Benjamin N. Cardozo

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Benjamin N. Cardozo

Benjamin Nathan Cardozo (born May 24, 1870 in New York City , † July 9, 1938 in Port Chester , New York ) was an American lawyer who was last judge at the US Supreme Court.

Life

Origin and education

From a group consisting Portugal immigrant family of Sephardic Jews originating Cardozo began after the school in 1889 to study law at the Law School of Columbia University and became a member of the fraternity Phi Delta Phi . After being admitted to the bar, he worked as a lawyer and was also involved in the Zionist organization in the USA.

Practice at the New York Court of Appeals

In 1913 he was appointed judge of the New York Supreme Court and then in 1914 to the New York Court of Appeals called the for the State competent New York Court of Appeals . His first secretary was Charles Evans Hughes Jr. , who later became a US Solicitor General , between 1914 and 1916 . Cardozo was ultimately President of the New York Court of Appeal ( Chief Judge ) from 1927 to 1932 . During this time in 1928 the fundamental judgment he wrote in the Palsgraf v. Long Island RR on New York Public Transportation Liability and Liability for Compensation .

In addition, Cardozo, who also wrote numerous legal books , was Vice President of the American Law Institute from 1923 to 1932 .

Judge at the Supreme Court of the United States

Cardozo during his tenure as a US Supreme Court judge

On March 14, 1932, he was appointed an associate judge at the US Supreme Court by US President Herbert Hoover . He succeeded Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. and held the office of associate justice until his death from a stroke after suffering a myocardial infarction in 1937 . In the years that followed, his legal views had a decisive influence on opinion-making and thus the jurisprudence of the US Supreme Court, for example on social security . In 1933 Cardozo was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences .

During his tenure on the Supreme Court, he worked on important decisions such as Nixon v. Condon (1932), Welch v. Helvering (1933), Panama Refining Co. v. Ryan (1935), Schechter Poultry Corp. v. United States (1935), Carter v. Carter Coal Company (1936), Steward Machine Company v. Davis (1937), Helvering v. Davis (1937) and Palko v. Connecticut (1937) with.

Together with Judges Louis Brandeis and Harlan Fiske Stone , he formed the liberal wing of the Supreme Court between 1932 and 1937 . The judges, known as the "Three Musketeers", supported the New Deal policy initiated by President Franklin D. Roosevelt with their opinions .

On the other hand, however, they faced the four conservative judges (the so-called " Four Horsemen ") James C. McReynolds , George Sutherland , Pierce Butler and Willis Van Devanter . Because of the neutral then Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes and the judge Owen Roberts , there were often different majorities.

McReynolds' aversion to Cardozo went far beyond legal disagreements: Before Cardozo was appointed judge, McReynolds asked President Hoover, along with Judges Butler and Van Devanter, in 1932 not to plague the Supreme Court with “a second Jew”. During the swearing-in ceremony, he deliberately read a daily newspaper. According to the information provided by his biographer John Frush Knox, who was his court assistant from 1936 to 1937, he did not exchange a word with Cardozo. He even stayed away from the funeral service for Cardozo, who died in 1938, as well as the swearing-in of Cardozo's Jewish successor Felix Frankfurter .

After his death he was buried in the Beth Olom Cemetery in Queens . The Benjamin N. Cardozo Law School of Yeshiva University and the Benjamin N. Cardozo High School in New York City were named in his honor.

Publications

  • The Jurisdiction of the Court of Appeals of the state of New York , 1903
  • The nature of the judicial process , 1921
  • The growth of the law , 1924
  • The paradoxes of legal science , 1928
  • What medicine can do for law , 1930
  • Law and literature and other essays and addresses , 1931
  • John G. Milburn by Benjamin , 1931
  • Law is justice , 1938
  • Selected Writings of Benjamin N Cardozo , 1947

Background literature

  • Joseph P. Pollard: Mr. Justice Cardozo , 1935
  • Irving Lehman: Benjamin Nathan Cardozo , 1938
  • George Rossiter Farnum: Benjamin N. Cardozolights and shadows , 1938
  • Beryl Harold Levy: Cardozo and frontiers of legal thinking , 1938
  • Moses Judah Aronson: Cardozo's doctrine of sociological jurisprudence , 1938
  • George Sidney Hellman: Benjamin N. Cardozo, American Judge , 1940
  • Irving Lehman: The influence of Judge Cardozo on the common law , 1942
  • Miriam Theresa Rooney: Mr. Justice Cardozo's relativism , 1945
  • Joseph P. Pollard: Mr. Justice Cardozo; a liberal mind in action , 1970
  • William C. Cunningham: Cardozo's theory of judicial decisions, opinions and off-the-bench writings 1914-1932 , 1972
  • Richard A. Posner: Cardozo: A Study in Reputation , 1990
  • Andrew L. Kaufman: Cardozo , 1998

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Palsgraf v. Long Island RR
  2. ^ Homepage of Social Security
  3. ^ Homepage of Yeshiva University
  4. ^ Homepage of the Benjamin N. Cardozo High School
personal data
SURNAME Cardozo, Benjamin N.
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Cardozo, Benjamin Nathan
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American lawyer
DATE OF BIRTH May 24, 1870
PLACE OF BIRTH New York City
DATE OF DEATH July 9, 1938
Place of death Port Chester , New York