Roberts Dissenting

By the time the U.S. Supreme Court had wound up its recent session, Justice Owen Josephus Roberts had written 21 majority opinions -- and 53 vigorous and acid dissents. Also, he had completed 15 years of service and had passed the age of 70, when Federal judges may retire. Last week, as he got ready for a vacation on his farm near Chester Springs, Pa., Mr. Justice Roberts resigned.

Famed for his work as prosecutor in the Teapot Dome scandal, genial, wide-mouthed Owen Roberts was a big-time Philadelphia corporation lawyer when Herbert Hoover called him to the high court in 1930. Promptly he found himself the deciding vote between the right and left factions of the pre-Roosevelt tribunal, as often as not sided with the left's dissenters. But as the turbulent 30s went by and seven Roosevelt appointees took their places on the bench, he became the court's chief defender of precedent and legal stability.

Uncharted Seas. Solidly legalistic, Owen Roberts in time inherited the title of Justice Holmes -- "The Great Dissenter." From the quotable Holmes, Justice Roberts drew a maxim: "If a law makes you want to puke, then due process has been denied."

By the time the new court had demonstrated a capacity to defy precedent and also to reverse itself (as in the Jehovah's Witnesses case), Justice Roberts had plunked down a few tart phrases of his own. Said he: the Court had now set forth on an "uncharted sea of doubt and difficulty"; some of its decisions were like a "restricted railroad ticket, good for this day and train only."

Washington dopesters promptly began speculating on his successor. Two best bets: Vermont's Warren Robinson Austin or Ohio's Senator Harold Hitz Burton, both able Republicans. Democratic possibilities also mentioned: new Labor Secretary Lewis Baxter Schwellenbach or U.S. District Judge Sherman ("Shay") Minton, onetime Congressman of Indiana.

The White House last week also announced the resignation of monopoly-hating Thurman Wesley Arnold as a Judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. Talkative, cigar-smoking Thurman Arnold, ex-Yale professor, writer of witty and readable economic treatises (e.g., The Folklore of Capitalism-), said he would go back to law practice, with an eye to what interested him most when he was an Assistant Attorney General--anti-trust cases.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.