William O. Douglas | |
|---|---|
.jpg) Douglas byHarris & Ewing, 1939 | |
| Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States | |
| In office April 17, 1939 – November 12, 1975[1] | |
| Nominated by | Franklin D. Roosevelt |
| Preceded by | Louis Brandeis |
| Succeeded by | John Paul Stevens |
| 3rd Chairman of theSecurities and Exchange Commission | |
| In office August 17, 1937 – April 15, 1939 | |
| President | Franklin D. Roosevelt |
| Preceded by | James M. Landis |
| Succeeded by | Jerome Frank |
| Member of the Securities and Exchange Commission | |
| In office January 24, 1936 – April 15, 1939 | |
| President | Franklin D. Roosevelt |
| Preceded by | Joseph P. Kennedy Sr. |
| Succeeded by | Leon Henderson |
| Personal details | |
| Born | William Orville Douglas (1898-10-16)October 16, 1898 |
| Died | January 19, 1980(1980-01-19) (aged 81) Washington, D.C., U.S. |
| Resting place | Arlington National Cemetery |
| Political party | Democratic |
| Spouses | |
| Children | 2 |
| Education | Whitman College (BA) Columbia University (LLB) |
| Military service | |
| Allegiance |  United States |
| Branch/service |  United States Army |
| Years of service | 1918 |
| Rank | Private |
| Unit | Reserve Officers' Training Corps Student Army Training Corps, Whitman College |
| Battles/wars | World War I |
William Orville Douglas (October 16, 1898 – January 19, 1980) was an American jurist who served as anassociate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1939 to 1975. Douglas was known for his strongprogressive andcivil libertarian views and is often cited as the mostliberal justice in theU.S. Supreme Court’s history. Nominated by PresidentFranklin D. Roosevelt in 1939, Douglas was confirmed at the age of 40, becoming one of the youngest justices appointed to the court. He is the longest-serving justice in history, having served for 36 years and 209 days.
After an itinerant childhood, Douglas attendedWhitman College on a scholarship. He graduated fromColumbia Law School in 1925 and joined theYale Law School faculty. After serving as the third chairman of theSecurities and Exchange Commission, Douglas was successfully nominated to the Supreme Court in 1939, succeeding JusticeLouis Brandeis. He was among those seriously considered for the1944 Democratic vice presidential nomination and was subject to an unsuccessful draft movement prior to the1948 U.S. presidential election. Douglas served on the Court until his retirement in 1975 and was succeeded byJohn Paul Stevens. Douglas holds a number of records as a Supreme Court justice, including the mostopinions.
One of Douglas's most notable opinions wasGriswold v. Connecticut (1965), which established the constitutionalright to privacy and was foundational to later cases such asEisenstadt v. Baird,Roe v. Wade,Lawrence v. Texas andObergefell v. Hodges. His other notable opinions includedSkinner v. Oklahoma (1942),United States v. Paramount Pictures, Inc. (1948),Terminiello v. City of Chicago (1949),Brady v. Maryland (1963), andHarper v. Virginia State Board of Elections (1966). Douglas joined the unanimous opinion inBrown v. Board of Education (1954), which outlawed segregation in American public schools. He wrote notable concurring or dissenting opinions inDennis v. United States (1951),United States v. O’Brien (1968),Terry v. Ohio (1968), andBrandenburg v. Ohio (1969). He was a strong opponent of theVietnam War and an ardent advocate of environmentalism.
Douglas was born in 1898 inMaine Township, Otter Tail County, Minnesota, to William Douglas and Julia Bickford Fisk.[2][3] Douglas's father was aScottish[4] itinerantPresbyterian minister fromPictou County, Nova Scotia. The family first moved to California and then toCleveland, Washington. Douglas said he suffered from an illness at age two that he described aspolio, although a biographer reveals that it wasintestinalcolic.[5] His mother attributed his recovery to a miracle, telling Douglas that one day he would be President of the United States.[6]
His father died inPortland, Oregon in 1904, when Douglas was six years old. Douglas later claimed his mother had been left destitute.[5] After moving the family from town to town in the West, his mother, with three young children, settled inYakima, Washington. William, like the rest of the Douglas family, did odd jobs to earn extra money, and a college education appeared to be unaffordable. He was thevaledictorian atYakima High School and did well enough in school to earn a full academic scholarship to attend Whitman College inWalla Walla, Washington.[7]
At Whitman, Douglas became a member ofBeta Theta Pi fraternity. He worked at various jobs while attending school, including as a waiter and janitor during the school year, and at acherry orchard in the summer. Picking cherries, Douglas would say later, inspired him to pursue a legal career. He once said of his early interest in the law:
I worked among the very, very poor, themigrant laborers, theChicanos and theI.W.W's who I saw being shot at by the police. I saw cruelty and hardness, and my impulse was to be a force in other developments in the law.[8]
Douglas was inducted intoPhi Beta Kappa,[9] participated on the debate team, and was elected asstudent body president in his final year. After graduating in 1920 with a Bachelor of Arts degree inEnglish and economics, he taught English and Latin at his old high school for the next two years, hoping to earn enough to attend law school. "Finally," he said, "I decided it was impossible to save enough money by teaching and I said to hell with it."[7]
In the summer of 1918, Douglas took part in a U.S. ArmyReserve Officers' Training Corps training encampment at thePresidio of San Francisco.[10] That fall, he joined theStudent Army Training Corps at Whitman as aprivate.[11] He served from October to December, and was honorably discharged because theArmistice of November 11, 1918 ended the war and the army's requirements for more soldiers and officers.[11]
He traveled by train from Yakima to New York in 1922, taking a job tending sheep on a Chicago-bound train, in return for free passage, with hopes to attend the Columbia Law School.[7] Douglas drew on his Beta Theta Pi membership to help him survive in New York, as he stayed at one of its houses and was able to borrow $75 from a fraternity brother from Washington, enough to enroll at Columbia.[12] Six months later, Douglas's funds were running out. The appointments office at the law school told him that a New York firm wanted a student to help prepare acorrespondence course in law. Douglas earned $600 for his work, enabling him to stay in school. Hired for similar projects, he saved $1,000 by semester's end.[12] In August 1923, Douglas traveled toLa Grande, Oregon, to marry Mildred Riddle, whom he had known in Yakima.[6] Douglas graduated from Columbia in 1925 with aBachelor of Laws degree, ranked second in his class.
During the summer of 1925, Douglas started work at the firm of Cravath, DeGersdorff, Swaine and Wood (laterCravath, Swaine & Moore) after failing to obtain aSupreme Court clerkship withHarlan F. Stone.[13][14] Douglas was hired at Cravath by attorneyJohn J. McCloy, who later became the chairman of the Board of Chase Manhattan Bank.[15]
Douglas quit Cravath after four months. After one year, he moved back to Yakima but soon regretted the move and never practiced law in Washington. After a period of unemployment and another months-long stint at Cravath, he started teaching at Columbia Law School.[citation needed] In 1928, he joined the faculty ofYale Law School, where he became an expert oncommercial litigation andbankruptcy law. He was identified with thelegal realist movement, which pushed for an understanding of law based less on formalistic legal doctrines and more on the real-world effects of the law. Teaching at Yale, he and his fellow professorThurman Arnold were riding theNew Haven Railroad and were inspired to set the signPassengers will please refrain... toAntonín Dvořák'sHumoresque #7.[16]Robert Maynard Hutchins described Douglas as "the most outstanding law professor in the nation."[17] When Hutchins became president of theUniversity of Chicago, Douglas accepted an offer to move there, but he changed his mind after he was made aSterling Professor at Yale.[6]
In 1934, Douglas left Yale after PresidentFranklin Roosevelt nominated him to theSecurities and Exchange Commission (SEC).[18] By 1937, he had become an adviser and friend to the President and the chairman. That same year, Roosevelt promoted him to Chairman of the SEC, replacingJames M. Landis. He also became friends with a group of young New Dealers, includingTommy "The Cork" Corcoran andAbraham Fortas. He was also close, both socially and in thinking to the Progressives of the era, such as Philip and Robert La Follette Jr. That social/political group befriendedLyndon Johnson, a freshman representative from the 10th District of Texas. In his 1982 bookThe Years of Lyndon Johnson: The Path to Power,Robert Caro wrote that in 1937, Douglas had helped to persuade Roosevelt to authorize theMarshall Ford Dam, a controversial project whose approval enabled Johnson to consolidate his power as a representative.[19]
In 1939, JusticeLouis D. Brandeis retired from the Court, and on March 20 Roosevelt nominated Douglas as his replacement.[18] Douglas was Brandeis's personal choice to be his successor.[6] Douglas later revealed that his appointment had been a great surprise to him (Roosevelt had summoned him to an "important meeting"), and Douglas feared that he would be named as the chairman of theFederal Communications Commission. He was confirmed by theUnited States Senate on April 4 by a vote of 62 to 4. The four negative votes were all cast by Republicans:Lynn J. Frazier,Henry Cabot Lodge Jr.,Gerald P. Nye, andClyde M. Reed. Douglas was sworn into office on April 17, 1939, becoming, at age 40, the fifth-youngest justice to be confirmed to the Supreme Court.[20][a]
Douglas was often at odds with fellow justiceFelix Frankfurter, who believed injudicial restraint and thought the court should stay out of politics.[18] Douglas did not highly value judicial consistency orstare decisis when deciding cases.[18] "But the origin of Douglas and Frankfurter's deep-seated animosity went beyond important jurisprudential differences. Temperamentally, they were opposites. From the beginning of their close associations as justices, the two men simply grated on each other's nerves.... Although in 1974 Douglas claimed that there had been no 'war' between him and Frankfurter, the evidence to the contrary was overwhelming. Frankfurter and Douglas, two important American jurists whose decades-long bitter debates (indeed, whose 'wars') contributed a great deal to our understanding of constitutionalism in a modern society, could not tolerate each other. Intentionally and unintentionally, they went out of their way to harass each other for over two decades."[21]
JudgeRichard A. Posner, who was a law clerk for justiceWilliam J. Brennan Jr. during the latter part of Douglas's tenure, characterized Douglas as "a bored, distracted, uncollegial, irresponsible" Supreme Court justice, as well as "rude, ice-cold, hot-tempered, ungrateful, foul-mouthed, self-absorbed" and so abusive in "treatment of his staff to the point where his law clerks—whom he described as 'the lowest form of human life'—took to calling him "shithead" behind his back." Posner asserts also that "Douglas's judicial oeuvre is slipshod and slapdash," but Douglas's "intelligence, his energy, his academic and government experience, his flair for writing, the leadership skills that he had displayed at the SEC, and his ability to charm when he bothered to try" could have let him "become the greatest justice in history."[6] Brennan once stated that Douglas was one of only "two geniuses" he had met in his life (the other being Posner).[22]
In general, legal scholars have noted that Douglas's judicial style was unusual in that he did not attempt to elaborate justifications for his judicial positions on the basis of text, history, or precedent. Douglas was known for writing short, pithy opinions that relied on philosophical insights, observations about current politics, and literature, as much as more conventional judicial sources. Douglas wrote many of his opinions in twenty minutes, often publishing the first draft.[17] Douglas was also known for his fearsome work ethic, publishing over thirty books and once telling an exhausted secretary, Fay Aull, "If you hadn't stopped working, you wouldn't be tired."[17]
Douglas frequently disagreed with the other justices, dissenting in almost 40 percent of cases, more than half of the time writing only for himself.[17]Ronald Dworkin wrote that because Douglas believed his convictions were merely "a matter of his own emotional biases," Douglas would fail to meet "minimal intellectual responsibilities."[23] Ultimately, Douglas believed that a judge's role was "not neutral" as "The Constitution is not neutral. It was designed to take the government off the backs of the people."[24]
Douglas has been widely characterized as acivil libertarian.[25] On the bench, Douglas became known as a strong advocate ofFirst Amendment rights. With fellow justiceHugo Black, Douglas argued for a "literalist" interpretation of theFirst Amendment, insisting that the First Amendment's command that "no law" shall restrict freedom of speech should be interpreted literally. He wrote the opinion inTerminiello v. City of Chicago (1949), overturning the conviction of a Catholic priest who allegedly caused a "breach of the peace" by making anti-Semitic comments during a raucous public speech. Douglas, joined by Black, furthered his advocacy of a broad reading of First Amendment rights by dissenting from the Supreme Court's decision inDennis v. United States (1952), which affirmed the conviction of the leader of theU.S. Communist Party. Douglas was publicly critical of censorship, saying, "The way to combat noxious ideas is with other ideas. The way to combat falsehoods is with truth."[26]
In 1944, Douglas voted with the majority to uphold the wartimeinternment of Japanese Americans inKorematsu v. United States after having initially planned to dissent, a vote he later regretted.[27] Over the course of his career, he grew to become a leading advocate of individual rights. He was suspicious of majority rule as it related to social and moral questions, and he frequently expressed concern about forced conformity with "the Establishment". For example, Douglas wrote the opinion inGriswold v. Connecticut (1965), which stated that a constitutionalright to privacy forbids state contraception bans because "specific guarantees in theBill of Rights havepenumbras, formed by emanations from those guarantees that help give them life and substance."[18][28] That went too far for Hugo Black, who dissented inGriswold despite having been allies with Douglas. JusticeClarence Thomas would years later hang a sign in his chambers reading, "Please don't emanate in the penumbras."[17] Conservative JudgeRobert Bork had no objection to the concept of penumbras, writing, "There is nothing exceptional about [Douglas's] thought, other than the language of penumbras and emanations. Courts often give protection to a constitutional freedom by creating a buffer zone, by prohibiting a government from doing something not in itself forbidden but likely to lead to an invasion of a right specified in the Constitution."[29] Prof.David P. Currie of theUniversity of Chicago Law School called Douglas'sGriswold opinion "one of the most hypocritical opinions in the history of the Court."[30]
Douglas and Black also disagreed inFortson v. Morris (1967), which cleared the path for theGeorgia State Legislature to choose the governor in the deadlocked1966 race betweenDemocratLester Maddox andRepublicanHoward Callaway. Whereas Black voted with the majority under strict construction to uphold the state constitutional provision, Douglas and Abe Fortas dissented. According to Douglas, Georgia tradition would guarantee a Maddox victory but he had trailed Callaway by some 3,000 votes in the general election returns. Douglas also saw the issue as a continuation of the earlier decisionGray v. Sanders, which had struck down Georgia'sCounty Unit System, a kind ofelectoral college formerly used to choose the governor. According to political scientistsAndrew D. Martin and Kevin M. Quinn, he was by far the most liberal justice in the history of the Supreme Court with a Martin-Quinn score of -8 at his most liberal.[31][32] He voted to strike down the death penalty inFurman v. Georgia, argued that the environment should be grantedlegal personhood, tried to declare theVietnam War unconstitutional because Congress had never declared war, and generally showed an uncompromising defense of individual rights from which even stalwart liberals Brennan and Marshall shied away.[33]
Douglas was notable as a public pre-Stonewall supporter of gay rights.[34] Douglas dissented inBoutilier v. INS in which the Court ruled that gays and lesbians were included in the list of “psychopathic personalities” that Congress could deport, arguing that the term “psychopathic personality” was unconstitutionally vague, and even if it were not, not all gays and lesbians are psychopaths.[35] In 1968, in a concurring opinion in the case ofFlast v. Cohen, Douglas indicated that he did not believe injudicial restraint:
There has long been a school of thought here that the less the judiciary does, the better. It is often said that judicial intrusion should be infrequent, since it is "always attended with a serious evil, namely, that the correction of legislative mistakes comes from the outside, and the people thus lose the political experience, and the moral education and stimulus that come from fighting the question out in the ordinary way, and correcting their own errors"; that the effect of a participation by the judiciary in these processes is "to dwarf the political capacity of the people, and to deaden its sense of moral responsibility." J. Thayer, John Marshall 106, 107 (1901).¶The late Edmond Cahn, who opposed that view, stated my philosophy. He emphasized the importance of the role that the federal judiciary was designed to play in guarding basic rights against majoritarian control. ... His description of our constitutional tradition was in these words: "Be not reasonable with inquisitions, anonymous informers, and secret files that mock American justice. Be not reasonable with punitive denationalizations, ex post facto deportations, labels of disloyalty, and all the other stratagems for outlawing human beings from the community of mankind. These devices have put us to shame. Exercise the full judicial power of the United States; nullify them, forbid them, and make us proud again." Can the Supreme Court Defend Civil Liberties? in Samuel, ed., Toward a Better America 132, 144 -145 (1968).[36]
"Critics have sometimes charged that [Douglas] was result oriented and guilty of oversimplification; those who understand how he thought, and who share his compassion, conscience, and sense of fair dealing, see him as courageous and farsighted."[37] "There is no necessary contradiction between these two views."[30]
On June 17, 1953, Douglas granted a temporarystay of execution toEthel and Julius Rosenberg, who had been convicted of selling the plans for theatomic bomb to the Soviet Union during theCold War. The basis for the stay was that JudgeIrving Kaufman had sentenced the Rosenbergs to death without the consent of the jury. While this was permissible under theEspionage Act of 1917, under which the Rosenbergs were tried, a later law, theAtomic Energy Act of 1946, held that only a jury could pronounce the death penalty. Since at the time the stay was granted the Supreme Court was out of session, this stay meant that the Rosenbergs could expect to wait at least six months before the case was heard.
WhenAttorney GeneralHerbert Brownell heard about the stay, however, he immediately took his objection toChief JusticeFred M. Vinson, who reconvened the Court before the appointed date and set aside the stay. Douglas had departed for vacation, but on learning of the special session of the Court, he returned to Washington.[14]: 324–325 Because of widespread opposition to his decision, Douglas briefly facedimpeachment proceedings in Congress but attempts to remove him from the Court went nowhere.[38]
Douglas took strong positions on the Vietnam War. In 1952, Douglas traveled to Vietnam and met withHo Chi Minh. During the trip Douglas became friendly withNgo Dinh Diem and in 1953 he personally introduced the nationalist leader to senatorsMike Mansfield andJohn F. Kennedy. Douglas became one of the chief promoters for U.S. support of Diem, with CIA deputy director Robert Amory crediting Diem becoming "our man in Indochina" to a conversation with Douglas during a party atMartin Agronsky's house.[39]
After Diem's assassination in November 1963, Douglas became strongly critical of the war, believing Diem had been killed because he "was not sufficiently servile toPentagon demands."[39] Douglas now outspokenly argued the war was illegal, dissenting whenever the Court passed on an opportunity to hear such claims.[40] In 1968 Douglas issued an order blocking the shipment of Army reservists to Vietnam, before the eight other justices unanimously reversed him.[39]
InSchlesinger v. Holtzman (1973) JusticeThurgood Marshall issued anin-chambers opinion declining Rep.Elizabeth Holtzman's request for a court order stopping the military from bombingCambodia.[41] The Court was in recess for the summer but the Congresswoman reapplied, this time to Douglas.[39] Douglas met with Holtzman'sACLU lawyers at his home inGoose Prairie, Washington, and promised them a hearing the next day.[39] On Friday, August 3, 1973, Douglas held a hearing in theYakima federal courthouse, where he dismissed the Government's argument that he was causing a "constitutional confrontation" by saying, "we live in a world of confrontations. That's what the whole system is about."[39] On August 4, Douglas ordered the military to stop bombing, reasoning "denial of the application before me would catapult our airmen as well as Cambodian peasants into the death zone."[42] The U.S. military ignored Douglas's order.[41] Six hours later the eight other justices reconvened by telephone for a special term and unanimously overturned Douglas's ruling.[43]
Douglas was highly innovative in legal theory.[44] For example, in his dissenting opinion in the landmark environmental law caseSierra Club v. Morton, 405 U.S. 727 (1972), Douglas argued that "inanimate objects" should have standing to sue in court:
The critical question of "standing" would be simplified and also put neatly in focus if we fashioned a federal rule that allowed environmental issues to be litigated before federal agencies or federal courts in the name of the inanimate object about to be despoiled, defaced, or invaded by roads and bulldozers and where injury is the subject of public outrage. Contemporary public concern for protecting nature's ecological equilibrium should lead to the conferral of standing upon environmental objects to sue for their own preservation. This suit would therefore be more properly labeled asMineral King v. Morton.[45]
He continued:
Inanimate objects are sometimes parties in litigation. A ship has a legal personality, afiction found useful for maritime purposes. Thecorporation sole—a creature of ecclesiastical law—is an acceptable adversary and large fortunes ride on its cases ... So it should be as respects valleys, alpine meadows, rivers, lakes, estuaries, beaches, ridges, groves of trees, swampland, or even air that feels the destructive pressures of modern technology and modern life. The river, for example, is the living symbol of all the life it sustains or nourishes—fish, aquatic insects, water ouzels, otter, fisher, deer, elk, bear, and all other animals, including man, who are dependent on it or who enjoy it for its sight, its sound, or its life. The river as plaintiff speaks for the ecological unit of life that is part of it.[45]
Douglas biographerM. Margaret McKeown found that he was influenced in his opinion by reading a pre-publication copy of aSouthern California Law Review article by Christopher Stone.[46] In "Should Trees Have Standing? – Toward Legal Rights for Natural Objects",[47] Stone advanced an argument that would later be the basis for the legal concepts ofEnvironmental personhood andRights of nature.[48][49]
Douglas was a lifelongmountaineer. In his autobiographicalOf Men and Mountains (1950), he discusses his close childhood connections with nature.[50] In the 1950s, proposals were made to create a highway along the path of the C&O Canal, which ran on the Maryland bank parallel to the Potomac River.The Washington Post editorial page supported the action. However, Douglas, who frequently hiked on the Canal towpath, opposed the plan and challenged the newspaper's editors to hike the 185-mile length of the Canal with him.[49] After the hike (which the journalists were unable to complete), thePost changed its stance and advocated preservation of the Canal in its historic state. Douglas is widely credited with saving the Canal and with its eventual designation as aNational Historic Park in 1971.[51] He served on the board of directors of theSierra Club from 1960 to 1962 and wrote prolifically on his love of the outdoors. In 1962, Douglas wrote a glowing review ofRachel Carson's bookSilent Spring, which was included in the widely-readBook-of-the-Month Club edition.He later swayed the Supreme Court to preserve theRed River Gorge in eastern Kentucky, when a proposal to build a dam and flood the gorge reached the Court. Douglas personally visited the area on November 18, 1967. The Red River Gorge's Douglas Trail is named in his honor.[52]
In May 1962,[53] Douglas and his wife, Cathleen, were invited by Neil Compton and the Ozark Society to visit and canoe down part of the free flowingBuffalo River in Arkansas. They put in at the low water bridge at Boxley. That experience made him a fan of the river and the young organization's idea of protecting it. Douglas was instrumental in having the Buffalo preserved as a free-flowing river left in its natural state.[54] The decision was opposed by the region'sCorps of Army Engineers. The act that soon followed designated the Buffalo River as America's first National River.[55]Douglas was a self-professed outdoorsman. According toThe Thru-Hiker's Companion, a guide published by theAppalachian Long Distance Hikers Association, Douglas hiked the entire 2,000 miles (3,200 km) trail from Georgia to Maine.[56] His love for the environment carried through to his judicial reasoning. His interests in natural history are also reflected in the fact that he collected plant specimens for the herbarium of the University of Texas at Austin. They curate at least 14 vascular plant specimens collected by Douglas together with botanist Donovan Stewart Correll, Head of the Botanical Laboratory, Texas Research Foundation in February and June 1965.[57] The specimens collected in February were from Presidio and Brewster Counties—several from Capote Falls. The specimens collected in June were from Blanco, Gillespie, and Llano Counties—near Austin, Texas. The Rocky Mountain Herbarium at the University of Wyoming curates a lichen collected by William O. Douglas in Snoqualmie National Forest.
Douglas's active role in advocating the preservation and protection of wilderness across the United States earned him the nickname "Wild Bill". Douglas was a friend and frequent guest ofHarry R. Truman, the owner of theMount St. Helens Lodge atSpirit Lake in Washington. Truman would later become known for his death in the1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens, a few months after Douglas died.
In 1967, on a hike to saveSunfish Pond on theAppalachian Trail inNew Jersey, Douglas was accompanied by more than a thousand people.[58] He said: "It's a vital element in the need to save some of our wilderness from the encroachment of civilization."[59]
From 1950 to 1961, Douglas travelled extensively in the Middle East and Asia. Douglas wrote many books about his experiences and observations during these trips. Other than writers fromNational Geographic—whom he sometimes met on the road—Douglas was one of the few American travel writers to visit these remote regions during this period in time. His travel books include:
In his memoir,The Court Years, Douglas wrote that he was sometimes criticized for taking too much time off from the bench, and writing travel books while on the U.S. Supreme Court. However, Douglas maintained that the travel gave him a world-wide perspective that was helpful in resolving cases before the Court. It also gave him a perspective on political systems that did not benefit from the legal protections in the American Constitution.[60]
When, in early 1944, President Franklin D. Roosevelt decided not to support the renomination of Vice PresidentHenry A. Wallace at the party's national convention, a short list of possible replacements was drafted. The names on the list included former senator and Supreme Court justiceJames F. Byrnes of South Carolina, former senator (and future Supreme Court justice)Sherman Minton, former governor andhigh commissioner to the PhilippinesPaul McNutt of Indiana,House speakerSam Rayburn of Texas, SenatorAlben W. Barkley of Kentucky, SenatorHarry S. Truman of Missouri, and Douglas.
Five days before the vice presidential nominee was to be chosen at the convention, on July 15,Committee chairmanRobert E. Hannegan received a letter from Roosevelt stating that his choice for the nominee would be either "Harry Truman or Bill Douglas".[61] After Hannegan released the letter to the convention on July 20, the nomination went without incident, and Truman was nominated on the second ballot. Douglas received two votes on the second ballot and none on the first.
After the convention, Douglas's supporters spread the rumor that the note sent to Hannegan had read "Bill Douglas or Harry Truman", not the other way around.[62] These supporters claimed that Hannegan, a Truman backer, feared that Douglas's nomination would drive Southern white voters away from the ticket (Douglas had a strong anti-segregation record on the Supreme Court) and had switched the names to suggest that Truman was Roosevelt's real choice.[62]
By 1948, Douglas's presidential aspirations were rekindled by Truman's low popularity, after he had succeeded Roosevelt in 1945. Many Democrats, believing that Truman could not be elected in November, began trying to find a replacement candidate. Attempts were made to draft popular retired GeneralDwight D. Eisenhower, a war hero, for the nomination. A "Draft Douglas" campaign, complete with souvenir buttons and hats, sprang up in New Hampshire and several other primary states. Douglas campaigned for the nomination for a short time, but he soon withdrew his name from consideration.
In the end, Eisenhower refused to be drafted, and Truman won nomination easily. Although Truman approached Douglas about the vice presidential nomination, the justice turned him down. Douglas's close associate Tommy Corcoran was later heard to ask, "Why be a number two man to a number two man?"[63] Truman selected SenatorAlben W. Barkley and the two won theelection.
Political opponents made two unsuccessful attempts to remove Douglas from the Supreme Court.
On June 17, 1953, U.S. RepresentativeWilliam M. Wheeler of Georgia, infuriated by Douglas's briefstay of execution in theRosenberg case, introduced a resolution to impeach him. The resolution was referred the next day to the Judiciary Committee to investigate the charges. On July 7, 1953, the committee voted to end the investigation.[64]
Douglas maintained a busy speaking and publishing schedule to supplement his income. He became severely burdened financially because of a bitter divorce and settlement with his first wife. He sustained additional financial setbacks after divorces and settlements with his second and third wives.[14]
Douglas became president of the Parvin Foundation. His ties to the foundation (which was financed by the sale of the infamousFlamingo Hotel by casino financier and foundation benefactor Albert Parvin) became a prime target for House Minority LeaderGerald Ford. Besides being personally disgusted by Douglas's lifestyle, Ford was also mindful that Douglas's protégé Abe Fortas was forced to resign because of ties to a similar foundation.[65] Fortas would later say that he "resigned to save Douglas," thinking that the dual investigations of himself and Douglas would stop with his resignation.[65]
Some scholars[66][67] have argued that Ford's impeachment attempt was politically motivated. Those who support this contention note Ford's well-known disappointment with the Senate over the failed nominations ofClement Haynsworth andG. Harrold Carswell to succeed Fortas. In April 1970, Ford moved to impeach Douglas in an attempt to hit back at the Senate. House Judiciary ChairmanEmanuel Celler handled the case carefully and did not uncover evidence of any criminal conduct by Douglas. Attorney GeneralJohn N. Mitchell and the Nixon administration worked to gather evidence against him.[68] Ford moved forward with the proceedings.
The hearings began in late April 1970. Ford was the main witness, and attacked Douglas's "liberal opinions", his "defense of the 'filthy' film", the controversial Swedish filmI Am Curious (Yellow) (1970), and his ties to Parvin. Douglas was also criticized for accepting $350 for an article he wrote onfolk music in the magazineAvant Garde. Its publisher had served a prison sentence for the distribution of another magazine in 1966 that had been deemed obscene by some critics. Describing Douglas's article, Ford stated, "The article itself is not pornographic, although it praises the lusty, lurid, and risqué along with the social protest of left-wing folk singers." Ford also attacked Douglas for publishing an article inEvergreen Review, which he claimed was known to publish photographs of naked women. The Republican congressmen, however, refused to give the majority Democrats copies of the magazines described, prompting CongressmanWayne Hays to remark, "Has anybody read the article – or is everybody over there who has a magazine just looking at the pictures?"[69] As it became clear that the impeachment proceedings would be unsuccessful, they were brought to a close without a public vote.[70]
According to Joshua E. Kastenberg of theUniversity of New Mexico School of Law, there were several purposes behind Ford's and Nixon's push to have Douglas impeached. First, while it was true that Nixon and Ford were angered at the Senate's determination not to confirm Haynsworth and Carswell, Nixon had a deep-seated hatred of Douglas. An attempt to have Douglas impeached and then brought to a Senate trial would further cement the alleged "Southern Strategy", as most of Ford's congressional allies against Douglas were Southern Democrats. Additionally, Nixon and Kissinger had secretly planned for an April 30 – May 1 invasion of Cambodia and Nixon thought that there was a possibility of using a House investigation into Douglas to deflect news coverage. Professor Kastenberg notes in his recent book on the subject that Attorney General John Mitchell and his deputy, William Wilson, had promised Ford that the Central Intelligence Agency, the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Internal Revenue Service, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation had evidence of Douglas's criminal conduct. In the end, however, none of these agencies had any evidence of wrongdoing by Douglas, but the promise led Ford to accuse Douglas of consorting with organized crime and Communists, and therefore of being a threat to national security.[71]
Around this time, Douglas came to believe that strangers snooping around his Washington home wereFBI agents, attempting to plantmarijuana to entrap him. In a private letter to his neighbors, he said: "I wrote you last fall or winter that federal agents were in Yakima and Goose Prairie looking me over at Goose Prairie. I thought they were merely counting fence posts. But I learned in New York City yesterday that they were planting marijuana with the prospect of a nice big TV-covered raid in July or August. I forgot to tell you that this gang in power is not in search of truth. They are 'search and destroy' people."[72]
During his tenure on the Supreme Court, Douglas set a number of records, all of which still stand. He sat on the U.S. Supreme Court for more than thirty-six years (1939–75), longer than any other justice. During those years, he wrote some thirty books in addition to hisopinions anddissenting opinions and gave more speeches than any other justice. Douglas had the most marriages (four) and the most divorces (three) of any justice serving on the bench.[17]
During his time on the Supreme Court, Douglas picked up a number ofnicknames from both admirers and detractors. The most common epithet was "Wild Bill" in reference to his independent and often-unpredictable stances and hiscowboy-style mannerisms, but many of the latter were considered by some to be affectations for the consumption of the press.[14]
Since the 1970 impeachment hearings, Douglas had wanted to retire from the Court. He wrote to his friend and former studentAbe Fortas: "My ideas are way out of line with current trends, and I see no particular point in staying around and being obnoxious."[65] However, he did not want to do so when a Republican was in the White House and would nominate his successor, saying "I won't resign while there's a breath in my body —until we get a Democratic President."[73]
At 76 on December 31, 1974, on vacation with his wife Cathleen in theBahamas, Douglas suffered a debilitating stroke in the right hemisphere of his brain. It paralyzed his left leg and forced him to use a wheelchair. Douglas was severely disabled but insisted on continuing to participate in Supreme Court affairs despite his obvious incapacity. Seven of his fellow justices (withByron White vehemently disagreeing)[74] voted to postpone until the next term any argued case in which Douglas's vote might make a difference.[75] Douglas finally retired on November 12, 1975, after 36 years of service. He was Franklin Roosevelt's last sitting Supreme Court justice. Indeed, Douglas had outlasted the last ofHarry S. Truman's appointments by eight years and was the last sitting justice to have served on theHughes,Stone, andVinson Courts.
Douglas's formal resignation was submitted, as required by federal protocols, to his longtime political nemesis, then-PresidentGerald Ford. In his response, Ford put aside previous differences and paid tribute to the retiring justice:
May I express on behalf of all our countrymen this nation's great gratitude for your more than thirty-six years as a member of the Supreme Court. Your distinguished years of service are unequaled in all the history of the Court.[76]: 334
Ford hosted William and Cathleen Douglas as honored guests at a White Housestate dinner later that month. Ford later said of the occasion, "We had had differences in the past, but I wanted to stress that bygones were bygones."[76]: 206
Douglas maintained that he could assume judicialsenior status on the Court and attempted to continue serving in that capacity, according to authorsBob Woodward andScott Armstrong. He refused to accept his retirement and tried to participate in the Court's cases well into 1976, afterJohn Paul Stevens had taken his former seat.[77] Douglas reacted with outrage when, returning to his old chambers, he discovered that his clerks had been reassigned to Stevens and when he tried to file opinions for cases in which he had heard arguments before his retirement, Chief JusticeWarren Burger ordered all justices, clerks, and other staff members to refuse help to Douglas in those efforts. When Douglas tried in March 1976 to hear arguments in a capital-punishment case,Gregg v. Georgia, the nine sitting justices signed a formal letter informing him that his retirement had ended his official duties on the Court. It was only then that Douglas withdrew from Supreme Court business.[78]
One commentator has attributed some of his behavior after his stroke toanosognosia, which can lead an affected person to be unaware and unable to acknowledge disease in himself, and often results in defects in reasoning, decision-making, emotions, and feeling.[79]
_that_his_dad_looks_pretty_nice_in_his_new_(...)_as_Associate_Justice_of_the_U.S._Supreme_Court._The_two_LCCN2016875460.jpg)
Douglas's first wife was Mildred Riddle, a teacher atNorth Yakima High School six years his senior, whom he married on August 16, 1923. They had two children, Mildred and William Jr.[80] William Douglas Jr. became an actor, playing Gerald Zinser inPT 109.
On October 2, 1949, Douglas had thirteen of his ribs broken after he got thrown by a horse and he tumbled down a rocky hillside.[81] As a result of his injuries, Douglas did not return to the Court until March 1950 and did not take part in many of that term's cases.[82] Four months after his return to the court, Douglas had to be hospitalized again when he was kicked by a horse.[14][83]
Douglas divorced Riddle in July 1953. Douglas's former friendThomas Gardiner Corcoran represented Riddle in the divorce, securing alimony with an "escalator clause" that gave Douglas a financial motivation to publish more books.[6] Douglas was not informed about Riddle's 1969 death until several months had passed because his children had stopped talking to him.[17]
While still married to Riddle, Douglas began openly pursuing Mercedes Hester Davidson in 1951.[17] Other justices at the time kept mistresses as secretaries or kept them away from the Court building according to Douglas's messenger Harry Datcher, but Douglas "did what he did in the open. He didn't give a damn what people thought of him."[17] Douglas married Davidson on December 14, 1954.[17][84]
In 1961, Douglas pursued Joan "Joanie" Martin, anAllegheny College student writing her thesis about him.[17] In the summer of 1963, he divorced Davidson; on August 5, 1963, at the age of 64, Douglas married 23-year-old Joan C. Martin.[85] Douglas and Martin divorced in 1966.
On July 15, 1966, Douglas married Cathleen Heffernan, then a 22-year-old student atMarylhurst College.[86] They met when he was vacationing atMount St. Helens Lodge, a mountain wilderness lodge in Washington state atSpirit Lake, where she was working for the summer as a waitress.[87] Though theirage difference was a subject of national controversy at the time of their marriage,[88] they remained together until his death in 1980.[89]
For much of his life, Douglas was dogged by various rumors and allegations about his private life, originating from political rivals and other detractors of his liberal legal opinions on the Court—often a matter of controversy. In one such instance in 1966, Republican RepresentativeBob Dole of Kansas attributed his court decisions to his "bad judgment from a matrimonial standpoint". Several other Republican members of Congress introduced resolutions in theHouse of Representatives, though none ever passed, that called for investigation of Douglas's moral character.[87]
Daniel Pierce Thompson was Douglas's great-granduncle.[90]
Four years after retiring from the Supreme Court, Douglas died on January 19, 1980, at age 81, atWalter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C.[91] He was survived by his fourth wife, Cathleen Douglas, and two children, Mildred and William Jr., with his first wife.[92]
Douglas is interred in Section 5 of Arlington National Cemetery near the graves of eight other former Supreme Court justices:Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.,Warren E. Burger,William Rehnquist,Hugo Black,Potter Stewart,William J. Brennan,Thurgood Marshall, andHarry Blackmun.[93][94] Throughout his life Douglas claimed he had been a U.S. Army private duringWorld War I, which was inscribed on his headstone. Some historians, including biographerBruce Murphy, asserted that this claim was false,[5][6][14] although Murphy later added, according toWashington Post editorial writerCharles Lane, that Douglas's "career on the court makes it 'appropriate'" that he be buried in Arlington Cemetery.[11]
Lane engaged in further research—consulting applicable provisions of the relevant federal statutes, locating Douglas's honorable discharge and speaking with Arlington Cemetery staff.[11] Records in theLibrary of Congress showed that from June to December 1918, Douglas served in the SATC as (what the War Department's regulations termed) "a soldier in the Army of the United States ... placed upon active-duty status immediately."[11] Tom Sherlock, Arlington's official historian, told Lane that an "active-duty recruit whose service was limited to boot camp would qualify" to be buried in Arlington.[11] Lane therefore concluded, "Legally, then, Douglas may have had a plausible claim to be a 'Private, U.S. Army,' as his headstone at Arlington reads."
The papers of William O. Douglas from his career as professor of law, Securities and Exchange commissioner, and associate justice of the United States Supreme Court were bequeathed by him to theLibrary of Congress.[102]
Douglas was also a contributor toPlayboy magazine:[103][104]
Justice Douglas was also a strong advocate for outdoor recreation and environmental causes.
Media from Commons
Quotations from Wikiquote
Texts from Wikisource| Political offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by | Chair of theSecurities and Exchange Commission 1937–1939 | Succeeded by |
| Legal offices | ||
| Preceded by | Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States 1939–1975 | Succeeded by |
Chairmen of theUnited States Securities and Exchange Commission | ||
|---|---|---|
 | ||
