James Clark McReynolds
James Clark McReynolds ( born February 3, 1862 in Elkton, Todd County, Kentucky; † August 24, 1946 in Washington, DC ) was an American lawyer, politician, Minister of Justice ( Attorney General ), and Judge of the United States Supreme Court
Study and career
McReynolds, son of a surgeon who first completed a general education studies at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, which he finished in 1882 with a Bachelor of Arts (BA). He then studied law at the Law School of the University of Virginia, where he graduated in 1884 with a Bachelor of Laws ( LL.B. ).
After that, he was secretary to U.S. Senator Howell Edmunds Jackson from Tennessee. 1886, he has held positions as a lawyer in Nashville, before he was from 1900 to 1903 professor of commercial law, insurance law and corporate law at the Law School Vanderbilt University. In 1907 he began a career as a lawyer in New York City.
Political career
Minister of Justice under President Wilson
McReynolds began his political career in 1896 with an unsuccessful candidacy for the U.S. House of Representatives. He went to the Republicans and defeated the Democrat John W. Gaines significantly.
In 1903 he was appointed as assistant to the Minister of Justice ( Assistant Attorney General ) in the government of Theodore Roosevelt. This office he held from then until 1907. Then he was between 1907 to 1912 chief advisor to the government and complained at this time especially opponents of the Sherman Antitrust Act to.
On March 5, 1913, he was appointed by President Woodrow Wilson as Attorney General in the Cabinet. However, this office he held only until 29 August 1914.
Supreme Court Justice
A few weeks later, President Wilson appointed him on October 12, a judge of the Supreme Court, where he became the successor of the deceased on July 12, 1914 Horace Harmon Lurton. On January 31, 1941 McReynolds, who had previously expressed once entered, that he would remain judges, while Franklin D. Roosevelt was president, resigned from his post as a judge of the Supreme Court. Was succeeded by James F. Byrnes, U.S. Senator from South Carolina.
Important decisions
During his tenure, he was known to his decisions were scarce and he looked at the same time divergent opinions as a waste of time. In the early years he was the author of the decisions Meyer v. Nebraska ( 1923) and Pierce v. Society of Sisters ( 1925), which protected the rights of citizens by the reference to the 14th Amendment to the Constitution and strengthened. Much later these decisions to strengthen the decisions to constitutional right of privacy ( Griswold v. Connecticut, 1965) and later for abortion rights ( Roe v. Wade, 1973) was used.
During the first term of President Roosevelt, he was next to George Sutherland, Pierce Butler and Willis Van Devanter the conservative wing of the judges, the so-called Four Horsemen ( Four Horsemen ) to. This wing, and particularly McReynolds, who despised the president outright, made decisions that criticized the New Deal programs of Roosevelt vigorously.
When Judge McReynolds voted against the Tennessee Valley Authority, the Law on the recovery of the national industry ( National Industrial Recovery Act ) and the Social Security Act ( Social Security Act ), which were part of Roosevelt's New Deal all. Even after the death of the other conservative judges he agreed last Retained the four horsemen continue against the policies of the president.
In 1939 he was also the author of the controversial decision in United States v. Miller, who was the only Supreme Court decision that took immediately to the 2nd Amendment reference.
Behavior towards other judges, anti-Semitism and fictional character
In addition to his dislike of President Roosevelt, he was regarded by many as one of the most unpleasant judges of the Supreme Court.
Even the Chief Justice William Howard Taft called him selfish, prejudiced and irresponsible. In addition, he was known for his overt anti-Semitism.
With Louis Brandeis, who in 1916 first Jewish Justice of the Supreme Court, he moved to 1919 not a word, left the meeting room at the entrance of Brandeis and even at Brandeis ' resignation in 1939 he refused to sign the usual appreciation letter. In 1924, he refused to sit in a group photo of the Supreme Court next to Brandeis.
Prior to the appointment of Benjamin N. Cardozo to the judge, he asked President Herbert C. Hoover, together with the judges Butler and Van Devanter 1932 about the Supreme Court " not to afflict with a second Jew." During the swearing-in ceremony he read consciously in a daily newspaper. According to his biographer John Frush Knox, who was from 1936 to 1937 his court wizard, he moved with Cardozo a word. Even the funeral of the Cardozo died in 1938, he remained as distant as the swearing in of Cardozo Jewish successor to Felix Frankfurter.
Rumor McReynolds ' Art should also have been the reason for the resignation of Judge John Hessian Clarke after only six years in office. In addition, he was known as a misogynist and left at the appearance of lawyers even his tribunal. On the other side of the bachelor left a considerable fortune to charities and took over the sponsorship of 33 children who were victims of the 1940 German air raid on London.
More recently, he was a fictional character in the Timeline -191 series by Harry Turtledove.