Today in Supreme Court History: November 23, 1804

11/23/1804: President Franklin Pierce's birthday. He would appoint Justice John Archibald Campbell to the Supreme Court.

President Pierce appointed Justice Campbell to the Supreme Court

Comments

[RoyMo]

Man gave up his seat on court to serve the CSA

[JoeFromtheBronx]

Afterward, he went back to the Supreme Court, now as an advocate. He was one of the lawyers in the Slaughterhouse Cases.

Campbell strongly opposed the Reconstruction Amendments, but a lawyer works with the material at hand. He argued the 13A & 14A protected the butchers in their case against some regulation.

[Syd Henderson]

Which actually puts him on the side of the good guys for once. Or was he an errand boy sent by butchers.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

He did not support racial equality and used the amendments against public welfare regulations in a way that in the long term blocked benign regulations of the economy. His support of "good guys" was somewhat limited.

[Alpheus W Drinkwater]

A fascinating but brief role played by Justice Campbell was his role as go-between from the early delegates sent by the Confederacy and Secretary of State Seward and other members of Lincoln's cabinet. None of them could officially meet with the delegates, of course, since there was no recognition of the Confederacy as legitimate. Shortly after this, Justice Campbell resigned his seat.

[Dan Schiavetta]

Pierce might have been a bad President, but he had such horrible personal tragedies happen to him that I'm surprised he could even get out of bed in the morning.

[Malika]

Three children dying young, the other one dying later in a train wreck and a wife suffering from severe depression, yes.

[Frank Drackman]

If he had a son who died in Iraq he’d be up there with Sleepy Joe!

[Dan Schiavetta]

Well, that didn’t last long. Muted.

[Dan Schiavetta]

Arnold Tours v. Camp, 400 U.S. 45 (decided November 23, 1970): travel agencies had standing to contest Comptroller of Currency’s authority to issue rule allowing national banks to get into the travel agency business (travel agencies won, 472 F.2d 427)

Bohlen v. Arthurs, 115 U.S. 482 (decided November 23, 1885): tenant could not cut timber and sell it without consent of co-tenant; co-tenant was allowed to seize timber (diversity action)

Beck v. Ohio, 379 U.S. 89 (decided November 23, 1964): police could not arrest man with a history of gambling convictions without a more specific showing of probable cause or warrant (upon searching his person they found “clearing house strips” indicating he was running a numbers racket, possession of which was illegal under Ohio statute)

[Malika]

captain? What's with the new handle?

[Dan Schiavetta]

As of Tuesday I’ve decided to use my real name. Hi!

[Frank Drackman]

That’s weird how peoples don’t use their real names

[JoeFromtheBronx]

On 11/23/2022, a stay of execution/cert request was denied for Kevin Johnson, later executed for murder of a police officer. See the link below for possible special circumstances.

https://verdict.justia.com/2022/11/28/the-defense-and-a-special-prosecutor-agree-about-unfairness-in-a-missouri-capital-case

One grounds of the appeal was that he was under 21, particularly that he was significantly mentally impaired. Racial bias was also alleged. His teenager daughter was not allowed to view his execution because she was under 21.

Justice Jackson (with Sotomayor) released a dissent a day after the execution.

https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/22pdf/22a463_o759.pdf

[Noscitur a sociis]

Bad faith actors gonna act in bad faith.

[Malika]

The daughter wasn't allowed because she was under 21? In 2022?

[Malika]

In reading about his personal tragedies on Wiki I came across this:

"He was also frustrated with the "religious bigotry" of abolitionists, who cast their political opponents as sinners.[35] "I consider slavery a social and political evil," Pierce said, "and most sincerely wish that it had no existence upon the face of the earth."[36]"

The idea that you find something to be a social and political evil but *don't* think those who practice it should be considered sinners seems odd. I mean, you could "hate the sin but not the sinner" but how could you consider it evil but not think those engaged in it and supporting it were anything but sinners?

[Dan Schiavetta]

Slavery was a way of life. The plantation owners were born and raised into a successful and lucrative system, where they lived a life of comfort and privilege, and where freeing their slaves would have meant going bust, losing the plantation, and leaving their families destitute. It was an evil system but I don’t think that makes the planters necessarily bad people. As for any hardship to the slaves, they were insulated from that — whippings were delegated to the foremen.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Compare it to the North -- 50% of telephone linemen died on the job from electrocution, coupling train cars before automatic couplers was frightfully dangerous, as was industrial work.

Slaves had financial value -- employees didn't so there wasn't a concern about them dying.

[Sarcastr0]

50% of telephone linemen died on the job from electrocution

Pre abolition telephones!
And one of those unsourced numbers that only Ed can provide because Ed never lies.

[Noscitur a sociis]

Guess we can go ahead and add slavery to the list of things Dr. Ed supports, along with rape, murder of women, and genocide.

[Frank Drackman]

It’s just a quaint Southern tradition like Mint Juleps and Incest

[Krayt]

"Slavery wasn't so bad, see this other shitty situation over here!"

[Stupid Government Tricks]

And it had been the way of the world for thousands of years, and was still the way of much of the world at the time.

[Sarcastr0]

So?

[bernard11]

It was an evil system but I don’t think that makes the planters necessarily bad people.

What would it have taken for you to consider them bad people?

Not only were the slaves forced, uncompensated, laborers, they could be assaulted, raped, killed, separated from their families, all on the whim of that nice gentleman in the big house. It was forbidden for them to be educated, even to learn to read and write.

Slavery was also destructive to the southern economy in general. Free labor discourages capital investment, industrialization, etc., and it also held down wages, so it hurt the non-slave-holding free population as well.

Without slavery the economy would have become more diversified, and healthier.

[Dan Schiavetta]

Robert Fogel won a Nobel Prize for demonstrating that yes, slavery was an efficient and profitable system. It got even more so in the years leading up to the Civil War. Free enterprise, without strict governmental protection of human rights, is heartless, cruel.

[bernard11]

Dan,

Don't know where you got this, but there are more than a few flaws in your statement.

First, he showed that slavery was profitable and efficient for slaveholders, not that it was economically efficient for the southern economy as a whole. Big difference.

Second, and I'm going from Wikipedia here, but probably no worse than your sources,

In 1989 Fogel published Without Consent or Contract The Rise and Fall of American Slavery as a response to criticism stemming from what some perceived as the cold and calculating conclusions found in his earlier work, Time on the Cross.

In it he very clearly spells out a moral indictment of slavery when he references things such as the high infant mortality rate from overworked pregnant women, and the cruel slave hierarchies established by their masters.

He ... he analyzed a mountain of evidence pertaining to the lives of slaves, but he focuses much more on the social aspects versus economics this time. He both illustrates how incredibly hard and life-threatening the work of a slave was,

That slavery was profitable for the slaveholder is hardly an astonishing insight. Free labor does tend to reduce costs. But that was not what I was addressing. Instead, I maintain that, in the long run, slavery was a serious impediment to the growth of the southern economy.

[David Nieporent]

Slavery was a way of life.

Not for Pierce! He was from NH! He didn't even have that flimsy excuse of the southerners.

It was an evil system but I don’t think that makes the planters necessarily bad people.

We disagree. This isn't mere presentism; the arguments for the evil of slavery were well known at the time. Hell, many slaveholders went with, "Yeah, it's evil, but…"

[Dan Schiavetta]

I don’t think any plantation owners voluntarily freed their slaves. Why not? For the reason I gave above. Few people, today or then, would sacrifice so much for doing the right thing.

[Syd Henderson]

I think Martha Washington did. George had arranged for them to be freed after her death, but that put her in an awkward position.

Benjamin Franklin owned several household slaves, but eventually freed all but a couple of elderly slaves. He did take a couple of slaves back who had trouble living as freedmen. I always thought that surprising since he was pretty much an abolitionist by the time he died.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

People thought abolitionists were extremists who didn't realize their push for immediate (or much more immediate) abolition of slavery would cause many societal problems. The abolitionist opponents often said they realized slavery was bad but the current continuance of slavery was a necessary evil. Take that as you like.

The judgment of "sinners" is a complicated affair. On some level, people thought all humans were sinners. How much opponents of the end of something bad are "sinners" is a complex matter, especially if it is not very easy to end the practice.

For instance, the modern criminal justice system is quite problematic, including some quite shameful aspects. People who do not support systematic changes are often willing to agree with that to some degree. Are they sinners? I will let others decide.

[bernard11]

their push for immediate (or much more immediate) abolition of slavery would cause many societal problems.

What problems? The loss of free labor would have meant the planters had to pay market wages to get their cotton planted and picked. Probably some planters would have gone out of business, but that just means that, for them, cotton was never really a profitable enterprise, in the sense of being the best use of resources. So maybe they would have done something else - planted other crops, gone into some non-agricultural business, who knows.

And yes, the transition would be painful (though not if they hadn't started down the slavery road to begin with) but things would have settled down.

Would the transition have been worse than the "transition" of 1861-65?

[David Nieporent]

And yes, the transition would be painful (though not if they hadn’t started down the slavery road to begin with) but things would have settled down.

I'm not even willing to grant them transition costs, given that they even rejected compensated emancipation.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

I did not say their conclusions were correct.

It was however what they believed — including Abraham Lincoln, who was not an abolitionist until the middle of the Civil War. He thought slavery might linger on for decades.

A basic concern was racial divisions, including fears of racial violence. Yes, this in large part was based on racism.

They also thought that slaves were not ready for freedom. Again, there was a chunk of racism there, but it would have taken a significant amount of work to smooth the way. This would have required social and governmental efforts seen as largely foreign to many people in the thinly governed slave South.

You grant “pain” which is easy for us to say at this distance. And, yes, the horrors of the Civil War suggest why they would fear change. Even a fraction of the horrors would be scary.

The antebellum U.S. was a conservative, small-government, and racist society. A big change regarding the economy/property rights & race relations was scary. It was very threatening.

Small-scale gradual emancipation took place in places like PA and NY over an extended period. Abolitionists would have even felt that questionably slow. Trying to end slavery quickly in slave states like South Carolina or Virginia would at best take even longer, logically.

And, yes, since compensated extended emancipation was also opposed even in small quantities like D.C., the anti-abolitionists often were speaking from bad faith. People like Jefferson ultimately put off freedom into the distant future. It became untenable.

[bernard11]

They also thought that slaves were not ready for freedom.

It's not clear to me what this means. What exactly were they not ready for? Most (hypothetically) freed slaves would likely have become agricultural workers, but with much greater rights, and money wages. I suspect they were ready for that.

Would they have been poor money managers? Maybe, but I doubt there were many Rothschilds among southern whites either. And don't forget that much of this alleged deficiency would have been attributable to laws prohibiting even minimal education for slaves.

If you argue that slavery is wrong, but the slaves are not ready for freedom, then you either have a plan to make them ready, or you are simply making excuses.

[David Nieporent]

It’s not clear to me what this means.

It means that they viewed slaves as little more than children. Just as the vast majority of people today wouldn't think their 14-year old kids are ready to live on their own and support themselves. (Of course, this may have been motivated reasoning in the case of slaveholders.)

[bernard11]

Of course, parents generally try to educate their children, and prepare them to live on their own and support themselves.

This is notably absent in the treatment of slaves, who were blocked from education. And, while most slaves were agricultural workers there were a fair number who had other marketable skills - carpentry, blacksmithing, etc. and were, with just a bit of help at the start, capable of earning an independent living.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

If you argue that slavery is wrong, but the slaves are not ready for freedom, then you either have a plan to make them ready, or you are simply making excuses.

I explained how they acted with some bad faith, especially in my final comment about Jefferson. New York and Pennsylvania provided an alternative path. Gradual emancipation. Abolitionism, however, had a more immediate feel even to that.

What exactly were they not ready for?

Slaves would not all become agricultural workers. They would become a range of things like free people in general. They would also become citizens and members of society.

Today, people prepare to become full members of society by an extended period of education while being supported by parents. Slaves were seen as perennial children. As I said, racism polluted the anti-abolitionist movement to a significant degree.

Decolonization in Africa shows the complexities of preparing a people for self-government. Without racism, the move from slavery to a free interracial society would have required an extended effort that the society and government at the time, especially one polluted by racism, had trouble doing.

We saw that with the limits of Reconstruction. Slavery ended but blacks remained second-class citizens.

[F.D. Wolf]

President Pierce ran for re-nomination in 1856, but finished second at the Democratic convention to James Buchanan, who would go on to win the general election. The third major candidate at the convention, Stephen Douglas, threw his support to Buchanan with the at-least tacit understanding that Buchanan would serve only one term, and that Douglas would be the nominee in 1860, which is exactly how things would transpire.

Several Democrats attempted to convince Pierce to run in 1860 and again in 1864, but he was not interested. Pierce remains the only incumbent president to have actively sought re-election to be denied re-nomination by his party.

[Dan Schiavetta]

By that time his wife had died and he was drinking himself to death. We should all be grateful our lives have been luckier than his.

[F.D. Wolf]

Pierce definitely had more than his fair share of tragedy in his life, which I do not minimize, but he was clearly an alcoholic, and I daresay his drinking caused a lot of his problems and exacerbated others. His drinking caused him miseries, which caused him to drink more, which caused him more miseries, which caused him to drink more... It is the doom cycle the alcoholic is trapped in.