Introduction

Abstract

Introduction Melvin I. Urofsky Last year marked the seven hundredth anniversary of Magna Carta. Pick up any constitutional history textbook and you will learn that there were several such documents. Every time a new king seized power, he promised not to abuse his powers and assured his barons that their privileges would be safe. In fact, the document that is so revered in the world of Anglo-American law itself reaf­ firmed the substance of pledges made in Henry I’s Coronation Charter in the twelfth century. But the one signed by King John at Runnymede on June 15,1215, holds a special place in our history. To mark the anniversary, the Society invited the Rt. Hon. Brenda Hale, Baroness of Richmond, to give its annual lecture. An English barrister, jurist, and judge, she is currently the Deputy President of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom, and therefore familiar with the Great Charter on a regular basis. When former law clerks write about “their”judges, their reminiscences are usually overflowing with both praise and affection. Even the clerks of curmudgeonly Justices like William O. Douglas found much to like in recalling their year at the Court. There is one exception, however, and that is James Clark McReynolds, who served on the high court from 1914 to 1941, and was considered a nasty person not only by his clerks but by his fellow Justices as well. Several years ago scholars unearthed a manuscript memoir by one of his clerks, John Knox, which did nothing to redeem McReynolds’s reputation. Our managing editor, as well as Director of Publications at the Society, Clare Cush­ man, found a cache ofletters at the Utah State Historical Society from Milton Musser, who clerked for McReynolds in the 1938 and 1939 Terms, to his mother. He wrote home regularly, and his letters are a fascinating glimpse into McReynolds’s Chambers. The documents also confirm how difficult it was to work for the man. Edward T. Sanford is not one of the better-known members of the Court, on which he served from 1923 until his sudden death in 1930. A member of the inaugural staff of the Harvard Law Review, he then returned to his native Knoxville and practiced 134 JOURNAL OF SUPREME COURT HISTORY law there for fifteen years, until he entered government service and became assistant attorney general. In 1908 Theodore Roosevelt named him to a federal district court in Tennessee, and fifteen years later, Warren Harding named him to take Mahlon Pitney’s place on the High Court. Today he is perhaps best remembered as the author of two First Amendment speech cases, Gitlow v. New York (1925) and Whitney v. California (1927), in which he ruled that states could limit anti-government speech. Yet for all his low historical profile, this issue has two articles about him. John M. Scheb II, a professor of political science at the University of Knoxville, Tennessee, has written about Sanford’s life in Knoxville, his law practice, and his tenure on the district court. Stephanie L. Slater is an attorney with the Tennessee Court of Appeals, and she examines in-depth Sanford’s judicial opinions as a Justice on the U.S. Supreme Court. Finally, in the Judicial Bookshelf, our resident book reviewer gives us a look at recently published volumes. D. Grier Stephenson, Jr., is the Charles A. Dana Professor of Government at Franklin & Marshall College, and has been writing the Bookshelf for many years now, for which all of us, especially me, are quite grateful As always, an interesting buffet. Enjoy! ...