Pierce Butler | |
|---|---|
 Butlerc. 1922 | |
| Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States | |
| In office January 2, 1923 – November 16, 1939[1] | |
| Nominated by | Warren G. Harding |
| Preceded by | William R. Day |
| Succeeded by | Frank Murphy |
| Personal details | |
| Born | (1866-03-17)March 17, 1866 Dakota County, Minnesota, U.S. |
| Died | November 16, 1939(1939-11-16) (aged 73) Washington, D.C., U.S. |
| Resting place | Calvary Cemetery |
| Party | Democratic |
| Spouse | |
| Children | 8 |
| Education | Carleton College (BA,BS) |
| Signature |  |
Pierce Butler (March 17, 1866 – November 16, 1939) was an Americanjurist who served as anassociate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1923 until his death in 1939. He is notable for being the first Supreme Court justice from Minnesota, and for being a Democrat appointed by a Republican president. He was a staunchconservative and was regarded as a part of theFour Horsemen, the conservative bloc that dominated the Supreme Court during the 1930s. A devout Catholic, he was also the sole dissenter in the caseBuck v. Bell, though he did not write an opinion.
Butler was born inNorthfield, Minnesota, to Patrick and Mary Ann Butler.[2] He was born in a log cabin as the sixth of nine children, with all but his sister living to adulthood.[citation needed] His parents wereIrish Catholic immigrants fromCounty Wicklow, who had met inGalena, Illinois.[3] They left their home in Ireland due to theGreat Famine.
Butler graduated fromCarleton College in 1887. He received both a degree in the arts and a degree in science. He thenread the law for one year before being admitted to thebar in 1888.[2] He married Annie M. Cronin in 1891.[4]
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He was elected as county attorney inRamsey County in 1892, and re-elected in 1894.[2] Butler joined the law firm of How & Eller in 1896, which became How & Butler after the death of Homer C. Eller the following year. He accepted an offer to practice inSt. Paul, Minnesota, where he took care of railroad-related litigation forJames J. Hill. He was highly successful in representing railroads.[5]
In 1905 he returned to private practice and rejoined Jared How. He had also served as a lawyer for the company owned by his five brothers. In 1908, Butler was electedPresident of theMinnesota State Bar Association.
From 1912 to 1922, he worked in railroad law inCanada, alternately representing the shareholders of railroad companies and the Canadian government; he produced favorable results for both. When he was nominated for theUnited States Supreme Court in 1922, Butler was in the process of winning approximately $12,000,000 for theToronto Street Railway shareholders.
On December 5, 1922, Butler was nominated by PresidentWarren G. Harding as anassociate justice of the Supreme Court, to succeedWilliam R. Day.[6] Although he was supported byChief JusticeWilliam Howard Taft, Butler's opposition to "radical" and "disloyal" professors at theUniversity of Minnesota (where he had served on the Board of Regents) made him a controversial Supreme Court nominee.Farmer–Labor Senator-electHenrik Shipstead of Minnesota opposed him, as did theProgressive SenatorRobert M. La Follette ofWisconsin.[5] Also against his confirmation were labor activists, someliberal magazines (The New Republic andThe Nation) and theKu Klux Klan because he wasCatholic. His appointment was supported by prominent Roman Catholics, fellow lawyers (the Minnesota State Bar Association strongly endorsed him), and business groups (especially railroad companies), as well as Minnesota's incumbent senators,RepublicansKnute Nelson and lame duckFrank B. Kellogg. Butler was confirmed by theUnited States Senate on December 21, 1922, by a 61–8 vote,[7] and took the judicial oath of office on January 2, 1923.[1]
As an associate justice, Butler vigorously opposed regulation of business and the implementation of welfare programs by the federal government (as unconstitutional). During theGreat Depression, he ruled against the constitutionality of many "New Deal" laws – theAgricultural Adjustment Administration and theNational Recovery Administration – which had been supported by his fellow DemocratFranklin D. Roosevelt.[5] This earned him a place among the so-called "Four Horsemen," which also includedJames Clark McReynolds,George Sutherland, andWillis Van Devanter.[5][8] During his sixteen years on the bench, Justice Butler authored 327 majority opinions as well as 50 dissenting opinions.
He wrote the majority opinion (6–3) inUnited States v. Schwimmer, in which theHungarian immigrant's application for citizenship was denied because of her candid refusal to take an oath to "take up arms" for her adopted country.
InPalko v. Connecticut, Butler was the lone dissenter; the rest of the justices believed that astate was not restrained fromtrying a man a second time for the same crime. Butler believed this violated theFourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution.[citation needed]
He sided with the majority inPierce v. Society of Sisters, holding unconstitutional an Oregon state law that prohibited parents from sending their children to private or religious schools.[8]
In the 1927 decision forBuck v. Bell, Butler was the only Justice who dissented from the ruling[9] and JusticeOliver Wendell Holmes Jr.'s opinion holding that the forced sterilization of an allegedly "feeble-minded" woman inVirginia was constitutional.[10] Holmes believed that Butler's religion influenced his thinking inBuck, remarking that "Butler knows this is good law, I wonder whether he will have the courage to vote with us in spite of his religion."[11] Although Butler dissented in bothBuck andPalko, he did not write a dissenting opinion in either case;[12] the practice of a Justice's noting a dissent without opinion was much more common then than it would be in the later 20th and early 21st centuries.
Another consequential dissent was from the opinion expressed inOlmstead v. United States, which upheld federalwiretapping.[8] He took an expansive view of4th Amendment protections.[13]
On November 15, 1939, Butler went into aWashington, D.C., hospital for "a minor ailment" but died in the early morning of November 16, at the age of 73 while still on the Court. He was the last serving Supreme Court Justice appointed by President Harding. He is buried inCalvary Cemetery in St. Paul.[14][15]
The bulk of his and his family's collected papers are with theMinnesota Historical Society.[16][17] Other papers are collected elsewhere.[17]
Pierce Butler Route inSaint Paul, Minnesota, is named in honor of Butler's son, Pierce Butler Jr.[18]
{{cite book}}:|work= ignored (help) Also on Proquest Digital Dissertations. Paper AAI3357971.
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| Preceded by | Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States 1923–1939 | Succeeded by |
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