Harry Blackmun
Harry Blackmun | |
---|---|
Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States | |
In office June 9, 1970 – August 3, 1994[1] | |
Nominated by | Richard Nixon |
Preceded by | Abe Fortas |
Succeeded by | Stephen Breyer |
Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit | |
In office September 21, 1959 – June 8, 1970 | |
Nominated by | Dwight D. Eisenhower |
Preceded by | John B. Sanborn Jr. |
Succeeded by | Donald Roe Ross |
Personal details | |
Born | Harry Andrew Blackmun November 12, 1908 Nashville, Illinois, U.S. |
Died | March 4, 1999 Arlington County, Virginia, U.S. | (aged 90)
Resting place | Arlington National Cemetery |
Political party | Republican |
Spouse |
Dorothy Clark (m. 1941) |
Children | 3 |
Education | Harvard University (AB, LLB) |
This article is part of a series on |
Liberalism in the United States |
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Harry Andrew Blackmun (November 12, 1908 – March 4, 1999) was an American lawyer and jurist who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1970 to 1994. Appointed by President Richard Nixon, Blackmun ultimately became one of the most liberal justices on the Court. He is best known as the author of the Court's opinion in Roe v. Wade.[2]
Raised in
Aside from Roe v. Wade, notable majority opinions by Blackmun include
Early life and career
Blackmun was born on November 12, 1908, in
Blackmun attended
After graduating from law school, Blackmun returned to Minnesota, where he served in a variety of positions including private counsel, law clerk, and adjunct faculty at the
Court of Appeals
In the late 1950s, Blackmun's close friend
Supreme Court
President
While on the Court, Blackmun served as Circuit Justice for the Eighth Circuit (June 9, 1970 – August 2, 1994) and for the First Circuit (August 7, 1990 – October 8, 1990).
Early years on the Supreme Court
A lifelong
That began to change, however, between 1975 and 1980, by which time Blackmun was joining Brennan in 54.5% of the divided cases, and Burger in 45.5%.[13] Shortly after Blackmun dissented in Rizzo v. Goode (1976), William Kunstler embraced him and "welcom[ed] him to the company of the 'liberals and the enlightened.'"[14]
From 1981 to 1986, when Burger retired, the two men voted together in only 32.4% of close cases, whereas Blackmun joined Brennan in 70.6% of the close cases.[13]
Abortion
In 1973, Blackmun authored the majority opinion in Roe v. Wade, invalidating a Texas statute that banned abortion except when a pregnant woman's life was in danger.[15][16] The Court's judgment in the companion case of Doe v. Bolton held a less restrictive Georgia law to be unconstitutional as well.[16] Roe was based on the right to privacy announced in Griswold v. Connecticut (1965),[17][18] and it established a constitutional right to abortion in the United States.[19] Blackmun's opinion in Roe made him a target for criticism by opponents of abortion, and he received voluminous negative mail and death threats because of it.[20][21]
Blackmun became a passionate advocate for abortion rights, often delivering speeches and lectures promoting Roe v. Wade as essential to women's equality and criticizing Roe's critics. Defending abortion rights in
Few decisions are more personal and intimate, more properly private, or more basic to individual dignity and autonomy, than a woman's decision – with the guidance of her physician and within the limits specified in Roe – whether to end her pregnancy. A woman's right to make that choice freely is fundamental ...[22]
Blackmun filed separate opinions in Webster v. Reproductive Health Services (1989) and Planned Parenthood v. Casey (1992), warning that Roe was in jeopardy: "I am 83 years old. I cannot remain on this Court forever, and when I do step down, the confirmation process for my successor well may focus on the issue before us today. That, I regret, may be exactly where the choice between the two worlds will be made."
Ancillary to the primary right to abortion, Blackmun extended
Split with Burger
After Roe, Blackmun began to drift away from Burger's influence to increasingly side with Brennan in finding constitutional protection for unenumerated individual rights. For example, Blackmun wrote a dissent to the Court's opinion in Bowers v. Hardwick (1986). The Court's ruling in this case denied constitutional protection to homosexual sodomy. Burger's opinion in Bowers read: "To hold that the act of homosexual sodomy is somehow protected as a fundamental right would be to cast aside millennia of moral teaching." In his dissent, Blackmun responded by quoting Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.: "[i]t is revolting to have no better reason for a rule of law than that so it was laid down in the time of Henry IV. It is still more revolting if the grounds upon which it was laid down have vanished long since, and the rule simply persists from blind imitation of the past." Burger and Blackmun drifted apart, and as the years passed, their lifelong friendship degenerated into a hostile and contentious relationship.[23]
From the 1981 term through the 1985 term, Blackmun voted with Brennan 77.6% of the time, and with Thurgood Marshall 76.1%.[24] From 1986 to 1990, his rate of agreement with the two most liberal justices was 97.1% and 95.8%.[24]
Blackmun's judicial philosophy increasingly seemed guided by Roe, even in areas where Roe was not apparently directly applicable. His concurring opinion in 1981's Michael M. v. Superior Court of Sonoma County, a case that upheld statutory rape laws that applied only to men, did not directly implicate Roe, but because the laws were justified on the basis that women would be subject to the "risk" of pregnancy, Blackmun had cause to discuss Roe further in his opinion.[25]
Later years on the bench
Despite Blackmun's stated personal "abhorrence" of the death penalty in
[t]his is a very personal dissent, and I have struggled to adopt your 'voice' to the best of my ability. I have tried to put myself in your shoes and write a dissent that would reflect the wisdom you have gained, and the frustration you have endured, as a result of twenty years of enforcing the death penalty on this Court.[26]
Blackmun and his clerks then sought an appropriate case to serve as a "vehicle for [the] dissent," and settled on Callins.[27] That the case found the dissent, rather than the more traditional relationship of the dissent relating to the case, is underscored by the opinion's almost total omission of reference to the case it ostensibly addressed: Callins is relegated to a supernumerary in his own appeal, being mentioned but five times in a 42-paragraph opinion – three times within the first two paragraphs, and twice in footnote 2.[28]
Blackmun also wrote an impassioned dissent in
In his emotional dissent in DeShaney v. Winnebago County (1989), rejecting the constitutional liability of the state of Wisconsin for four-year-old Joshua DeShaney, who was beaten until brain-damaged by his abusive father, Blackmun famously opined, "Poor Joshua!" In his dissent in Herrera v. Collins (1993), where the Court refused to find a constitutional right for convicted prisoners to introduce new evidence of "actual innocence" for purposes of obtaining federal relief, Blackmun argued in a section joined by no other justice that "The execution of a person who can show that he is innocent comes perilously close to simple murder."
Women's rights
In Stanton v. Stanton (1975), a case striking down a state's definitions of adulthood (males reaching it at 21, women at 18), Blackmun wrote:
A child, male or female, is still a child ... No longer is the female destined solely for the home and the rearing of the family, and only the male for the marketplace and the world of ideas ... If a specified age of minority is required for the boy in order to assure him parental support while he attains his education and training, so, too, is it for the girl.[29]
Relationship with law clerks
Compared to other justices, Blackmun gave his law clerks great latitude in drafting opinions, such as his opinion in Planned Parenthood v. Casey, which was written by Stephanie Dangel, then one of Blackmun's clerks and now a law professor at the University of Pittsburgh.[30][31] Blackmun's Casey opinion draft included sharp criticism of Chief Justice William Rehnquist, which included, according to Dangel, a sarcastic reference to Rehnquist as "The Chief" rather than Chief Justice because "I have my doubts as to whether he deserves to be called 'justice' on this one."[32] Dangel changed it to "Chief Justice" at Justice Anthony Kennedy's urging.
Blackmun also revealed in a 1995 oral history with
Notable clerks
Blackmun's clerks included Edward B. Foley[35] and Chai Feldblum.[36]
Relationship with other justices
When Blackmun's papers were released at the
Blackmun and Justice Potter Stewart both followed baseball obsessively. In one oral argument on October 10, 1973, Stewart passed Blackmun a note that read, "V.P. AGNEW JUST RESIGNED!! METS 2 REDS 0." The game in question was the fifth and deciding game of the 1973 National League Championship Series, and the Mets won it 7–2, sending them to the 1973 World Series.[38]
Post-Supreme Court
Blackmun announced his retirement from the Supreme Court in April 1994, four months before he officially left the bench, assuming retired status on August 3, 1994. By then, he had become the court's most liberal justice.[24] In his place, President Bill Clinton nominated Stephen Breyer, whom the Senate confirmed, 87–9.
In 1995, Blackmun received the United States Senator John Heinz Award for Greatest Public Service by an Elected or Appointed Official, an award given out annually by Jefferson Awards.[39]
In 1997, Blackmun portrayed Justice
On February 22, 1999, Blackmun fell in his home and broke his hip. The next day, he underwent hip replacement surgery at Arlington Hospital in
External videos | |
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After Words interview with Linda Greenhouse on Becoming Justice Blackmun, May 1, 2005, C-SPAN |
In 2004 the
Based on these papers, Linda Greenhouse of The New York Times wrote Becoming Justice Blackmun: Harry Blackmun's Supreme Court Journey. Jan Crawford's Supreme Conflict also draws heavily from the papers.
See also
- List of justices of the Supreme Court of the United States
- List of law clerks of the Supreme Court of the United States (Seat 2)
- List of United States Supreme Court justices by time in office
- United States Supreme Court cases during the Burger Court
- United States Supreme Court cases during the Rehnquist Court
References
Citations
- ^ a b "Justices 1789 to Present". Washington, D.C.: Supreme Court of the United States. Retrieved February 15, 2022.
- ^ Greenhouse 2005, p. 250.
- ISBN 9780936124179. Archivedfrom the original on August 3, 2020. Retrieved March 15, 2018 – via Google Books.
- ^ Greenhouse 2005, p. 3.
- ^ Woodward & Armstrong 1979, p. 97.
- ^ "Blackmun's Solace - Religion 'Roe' Author Unfazed by Abortion Critics". October 14, 1990.
- ^ Greenhouse 2005, pp. 2–18.
- ^ Greenhouse 2005, p. 249.
- ^ a b Greenhouse 2005, pp. 25–29.
- ^ a b McMillion, Barry J. (January 28, 2022). Supreme Court Nominations, 1789 to 2020: Actions by the Senate, the Judiciary Committee, and the President (PDF) (Report). Washington, D.C.: Congressional Research Service. Retrieved February 15, 2022.
- ^ "Carswell Nomination to Court Rejected by Senate." In CQ Almanac 1970, 26th ed., 05-154-05-162. Washington, D.C.: Congressional Quarterly, 1971.
- ^ DeSilver, Drew (February 26, 2016). "Long Supreme Court vacancies used to be more common". Washington, D.C.: Pew Research Center. Retrieved April 2, 2022.
- ^ a b c Greenhouse 2005, p. 186.
- ^ Woodward & Armstrong 1979, p. 506.
- ^ "Norma McCorvey, plaintiff in Roe v. Wade, dies at 69". PBS NewsHour. February 18, 2017.
- ^ a b "A History of Key Abortion Rulings of the U.S. Supreme Court". PewForum.org. January 16, 2013.
- ^ "Roe v. Wade Fast Facts". CNN. November 4, 2013.
- ^ Markels, Alex (November 30, 2005). "Supreme Court's Evolving Rulings on Abortion". NPR.
- ^ Liptak, Adam (December 1, 2021). "What did Roe v. Wade say?". The New York Times.
- ^ "Blackmun Obit". NPR.org. March 4, 1999.
- PMID 12178877– via PubMed.
- ^ Greenhouse 2005, p. 185.
- ^ Greenhouse 2005, pp. 186–187.
- ^ a b c Greenhouse 2005, p. 235.
- ^ "BLACKMUN, J., Concurring Opinion in Michael M. v. Superior Court". Law.cornell.edu. Archived from the original on October 11, 2011. Retrieved May 4, 2011.
- ^ Greenhouse 2005, pp. 177–178.
- ^ Garrow, David J. "Legal Affairs". Legal Affairs. Archived from the original on October 15, 2009. Retrieved May 4, 2011.
- ^ "Callins v. Collins, 510 U.S. 1141 (1994)". Supct.law.cornell.edu. Archived from the original on October 9, 2011. Retrieved December 13, 2011.
- ^ Greenhouse 2005, p. 218
- ^ "Blackmun Clerks Had Too Much Power, Says Historian". Law.com. Archived from the original on December 27, 2010. Retrieved May 4, 2011.
- ^ "Stephanie Dangel | School of Law | University of Pittsburgh". www.law.pitt.edu. Retrieved March 8, 2022.
- ^ Mauro, Tony (March 5, 2004). "Blackmun Papers Are a Window on Court's Daily Life". Law.com. Retrieved May 4, 2011.[dead link]
- ^ "The Volokh Conspiracy". Volokh.com. Archived from the original on May 12, 2011. Retrieved May 4, 2011.
- ^ Liptak, Adam (June 8, 2013). "Exhibit A for a Major Shift: Justices' Gay Clerks". The New York Times. Archived from the original on December 24, 2016. Retrieved February 27, 2017 (discussing Karlan's authorship of Justice Blackmun's dissent in Bowers).
- ^ "StackPath". fedsoc.org. Archived from the original on August 12, 2020. Retrieved August 15, 2020.
- ^ "Clinical Faculty and Staff (Federal Legislation Clinic)". Georgetown Law. Georgetown University. Archived from the original on October 14, 2011. Retrieved October 23, 2020.
- ^ a b Merida, Kevin; Fletcher, Michael A. (October 10, 2004). "Thomas v. Blackmun". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on August 20, 2011. Retrieved October 19, 2008.
- ^ Biskupic, Joan (December 25, 2007). "Ginsburg, Scalia Strike a Balance". USA Today. Archived from the original on August 3, 2009. Retrieved August 24, 2009.
- ^ "National". jeffersonawards.org. Jefferson Awards Foundation. Archived from the original on November 24, 2010. Retrieved March 15, 2018.
- ^ Greenhouse 2005, p. 247.
- ^ Greenhouse 2005, pp. 247–248
Works cited
- ISBN 0-8050-7791-X.
- Harry Andrew Blackmun at the Biographical Directory of Federal Judges, a publication of the Federal Judicial Center.
- ISBN 978-0-380-52183-8.
Further reading
- Clinton, Bill (2005). My Life. Vintage. ISBN 1-4000-3003-X.
- Wrightsman, Lawrence S., and Justin R. La Mort (2005). Why Do Supreme Court Justices Succeed or Fail? Harry Blackmun as an Example. Missouri Law Review 70.
- Yarbrough, Tinsley. Harry A. Blackmun: The Outsider Justice. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-514123-7.
External links
- Excerpt from Blackmun's Callins opinion, and Justice Scalia's response
- NPR series on Justice Blackmun's Files
- Blackmun's Papers at the Library of Congress
- Justice Blackmun Receives Honorary Doctorate from DePauw University; May 22, 1971
- Transcript: The Justice Harry A. Blackmun Oral History Project
- Harry Blackmun at IMDb
- Arlington National Cemetery
- Appearances on C-SPAN