Today in Supreme Court History: September 5, 1922

9/5/1922: Justice George Sutherland takes the oath.

Justice George Sutherland

Comments

[Dan Schiavetta]

Moore v. Brown, 448 U.S. 1335 (decided September 5, 1980): Rehnquist refuses to stay injunction requiring Mobile, Alabama school board to be elected by district (instead of traditional at-large); at-large system was not facially discriminatory because it was instituted in 1826, and District Court erroneously pointed to the effect of excluding blacks, as opposed to the intent, but the parties had agreed to hold district election for now and can return to at-large later if appeal succeeds (the Court ended up agreeing with Rehnquist via a companion case, 446 U.S. 55, 1980)

[Martinned2]

That went well... (discussing whether an Indian Sikh was white for the purposes of immigration law).

The eligibility of this applicant for citizenship is based on the sole fact that he is of high caste Hindu stock, born in village Taragarh Talawa, Amritsar district, Punjab, one of the extreme north western districts of India, and classified by certain scientific authorities as of the Caucasian or Aryan race ... In the Punjab and Rajputana, while the invaders seem to have met with more success in the effort to preserve their racial purity, intermarriages did occur producing an intermingling of the two and destroying to a greater or less degree the purity of the "Aryan" blood. The rules of caste, while calculated to prevent this intermixture, seem not to have been entirely successful ... the given group cannot be properly assigned to any of the enumerated grand racial divisions. The type may have been so changed by intermixture of blood as to justify an intermediate classification. Something very like this has actually taken place in India. Thus, in Hindustan and Berar there was such an intermixture of the "Aryan" invader with the dark-skinned Dravidian.

[SRG2]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Bhagat_Singh_Thind

"Quaint" ideas on race sadly in evidence here...

[SMP0328]

Sounds like an opinion you would get from a German court a decade or two later.

[Martinned2]

The irony of the Americans insisting on segregated pubs in England while fighting the Nazi's isn't lost on the rest of us...

https://www.iwm.org.uk/history/they-treated-us-royally-the-experiences-of-black-americans-in-britain-during-the-second-world-war

(And similarly the difficulties the French had of finding a purely white regiment to symbolically liberate Paris. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/7984436.stm)

[Dan Schiavetta]

A whole chapter is devoted to this in "London at War" by Philip Ziegler, as well as outrage over black servicemen dating (white) English girls.

Eisenhower also mentions the objection of Southern servicemen to integrated restaurants in his 1948 book, "Crusade in Europe". With his typical tact he carefully does not condemn their attitudes nor does he mention doing anything about them.

[SRG2]

More detail on one famous (i.e., largely unknown) event: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Bamber_Bridge

[JoeFromtheBronx]

There are two oaths though sometimes judges take a combined one. There is a judicial and constitutional oath. Every time he says “the” oath, it annoys me just a tad.

Furthermore, he was confirmed OTD. The Supreme Court website notes that the judicial oath was taken on 10/2/22.

As the Sutherland Institute website notes:

In September 1922, George Sutherland was in London, England awaiting a ship back to America after representing the United States in an arbitration with Norway during six weeks of arguments at The Hague, Netherlands

https://sutherlandinstitute.org/george-sutherlands-judicial-confirmation/

Of the “Four Horsemen,” Sutherland was the most influential and respected overall. He also was a supporter of women’s suffrage, citing it as evidence that women’s equality was reached to the degree there was no need for a special minimum wage law for women [Adkins v. Children’s Hospital].

Since I referenced the Pierce Butler nomination in a recent entry, this is also notable (Manton was another possibility):

Following his retirement, Sutherland sat by special designation as a member of the Second Circuit panel that reviewed the bribery conviction of former Second Circuit Chief Judge Martin Manton, and authored the court’s opinion upholding the conviction.

(Wikipedia)

[Mark Regan]

At least Justice Sutherland was willing to give concept approval to federal grant-in-aid programs [Sheppard-Towner, in Massachusetts v. Mellon; old-age assistance, in his Steward Machine dissent] and to Social Security retirement pensions [Helvering v. Davis].

That puts him and Justice Van Devanter, who joined him in Steward Machine and Helvering v. Davis, well to the pro-Government side of Justice Thomas.