John H. Ferguson (1915–1970) was a 20th-Century American lawyer who became the fifthU.S. ambassador to Morocco.[1][2][3][4]
John Haven Ferguson was born inOklahoma City, Oklahoma. He studied atYale University andHarvard Law School.[1]
Ferguson was a "prominent lawyer in Washington," New York, and Paris.[1]
Service in the U.S. Government included deputy director of theU.S. Department of State'spolicy planning staff (where he knew fellow Harvard Law alumnusAlger Hiss[5]) and assistant to the president of theInternational Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD).[1] He also served as Ferguson had been a special assistant toDean Acheson (then, Undersecretary of State).[6]
In March 1947, he left government service (most recently as assistant to theWorld Bank's first president,Eugene Meyer, father ofKatharine Graham of theWashington Post) to enter private practice in New York City with the law firm of Root, Ballantine, Harlan, Bushby and Palmer (laterDewey Ballantine, nowDewey & LeBoeuf).[6]
In 1954, Ferguson moved to Paris. He worked there as a lawyer and served on committees connected toNATO and theEuropean Common Market.[2]
On August 21, 1962, U.S. PresidentJohn F. Kennedy appointed him United States Ambassador to Morocco. He presented his credentials on October 1, 1962, and served until November 24, 1964.[1][4]
In August–September 1948, he was one of many prominent lawyers who advisedAlger Hiss on whether to file a defamation suit againstWhittaker Chambers after Chambers stated on NBC Radio'sMeet the Press that Hiss had been a Communist.[7] Writing to his lifelong friend and fellow Harvard lawyerWilliam L. Marbury Jr., Hiss wrote in 1948:
I am planning a suit for libel or defamation... The number of volunteer helpers is considerable: Freddy Pride ofDwight, Harris, Koegel & Casking (the offshoot of youngCharles Hughes' firm), Fred Eaton ofShearman and Sterling,Eddie Miller ofMr. Dulles' firm, Marshall McDuffie, now no longer a lawyer; in WashingtonJoe Tumulty,Charlie Fahy, Alex Hawes, John Ferguson (Mr.Ballantine's son-in-law) and others–but the real job is get general overall counsel and that fortunately is now settled, but we must move swiftly as so far the committee with its large investigating staff and considerable resources has been able to seize the initiative continuously and regularly. Everyone has been most helpful...[7]
In 1940, Ferguson married Helen Ballantine, daughter ofArthur A. Ballantine, theInternal Revenue Service's first solicitor and co-founder ofDewey Ballantine. They had two children. "During World War II, she was employed by the Chinese government on supply matters... During a trip to the Soviet Union in the early 1960s, she learned enough Russian to get around without the assistance of an interpreter. She did the same with Mandarin during a trip to China in the 1980s."[1][2][6]
By the late 1960s, he suffered from kidney ailments; his wife trained and gave him dialysis at home.[2]
He died age 55 in Paris on August 24, 1970, near the southern French town ofGordes.[1]