are going to focus on the arguments of six of them in the 1952 and
1953 arguments.
Paul Wilson was a 36-year-old assistant attorney general for Kansas. Raised on a
farm near Lyndon, Kansas south of Topeka, he had a bachelor’s and master’s
degree in political science from Kansas University and a law degree from
Washburn University in Topeka.. He served in the Army during World War II and
had been county attorney for Osage county as well as general counsel for the
Kansas Department of Social Welfare prior to joining the attorney general’s office.
He would later become a law professor at the University of Kansas. Neither he
nor the attorney general, Harold Fatzer, was enthusiastic about arguing the case.
Thurgood Marshall grew up in Maryland. He attended Lincoln College in
Pennsylvania and Howard Law School in Washington D. C., partly because the
law school at the University of Maryland did not admit blacks. Forth-four years
old in 1952, Marshall had been a courageous and effective front-line fighter for
civil rights since shortly after beginning his legal career. As a pioneering civil
rights lawyer, he appeared fairly often before the U. S. Supreme Court, usually
successfully. He later became the first black solicitor general of the United States
and the first black U. S. Supreme Court justice. No other person did more to
advance the legal rights of blacks through the courts. A skilled courtroom
advocate, both at the trial and appellate levels, Marshall was also a warm human
being with a zest for living and a great sense of humor. His success was partially
due to his ability to rally people to fight for their rights in the courts and to explain
complex legal ideas in ways that could be easily understood. He was a civil rights
lawyer during times and in places where it was sometimes dangerous to be one.
Robert Lee Carter, like Marshall, attended Lincoln University in Pennsylvania and
Howard Law School. He served as an officer in the Air Force during World War
II and was 35 in 1952. He came to work for the Legal Defense Fund of the
National Association for the Advancement of Colored People in 1944 and became
a key aid to Marshall. He was a hard worker and a stickler for details, which
allowed Marshall more freedom to travel to trouble spots while Carter tended to
the basics in the national office.
John W. Davis was one of the most successful lawyers in America in the first half
of the 20th century. Born in West Virginia, he served in the state legislature and
was elected to Congress. President Wilson named him solicitor general where he
argued sixty-seven cases before the Supreme Court in five years, winning
forty-eight of them. He later served as ambassador to Great Britain and was the
unsuccessful Democratic Party candidate for President in 1924. As a much
sought-after Wall Street lawyer, he generally represented large corporations and
appeared often before the Supreme Court. He was considered by many to be the
best appellate advocate in the country. In Brown, he appeared for the state of
South Carolina to defend their educational system. 80 years old at the time, but
still vigorous and highly effective, the Brown case was his last Supreme Court
appearance.
Spotswood W. Robinson III was Virginia native who graduated from Virginia
Union University and Howard Law School. He worked with Thurgood Marshall
at the Legal Defense Fund. During his career, in addition to private practice, he
was a law professor and the dean of Howard Law School. He served on the U.S.
Civil Rights Commission and was the first African-American to sit as a Federal
District judge in the District of Columbia and on the Federal Court of Appeals for
the District of Columbia, the court second only to the U.S. Supreme Court in
importance.
J. Lee Rankin had been a politically active Republican. That and his legal skills
led to his being appointed an assistant United States Attorney General. He
appeared in Brown as a friend of the court (amicus curiae) to argue that the U.S.
Government agreed generally with the position taken by the plaintiffs, that school
segregation should be ended by the court. Rankin later served as Solicitor General
of the United States and as chief counsel of the Warren Commission on the
assassination of President Kennedy. This was his first of many Supreme Court
appearances.