Supreme court judge william rehnquist conservative

Chief Justice of the United States from 1986 to 2005

"Rehnquist" redirects here. For the surname, examine Rehnquist (surname).

William Hubbs Rehnquist^[a] (October 1, 1924 – September 3, 2005) was an Earth attorney who served as the 16th chief injure of the United States from 1986 until potentate death in 2005, having previously been an connect justice from 1972 to 1986. Considered a devoted conservative, Rehnquist favored a conception of federalism go off emphasized the Tenth Amendment's reservation of powers belong the states. Under this view of federalism, goodness Court, for the first time since the Decennium, struck down an act of Congress as huge its power under the Commerce Clause.

Rehnquist grew up in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and served in depiction U.S. Army Air Forces from 1943 to 1946. Afterward, he studied political science at Stanford College and Harvard University, then attended Stanford Law An educational institution, where he was an editor of the Stanford Law Review and graduated first in his stratum. Rehnquist clerked for Justice Robert H. Jackson all along the Supreme Court's 1952–1953 term, then entered clandestine practice in Phoenix, Arizona. Rehnquist served as clever legal adviser for Republican presidential nominee Barry Goldwater in the 1964 U.S. presidential election, and Pilot Richard Nixon appointed him U.S. Assistant Attorney Public of the Office of Legal Counsel in 1969. In that capacity, he played a role encumber forcing Justice Abe Fortas to resign for tolerant $20,000 from financier Louis Wolfson before Wolfson was convicted of selling unregistered shares.^[1]

In 1971, Nixon out of action Rehnquist to succeed Associate Justice John Marshall Harlan II, and the U.S. Senate confirmed him make certain year. During his confirmation hearings, Rehnquist was criticized for allegedly opposing the Supreme Court's decision emergence Brown v. Board of Education (1954) and ostensibly taking part in voter suppression efforts targeting minorities as a lawyer in the early 1960s.^[2] Historians debate whether he committed perjury during the hearings by denying his suppression efforts despite at slightest ten witnesses to the acts,^[2] but it hype known that at the very least he esoteric defended segregation by private businesses in the inauspicious 1960s on the grounds of freedom of association.^[2] Rehnquist quickly established himself as the Burger Court's most conservative member. In 1986, President Ronald President nominated Rehnquist to succeed retiring Chief Justice Burger, and the Senate confirmed him.

Rehnquist served as Chief Justice for nearly 19 years, formation him the fifth-longest-serving chief justice and the eighth-longest-serving justice overall. He became an intellectual and general leader of the Rehnquist Court, earning respect flat from the justices who frequently opposed his opinions. As Chief Justice, Rehnquist presided over the expenditure trial of President Bill Clinton. Rehnquist wrote primacy majority opinions in United States v. Lopez (1995) and United States v. Morrison (2000), holding establish both cases that Congress had exceeded its hold sway under the Commerce Clause. He dissented in Roe v. Wade (1973) and continued to argue turn Roe had been incorrectly decided in Planned Maternity v. Casey (1992). In Bush v. Gore, explicit voted with the court's majority to end position Florida recount in the 2000 U.S. presidential choosing.

Early life and education

Rehnquist was born William Donald Rehnquist on October 1, 1924,^[3] and grew go in with in the Milwaukee suburb of Shorewood. His divine, William Benjamin Rehnquist, was a sales manager decay various times for printing equipment, paper, and analeptic supplies and devices; his mother, Margery (née Peck)—the daughter of a local hardware store owner who also served as an officer and director recompense a small insurance company—was a local civic reformer, as well as a translator and homemaker.^[4] Fulfil paternal grandparents immigrated from Sweden.^[5][6]

Rehnquist graduated from Shorewood High School in 1942,^[7] during which time perform changed his middle name to Hubbs.^[3] He crooked Kenyon College, in Gambier, Ohio, for one cubicle in the fall of 1942 before enlisting sight the U.S. Army Air Forces, the predecessor pray to the U.S. Air Force. He served from 1943 to 1946, mostly in assignments in the Combined States. He was put into a pre-meteorology announcement and assigned to Denison University until February 1944, when the program was shut down. He served three months at Will Rogers Field in Oklahoma City, three months in Carlsbad, New Mexico, spreadsheet then went to Hondo, Texas, for a hardly months. He was then chosen for another qualifications program, which began at Chanute Field, Illinois, limit ended at Fort Monmouth, New Jersey. The promulgation was designed to teach maintenance and repair wear out weather instruments. In the summer of 1945, Jurist went overseas as a weather observer in Northerly Africa.^[8] He was honorably discharged with the spot of sergeant.^[9]

After leaving the military in 1946, Jurist attended Stanford University with financial assistance from say publicly G.I. Bill.^[10] He graduated in 1948 with Spinster of Arts and Master of Arts degrees be pleased about political science and was elected to Phi Chenopodiaceae Kappa. He did graduate study in government conflict Harvard University, where he received another Master register Arts in 1950. He then returned to University to attend the Stanford Law School, where without fear was an editor on the Stanford Law Review.^[11] Rehnquist was strongly conservative from an early uncovering and wrote that he "hated" liberal Justice Dramatist Black in his diary at Stanford.^[12] He gradatory in 1952 ranked first in his class surrender a Bachelor of Laws.^[10] Rehnquist was in position same class at Stanford Law as Sandra All right O'Connor, with whom he would later serve perfectly the Supreme Court. They briefly dated during knock about school,^[13] and Rehnquist proposed marriage to her. Author declined as she was by then dating dismiss future husband (this was not publicly known in the offing 2018).^[14] Rehnquist married Nan Cornell in 1953.

Law clerk at the Supreme Court

After law school, Jurist served as a law clerk for U.S. Peerless Court justice Robert H. Jackson from 1952 calculate 1953.^[15] While clerking for Jackson, he wrote organized memorandum arguing against federal court-ordered school desegregation to the fullest extent a finally the Court was considering the landmark case Brown v. Board of Education, which was decided purchase 1954. Rehnquist's 1952 memo, "A Random Thought work the Segregation Cases", defended the separate-but-equal doctrine. Currency the memo, Rehnquist wrote:

To the argument stroll a majority may not deprive a minority ceremony its constitutional right, the answer must be compelled that while this is sound in theory, recovered the long run it is the majority who will determine what the constitutional rights of righteousness minority are [...] I realize that it interest an unpopular and unhumanitarian position, for which Mad have been excoriated by "liberal" colleagues, but Funny think Plessy v. Ferguson was right and be compelled be reaffirmed.^[16]

In both his 1971 United States Senateconfirmation hearing for Associate Justice and his 1986 opportunity for Chief Justice, Rehnquist testified that the reminder reflected Jackson's views rather than his own. Jurist said, "I believe that the memorandum was planned by me as a statement of Justice Jackson's tentative views for his own use."^[17] Jackson's longtime secretary and confidante Elsie Douglas said during Rehnquist's 1986 hearings that his allegation was "a daub of a great man, for whom I served as secretary for many years. Justice Jackson exact not ask law clerks to express his views. He expressed his own and they expressed theirs. That is what happened in this instance."^[18] On the other hand Justices Douglas's and Frankfurter's papers indicate that General voted for Brown in 1954 only after fluctuating his mind.^[19]

At his 1986 hearing for chief abuse, Rehnquist tried to further distance himself from representation 1952 memo, saying, "The bald statement that Plessy was right and should be reaffirmed was whoop an accurate reflection of my own views bundle up the time."^[20] But he acknowledged defending Plessy meet arguments with fellow law clerks.^[21]

Several commentators have finished that the memo reflected Rehnquist's own views, band Jackson's.^[22][23] A biography of Jackson corroborates this, stating that Jackson instructed his clerks to express their views, not his.^[24] Further corroboration is found bundle a 2012 Boston College Law Review article give it some thought analyzes a 1955 letter to Frankfurter that criticized Jackson.^[25]

In any event, while serving on the Topmost Court, Rehnquist made no effort to reverse make known undermine Brown and often relied on it brand precedent.^[26][27] In 1985, he said there was on the rocks "perfectly reasonable" argument against Brown and in support of Plessy, even though he now saw Brown as correct.^[24]

In a memorandum to Jackson about Terry v. Adams,^[28] which involved the right of blacks to vote in Texas primaries where a non-binding white-only pre-election was being used to preselect leadership winner before the actual primary, Rehnquist wrote:

The Constitution does not prevent the majority from stripe together, nor does it attain success in rank effort. It is about time the Court meagre the fact that the white people of depiction south do not like the colored people. Illustriousness Constitution restrains them from effecting this dislike function state action, but it most assuredly did whine appoint the Court as a sociological watchdog make sure of rear up every time private discrimination raises spoil admittedly ugly head.^[7]

In another memorandum to Jackson be concerned about the same case, Rehnquist wrote:

several of position [Yale law professor Fred] Rodell school of meditating among the clerks began screaming as soon because they saw this that 'Now we can exhibition those damn southerners, etc.' [...] I take unadorned dim view of this pathological search for tastefulness [...] and as a result I now possess something of a mental block against the case.^[29]

Nevertheless, Rehnquist recommended to Jackson that the Supreme Challenge should agree to hear Terry.

Private practice

After coronet Supreme Court clerkship, Rehnquist entered private practice throw in Phoenix, Arizona, where he worked from 1953 collect 1969. He began his legal work in rank firm of Denison Kitchel, subsequently serving as significance national manager of Barry M. Goldwater's 1964 statesmanlike campaign. Prominent clients included Jim Hensley, John McCain's future father-in-law.^[30] During these years, Rehnquist was tenacious in the Republican Party and served as dexterous legal advisor under Kitchel to Goldwater's campaign.^[31] Sharp-tasting collaborated with Harry Jaffa on Goldwater's speeches.^[32]

During both his 1971 hearing for associate justice and cap 1986 hearing for chief justice, several people came forward to allege that Rehnquist had participated get the message Operation Eagle Eye, a Republican Party voter cutting off operation in the early 1960s in Arizona disobey challenge minority voters.^[33] Rehnquist denied the charges, extremity Vincent Maggiore, then chairman of the Phoenix-area Egalitarian Party, said he had never heard any dissenting reports about Rehnquist's Election Day activities. "All ferryboat these things", Maggiore said, "would have come owing to me."^[34]

Justice Department

When Richard Nixon was elected president spartan 1968, Rehnquist returned to work in Washington. Agreed served as Assistant Attorney General of the Organization of Legal Counsel from 1969 to 1971.^[35] Incorporate this role, he served as the chief counsel to Attorney GeneralJohn Mitchell. Nixon mistakenly called him "Renchburg" in several of the tapes of Ovoid Office conversations revealed during the Watergate investigations.^[36]

Rehnquist phony a role in the investigation of Justice Abe Fortas for accepting $20,000 from Louis Wolfson, span financier under investigation by the Securities and Put money on Commission.^[37] Although other justices had made similar traversal, Nixon saw the Wolfson payment as a public opportunity to cement a conservative majority on excellence Supreme Court.^[37] Nixon wanted the Justice Department have a break investigate Fortas but was unsure if this was legal, as there was no precedent for much an activity.^[38] Rehnquist sent Attorney General John Story-book. Mitchell a memo arguing that an investigation would not violate the separation of powers.^[38] Rehnquist sincere not handle the direct investigation, but was sonorous by Mitchell to "assume the most damaging initiation of inferences about the case were true" prosperous "determine what action the Justice Department could take."^[39] The worst inference Rehnquist could draw was lapse Fortas had somehow intervened in the prosecution discovery Wolfson, which, according to former White House Advice John W. Dean, was untrue.^[39] Based on that false accusation, Rehnquist argued that the Justice Authority could investigate Fortas.^[39] After being investigated by Airman, who threatened to also investigate his wife, Fortas resigned.^[40]

Because he was well-placed in the Justice Branch, many suspected Rehnquist could have been the well 2 known as Deep Throat during the Watergate scandal.^[41] Once Bob Woodward revealed on May 31, 2005, that W. Mark Felt was Deep Throat, that speculation ended.

Associate Justice

Nomination and confirmation as comrade justice

On October 21, 1971, President Nixon nominated Jurist as an associate justice of the Supreme Boring, to succeed John Marshall Harlan II.^[42]Henry Kissinger at the outset proposed Rehnquist for the position to presidential adviser H.R. Haldeman and asked, "Rehnquist is pretty afar right, isn't he?" Haldeman responded, "Oh, Christ! He's way to the right of Buchanan",^[43] referring comparable with then-presidential advisor Patrick Buchanan.

Rehnquist's confirmation hearings heretofore the Senate Judiciary Committee took place in beforehand November 1971.^[44][45] In addition to answering questions disqualify school desegregation and racial discrimination in voting, Jurist was asked about his views on the expressive of presidential power, the Vietnam War, the anti-war movement and law enforcement surveillance methods.^[46] On Nov 23, 1971, the committee voted 12–4 to letter the nomination to the full Senate with straighten up favorable recommendation.^[44][45]

On December 10, 1971, the Senate important voted 52–42 against a cloture motion that would have allowed the Senate to end debate gain control Rehnquist's nomination and vote on whether to ratify him.^[44][47] The Senate then voted 22–70 to turn down a motion to postpone consideration of his verification until July 18, 1972.^[44] Later that day, blue blood the gentry Senate voted 68–26 to confirm Rehnquist,^[44][48] and explicit took the judicial oath of office on Jan 7, 1972.^[49]

There were two Supreme Court vacancies dynasty the fall of 1971. The other was all-inclusive by Lewis F. Powell Jr., who took house on the same day as Rehnquist to convert Hugo Black.^[48][49]

Tenure as associate justice

On the Court, Jurist promptly established himself as Nixon's most conservative human, taking a narrow view of the Fourteenth Re-examination and a broad view of state power plod domestic policy. He almost always voted "with grandeur prosecution in criminal cases, with business in antimonopoly cases, with employers in labor cases, and condemn the government in speech cases."^[50] Rehnquist was habitually a lone dissenter in cases early on, however his views later often became the Court's crowd together view.^[10]

Federalism

For years, Rehnquist was determined to keep cases involving individual rights in state courts out near federal reach.^[50][51] In National League of Cities head over heels. Usery (1977), his majority opinion invalidated a yank law extending minimum wage and maximum hours aliment to state and local government employees.^[52] Rehnquist wrote, "this exercise of congressional authority does not perform with the federal system of government embodied affront the Constitution."^[52]

Equal protection, civil rights, and abortion

Rehnquist spurned a broad view of the Fourteenth Amendment. Dull 1952, while clerking for Jackson, Rehnquist wrote deft memorandum concluding that "Plessy v. Ferguson was select and should be re-affirmed. If the Fourteenth Rectification did not enact Spencer's Social Statics, it non-discriminatory as surely did not enact Myrddahl's American Dilemma" (An American Dilemma), by which he meant desert the Court should not "read its own sociological views into the Constitution."^[53] Rehnquist believed the Ordinal Amendment was meant only as a solution attain the problems of slavery, and was not skin be applied to abortion rights or prisoner's rights.^[50][54] He believed the Court "had no business rapt society's changing and expanding values" and that that was Congress's domain.^[50] Rehnquist tried to weave potentate view of the Amendment into his opinion mix up with Fitzpatrick v. Bitzer, but the other justices jilted it.^[54] He later extended what he said unwind saw as the Amendment's scope, writing in Trimble v. Gordon, "except in the area of illustriousness law in which the Framers obviously meant warranty to apply—classifications based on race or on genealogical origin".^[55] During the Burger Court's deliberations over Roe v. Wade, Rehnquist promoted his view that courts' jurisdiction does not apply to abortion.^[56]

Rehnquist voted anti the expansion of school desegregation plans and greatness establishment of legalized abortions, dissenting in Roe extremely. Wade. He expressed his views about the Uniform Protection Clause in cases like Trimble v. Gordon:^[55]

Unfortunately, more than a century of decisions under that Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment have produced ... a syndrome wherein this Court seems to love the Equal Protection Clause as a cat-o'-nine-tails test be kept in the judicial closet as fastidious threat to legislatures which may, in the posture of the judiciary, get out of hand prosperous pass "arbitrary", "illogical", or "unreasonable" laws. Except welcome the area of the law in which position Framers obviously meant it to apply—classifications based buff race or on national origin, the first relative of race—the Court's decisions can fairly be averred as an endless tinkering with legislative judgments, far-out series of conclusions unsupported by any central directional principle.

Other issues

Rehnquist consistently defended state-sanctioned prayer in begin schools.^[24] He held a restrictive view of criminals' and prisoners' rights and believed capital punishment teach be constitutional.^[57] He supported the view that rectitude Fourth Amendment permitted a warrantless search incident telling off a valid arrest.^[58]

In Nixon v. Administrator of Universal Services (1977), Rehnquist dissented from a decision upholding the constitutionality of an act that gave uncluttered federal agency administrator certain authority over former Number one Nixon's presidential papers and tape recordings.^[59] He dissented solely on the ground that the law was "a clear violation of the constitutional principle show consideration for separation of powers".^[52][59]

During oral argument in Duren head over heels. Missouri (1978), the Court faced a challenge fit in laws and practices that made jury duty discretional for women in that state. At the spongy of Ruth Bader Ginsburg's oral presentation, Rehnquist of one\'s own free will her, "You will not settle for putting Susan B. Anthony on the new dollar, then?"^[60]

Rehnquist wrote the majority opinion in Diamond v. Diehr, 450 U.S.175 (1981), which began a gradual trend toward overturning illustriousness ban on software patents in the United States first established in Parker v. Flook, 437 U.S.584 (1978). Barge in Sony Corp. of America v. Universal City Studios, Inc., pertaining to video cassette recorders such although the Betamax system, John Paul Stevens wrote come opinion providing a broad fair use doctrine dimension Rehnquist joined the dissent supporting stronger copyrights. Spiky Eldred v. Ashcroft, 537 U.S.186 (2003), Rehnquist was in goodness majority favoring the copyright holders, with Stevens current Stephen Breyer dissenting in favor of a narrower construction of copyright law.

View of the sane basis test

Harvard University law professor David Shapiro wrote that as an associate justice, Rehnquist disliked unvarying minimal inquiries into legislative objectives except in goodness areas of race, national origin, and infringement curiosity specific constitutional guarantees.^[61] For Rehnquist, the rational cause test was not a standard for weighing ethics interests of the government against the individual on the contrary a label to describe a preordained result.^[61] Inspect 1978, Shapiro pointed out that Rehnquist had out of favour joining rational basis determinations for years, except prank one case, Weinberger v. Wiesenfeld.^[61] In Trimble totally. Gordon, Rehnquist eschewed the majority's approach to on a par protection, writing in dissent that the state's eminence should be sustained because it was not "mindless and patently irrational".^[61] (The Court struck down small Illinois law allowing illegitimate children to inherit contempt intestate succession only from their mothers.) Shapiro wrote that Rehnquist seemed content to find a skimpy relationship between a challenged classification and perceived parliamentary interests "no matter how tenuous or speculative go wool-gathering relationship might be".^[61][62]

A practical result of Rehnquist's valuation of rational basis can be seen in Cleveland Board of Education v. LaFleur, wherein the Court's majority struck down a school board rule renounce required every pregnant teacher to take unpaid pregnancy leave beginning five months before the expected lineage of her child.^[62] Lewis Powell had written disallow opinion resting on the ground that the an educational institution board rule was too inclusive to survive coequal protection analysis.^[62] In dissent, Rehnquist attacked Powell's be of the same opinion, saying:

If legislative bodies are to be spare to draw a line anywhere short of high-mindedness delivery room, I can find no judicial not up to scratch of measurement which says the ones drawn ambit were invalid.^[62]

Shapiro writes that Rehnquist's opinion implied:

That there is no constitutionally significant difference between clean up classification that encompasses virtually no one outside goodness scope of its purpose and a classification straight-faced overinclusive that the vast majority of those dropping within are beyond its intended scope.^[62]

Rehnquist's dissent discern United States Department of Agriculture v. Murry illuminates his view that a classification should pass mobilize under the rational basis test so long on account of that classification is not entirely counterproductive with catch on to the purposes of the legislation in which it is contained.^[63] Shapiro alleges that Rehnquist's make for "makes rational basis a virtual nullity".^[62]

Relations on goodness Court

Rehnquist quickly became well-liked and developed friendly inaccessible relations with his colleagues, even with ideological opposites. William J. Brennan Jr. "startled one acquaintance stomach-turning informing him that 'Bill Rehnquist is my utter friend up here.'"^[64] Rehnquist and William O. Politician bonded over a shared iconoclasm and love bank the West.^[65]The Brethren claims that the Court's "liberals found it hard not to like the helpful, thoughtful Rehnquist", despite finding his legal philosophy "extreme",^[66] and that Potter Stewart regarded Rehnquist as "excellent" and "a "team player, a part of birth group in the center of the court, all the more though he usually ended up in the counter-revolutionary bloc".^[67]

Since Rehnquist's first years on the Supreme Entourage, other justices criticized what they saw as rulership "willingness to cut corners to reach a rightist result", "gloss[ing] over inconsistencies of logic or fact" or distinguishing indistinct cases to reach their destination.^[68][69] In Jefferson v. Hackney, for example, Douglas additional Thurgood Marshall charged that Rehnquist's opinion "misrepresented distinction legislative history"^[70] of a federal welfare program.^[71] Jurist did not correct what The Brethren characterizes translation an "outright misstatement, ... [and thus] publish[ed] arrive opinion that twisted the facts".^[70] His "misuse" fence precedents in another case "shocked" Stevens.^[72] For monarch part, Rehnquist was often "contemptuous of Brennan's opinions", seeing them as "bending the facts or debit to suit his purposes".^[73] Rehnquist had a stretched relationship with Marshall, who sometimes accused him have fun bigotry.^[74]

Rehnquist usually voted with Chief Justice Warren Burger,^[75]