Today in Supreme Court History: July 26, 1892

7/26/1892: Justice George Shiras Jr. takes oath.

Justice George Shiras

Comments

[Malika the Maiz]

Looks like Shiras was able to avoid serving in the Civil War (bone spurs, no doubt) and was politically connected (cousin to perennial GOP Presidential wannabe James Blaine who recommended him for the nomination, meritocracy!). Also, he had a Liberty ship named after him.

[Supremacy Claus]

Justice be trippin', hallucinatin'. This continues today. We have a DEI Justice still trippin'. She cannot define the word, woman, not being a biologist. She did not know this lawyer reply. 135 times the Supreme Court ruled the definition of a word is the dictionary definition, namely, an adult human female. Every self stated goal of every one of the 200 law subjects is in utter failure. This toxic profession must be cancelled to save our nation. They allow devastating wars. They allow a billion crimes. Every other law subject stinks. These scumbags took the brilliant mind of Eugene Volokh and made him a dummy, a wasted life. Imagine the $billions of value he would have added to the economy in tech or in other reality based field. Now he is a toxic indoctrinator of hundreds of intelligent and ethical students.

Here is the reasoned, pablum review of ChatGPT.
Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) is one of the most criticized decisions in U.S. Supreme Court history. The Court upheld the constitutionality of racial segregation under the doctrine of "separate but equal." Here are major criticisms, both historical and legal:

1. Legal Criticisms
a. Misinterpretation of the 14th Amendment
The Court held that segregation did not violate the Equal Protection Clause as long as facilities were "equal." Critics argue this interpretation gutted the Amendment’s purpose, which was to ensure full legal equality for formerly enslaved Black Americans.

Justice Harlan’s lone dissent correctly predicted that the ruling would legitimize inequality and that “our Constitution is color-blind.”

b. Fiction of “Separate but Equal”
In practice, segregated facilities were rarely equal. Black Americans were systematically denied access to comparable education, transportation, public services, and accommodations.

The doctrine provided legal cover for Jim Crow laws throughout the South, entrenching second-class citizenship for African Americans.

2. Social and Ethical Criticisms
a. Institutionalization of Racism
Plessy gave legal legitimacy to state-sponsored racism, embedding white supremacy into the fabric of American law and society.

It allowed governments to codify racial hierarchy, under the pretense of neutrality.

b. Psychological Harm
Segregation sent a message of inferiority to Black citizens, especially children—a fact later acknowledged in Brown v. Board of Education (1954), which overturned Plessy.

Studies cited in Brown (like the famous “doll tests”) showed the psychological damage segregation caused to Black children.

3. Political and Structural Consequences
a. Undermining Civil Rights Progress
Plessy stalled the civil rights movement for nearly 60 years, until Brown v. Board began to roll it back.

It emboldened states to pass further discriminatory laws, expanding systemic racism across housing, voting, policing, and employment.

b. Erosion of Federal Oversight
The decision reflected and reinforced the Court’s deference to states’ rights over civil rights, weakening the federal role in protecting minority liberties.

4. Legacy and Modern Critique
Almost universally condemned today by scholars, courts, and civil rights activists.

Frequently cited as a cautionary tale about the Supreme Court’s failure to protect constitutional rights in the face of majoritarian prejudice.

Alongside Dred Scott v. Sandford and Korematsu v. United States, Plessy is often used as an example of how the Court can go disastrously wrong.

Summary
Plessy v. Ferguson was a constitutional, moral, and social failure. It elevated a legal fiction—“separate but equal”—to justify a reality of brutal inequality, emboldening systemic racism for decades. It is now remembered as one of the worst Supreme Court decisions in American history.

[Stupid Government Tricks]

Ya know ... well, probably not, or I wouldn't have to tell you ... but the more diarrhea you spew, the less likely people are to read any of it.

Keep it short and simple.

[Supremacy Claus]

Hi, Stupid. Thank you for the advice. Do you have any substantive argument?

[Supremacy Claus]

These decisions are sworn statements. It is appropriate to arrest the Justices for criminal perjury. Try them for legal provably fictitious statements. Assess all legal costs to their personal assets, since perjury is not part of the job description. Put them in gen pop.

[David Nieporent]

These decisions are sworn statements.

They are not. Why are you so stupid?

[JoeFromtheBronx]

One account I found noted that his brothers did fight in the war.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

Shiras declared his intention to serve for ten years and did retire after doing so. He lived for over twenty more years.

There is some debate over his vote in the Income Tax Cases. Some historians argue he switched his vote to the 5-4 majority.

His son of the same name was a U.S. Representative from the state of Pennsylvania and nature photographer who pioneered the use of nighttime flash photography.

Shiras wrote Wong Wing v. U.S., noting:

Applying this reasoning to the Fifth and Sixth Amendments, it must be concluded that all persons within the territory of the United States are entitled to the protection guarantied by those amendments, and that even aliens shall not be held to answer for a capital or other infamous crime unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

He wrote 259 majority opinions in 11 years.

He did have some help (Wikipedia cites one of his law clerks), but justices didn't have multiple law clerks back then as they do now.

https://www.historycentral.com/Bio/rec/GeorgeShiras.html

An interesting short account of the Income Tax Cases dispute that can be found online is "The Case of the “Vacillating Jurist”: Pittsburgh's George Shiras, Jr. and the Income Tax Case of 1895." Sounds like a Perry Mason episode.

[F.D. Wolf]

As Joe notes, there is some debate as to whether Justice Shiras flipped his vote in Pollock v. Farmers’ Loan & Trust Co., 157 U.S. 429, on rehearing, 158 U.S. 601 (1895), in which a 5-4 Court held the income tax was unconstitutional.

The case was initially heard in front of just eight justices, Justice Howell E. Jackson being gravely ill at home. In a 6-2 decision, per Chief Justice Fuller, the Court struck down certain provisions of the Revenue Act of 1894. As to the overall validity of the income tax, Fuller wrote, "the Justices who heard the argument are equally divided, and, therefore, no opinion is expressed."

A rehearing was ordered. This time a 5-4 Court declared the income tax unconstitutional. Justice Jackson (who would be dead in four months) had essentially crawled out of his deathbed to vote to uphold the Act. So, simple mathematics suggests someone changed his vote. But who?

The media blamed Shiras, so the public blamed Shiras. (As the decision was very unpopular with the public, Shiras became very unpopular with the public.) In the biography of Shiras begun by his son and completed by his nephew, the authors devoted several pages to the issue, arguing that Shiras had not changed his vote. George Shiras III & Winfield Shiras, Justice George Shiras, Jr., of Pittsburgh (1953). They point to sources suggesting the real vote switcher was either Justice Horace Gray or David Brewer. Willard L. King, in his Melville Weston Fuller: Chief Justice of the United States, 1888-1910 (1930), suggests the possibility that, in fact, no justice switched his vote, and that the disagreement at the first hearing was not over whether the income tax was unconstitutional, but as to exactly why it was unconstitutional. Regardless, the ultimate truth of the matter will likely never be known.