Roger J. Traynor | |
|---|---|
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| 23rdChief Justice of California | |
| In office September 1, 1964 – February 2, 1970 | |
| Appointed by | Pat Brown |
| Preceded by | Phil S. Gibson |
| Succeeded by | Donald R. Wright |
| Associate Justice of theCalifornia Supreme Court | |
| In office August 13, 1940 – September 1, 1964 | |
| Appointed by | Culbert Olson |
| Preceded by | Phil S. Gibson |
| Succeeded by | Stanley Mosk |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Roger John Traynor February 12, 1900 Park City,Utah, U.S. |
| Died | May 14, 1983(1983-05-14) (aged 83) Berkeley,California, U.S. |
| Spouse | |
| Children | 3 |
| Education | University of California, Berkeley (BA,MA,PhD,JD) |
Roger John Traynor (February 12, 1900 – May 14, 1983) was the 23rdChief Justice of California (1964–1970) and an associate justice of theSupreme Court of California from 1940 to 1964.[1] Previously, he had served as aDeputy Attorney General of California underEarl Warren, and an Acting Dean and Professor ofUC Berkeley School of Law.[2][3] He is widely considered to be one of the most creative and influential judges and legal scholars of his time.[2][4][5][6][7][8][9]
Ajurist noted forliberalism andactivism, Traynor's 30-year career as California's 77th Justice coincided with demographic, social, and governmental growth inCalifornia and in theUnited States of America.[2][4] Traynor believed (in the words of his biographer,G. Edward White) that "the increased presence ofgovernment in American life was a necessary and beneficial phenomenon."[10] After his retirement from the California Supreme Court, Traynor spent the last years of his life as a professor at theUC Hastings College of Law.[2][3]
Traynor was born and raised inPark City, Utah, then amining town, at the turn of the century by Felix and Elizabeth Traynor. His parents were impoverishedIrishimmigrants fromHilltown, County Down.[11][12]
In 1919, upon the advice of a high school teacher, he entered theUniversity of California, Berkeley, though he had only $500 in savings to finance his college education.[11] He won ascholarship at the end of his first year due to his excellent grades, and went on to earn aB.A. in 1923, anM.A. in 1924, and aPh.D. in 1926; all these degrees were inpolitical science. He also earned aJ.D. fromBoalt Hall, UC Berkeley's law school, in 1927. He earned the two latter degrees at the same time, while also teaching undergraduates and serving as editor-in-chief of theCalifornia Law Review. He was subsequently admitted to theState Bar of California that same year.[11]
AtBoalt Hall ofUC Berkeley, Traynor wrote articles ontaxation, while serving as editor-in-chief of theCalifornia Law Review, and became a full-timeprofessor in 1936.[11] In 1939, he started serving as the Acting Dean of Boalt Hall at UC Berkeley, where he had earned hisJ.D. degree.[13]
While he was a faculty member of the Berkeley Law School, Traynor also acted as aconsultant to theCalifornia State Board of Equalization from 1932 to 1940, and to theUnited States Department of the Treasury from 1937 to 1940.[14][15] In particular, he took a leave of absence from Berkeley in 1933 to work full-time for the Board of Equalization, and another leave in 1937 to help the Treasury Department draft the Revenue Act of 1938.[11]
Before theGreat Depression, nearly all California governmental functions were fundedonly through a general property tax on both real and personal property. This proved unworkable when property values collapsed. Through his work for the Board of Equalization, Traynor was responsible for creating much of California's modern tax regime, including thevehicle registration fee (1933),sales tax (1933),income tax (1935),use tax (1935),corporate income tax (1937), andfuel tax (1937).[11] He also served as the first administrator of the California sales tax and supervised its deployment across 200,000retailers.[16][17][18]
In January 1940, he started working part-time as a DeputyAttorney General under California Attorney GeneralEarl Warren (who later becameChief Justice of the United States).[11]
After retiring from the Supreme Court of California in 1970, Traynor became a professor at theUC Hastings College of Law.[2][3] He also spent some time visiting and teaching at the law schools ofUniversity of Utah,University of Virginia, and theUniversity of Cambridge.[2][3]
On July 31, 1940, Traynor was nominated to the Supreme Court of California byGovernorCulbert Olson.[19][20] He was unanimously confirmed by the Qualifications Committee on August 13 and was sworn in the same day.[11][21] In December 1940, he was retained by the voters in the election.[22][23] In August 1964, Chief JusticePhil S. Gibson stepped down from the bench, and GovernorPat Brown appointed Traynor to the post.[24]
Hisobituary in theNew York Times noted that "Traynor was often called one of the greatest judicial talents never to sit on theUnited States Supreme Court."[4][25]
Traynor authored more than 900 opinions, and he gained a reputation as the nation's leadingstate court judge.[25][11][26][27] During his tenure, the decisions of the Supreme Court of California became the most frequently cited by all other state courts in the nation. Several of Traynor's decisions were majority opinions that transformed California from a conservative and somewhat repressive state into a progressive, innovative jurisdiction in the forefront of American law.[28]
Traynor was also noted for the quality of his writing and reasoning,[29] and was honored during his lifetime with membership in theAmerican Academy of Arts and Sciences (a rare honor for a judge).[11] Many of his opinions are still mandatory reading for American law students. Also, Traynor did not uniformly join all opinions that could be characterized as "liberal" or "progressive" during his time on the Court; for example, he filed a two-sentence dissent in the landmark case ofDillon v. Legg (1968),[30] which was a major step towards the modern tort ofnegligent infliction of emotional distress.
His 1948 opinion inPerez v. Sharp was the first instance of astate supreme court striking down astatute prohibitingmiscegenation. Traynor also wrote a 1952 opinion that abolished the defense ofrecrimination in the context ofdivorce and paved the way for the social revolution ofno-fault divorce. But his most significant and well-known contribution to contemporaryAmerican law is probably his 1963 creation of true strict liability in product liability cases. An earlier generation of judges had cautiously experimented withlegal fictions like warranties to avoid leaving severely injuredplaintiffs without any recourse. Traynor simply threw those away and imposed strict liability as a matter ofpublic policy.[citation needed]
To those skeptical of government's power to redress social wrongs, Traynor's extraordinary work is notable for the degree to which it asserted the judiciary's power to resolve difficult issues of public policy, and to redefine the boundaries of corporate and governmental liability. In his biography of Traynor, White wrote: "If California was a testing ground for governmental theories of modern liberalism, Traynor was an architect of a judicial role compatible with the activities of the modern liberal state."[31]
In July 1983, theCalifornia Law Review gave over all its space in issue 4, volume 71 to publishing eloquent tributes to Justice Traynor from several esteemed judges, law professors, andpoliticians, includingWarren Burger,Henry Friendly, andEdmund G. Brown.[32]
The liberal tendencies of much of Traynor's work has since made him the subject of extensive criticism from Americanlibertarians andconservatives, andtort reformers have often grouped Traynor together with Earl Warren as examples ofjudicial activists. For example, the conservative magazineNational Review attacked Traynor's reasoning in thePacific Gas and Electric Company case (Pacific Gas & Elec. Co. v. G. W. Thomas Drayage Co., 69 Cal. 2d 33 (1968)) in a 1991 cover story.[33]
In 1998,Regulation (theCato Institute's journal) published a harsh critique of the California tort law system by Stephen Hayward. He claimed that "rather than protecting life, liberty, and property, [it] has ... become a threat to these."[34] In blunt language, Hayward identified Roger Traynor's liberalizing influence on the Court's view of liability as "the first breach":
In the 1944 case ofEscola v. Coca Cola Bottling Co.[35] ... Traynor introduced the idea of broad social fault. "I believe," Traynor wrote, "the manufacturer's negligence should no longer be singled out as the basis of a plaintiff's right to recover in cases like the present one." .... "Even if there is no negligence," Traynor wrote further, "public policy demands that responsibility be fixed wherever it will most effectively reduce the hazards to life and health inherent in defective products that reach the market." Note the appeal to the demands of public policy, rather than law .... While this line of reasoning might be the basis for a legislative debate over which public policies should be adopted to allocate and compensate for risk, Justice Traynor's opinion represents a clear case of legislation by judicial fiat.
In a 1966 essay addressed to both the legal community of his time and future generations, Traynor defended his judicial philosophy:
There are always some who note with alarm any appellate opinion that goes beyond a mechanical canvass of more or less established precedents. They include the diehards, dead set against all but familiar routines. They include the slothful, who would rationalize their own inertia. They also include carpers hostile toward any enlightenment, who would knowingly impair judicial vigil by keeping the visibility low. Slyly they equate justice with theblindfold image without articulating the corollary that decision would then be reduced to a blind toss of the coin. They do not state how problematic are the problems that reach the Supreme Court, and how great the need for judicial reasoning beyond formulas.[36]
On January 2, 1970, Traynor announced hisretirement in order to avoid losing eligibility for retirement benefits under a California law that stripped judges of most benefits if they chose to remain on the bench past age 70.[37][38] He became chairman of the National News Council, concerned withfreedom of the press.[39][40][41] Afterwards, he retired toBerkeley and died there in his home fromcancer.
On August 23, 1933, Traynor married Madeleine Emilie Lackman, a woman who shared his love of learning: she already held aM.A. in political science from UC Berkeley and would go on to earn a J.D. in 1956.[11] They had three sons: Michael, Joseph, and Stephen. Michael followed his father into law; he attendedHarvard Law School, became a partner withCooley Godward Kronish LLP, and has served as president of TheAmerican Law Institute.[43][44]
Roger J. Traynor, on leave from the University of California law school, was named division chief yesterday.
Roger J. Traynor, an internationally respected jurist
the membership of the court, which included such unusually gifted jurists as Roger J. Traynor
| Legal offices | ||
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| Preceded by | Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of California August 13, 1940 – September 1, 1964 | Succeeded by |
| Chief Justice of California September 1, 1964 – February 2, 1970 | Succeeded by | |
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| National | |
| Other | |
