John Hessin Clarke

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John Hessin Clarke
Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States
In office
October 9, 1916 – September 18, 1922[1]
Nominated byWoodrow Wilson
Preceded byCharles Evans Hughes
Succeeded byGeorge Sutherland
Judge of the United States District Court for the Northern District of Ohio
In office
July 21, 1914 – July 24, 1916
Nominated byWoodrow Wilson
Preceded byWilliam Day
Succeeded byDavid Westenhaver
Personal details
Born(1857-09-18)September 18, 1857
New Lisbon, Ohio, U.S.
(now Lisbon)
DiedMarch 22, 1945(1945-03-22) (aged 87)
San Diego, California, U.S.
Political partyDemocratic
EducationCase Western Reserve University (BA)

John Hessin Clarke (September 18, 1857 – March 22, 1945) was an American lawyer and judge who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1916 to 1922.

Early life

Born in New Lisbon, Ohio, Clarke was the third and youngest child and only son of John Clarke (1814–1884), a Quaker immigrant from County Antrim, Ireland who became a lawyer and judge in the United States, and his wife Melissa Hessin. He attended New Lisbon High School and Western Reserve College, where he became a member of Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity. He graduated Phi Beta Kappa in 1877.[2] Clarke did not attend law school but studied the law under his father's direction and passed the bar exam cum laude in 1878.

After practicing law in New Lisbon for two years, Clarke moved to

John M. Palmer
later that year.

Progressive politician

Soon after the 1896 presidential election, Clarke moved to

New York, Chicago and St. Louis Railroad. Yet Clarke continued his involvement in the Democratic Party. His politics evolved during this period, as Clarke abandoned many of the political views of his youth, including those involving states' rights, and embraced instead the program of the emerging progressive movement. Clarke's political evolution during this period was facilitated considerably by his friendship with Cleveland mayor Tom L. Johnson, who helped restore Clarke's standing within the state party after Clarke's previous failure to support Bryan's presidential bid.[3]

In 1903, Johnson succeeded in taking control of the state Democratic Party, an effort which Clarke supported. At the party's convention that August, Clarke was nominated as the Democratic candidate for the United States Senate. Though an accomplished orator, Clarke's work as a railroad attorney, his opposition to Bryan's presidential candidacy seven years before, and his own personal limitations all contributed to his failure to upset his Republican rival, Mark Hanna, who won the balloting in the Ohio General Assembly by 115 votes to 25 for Clarke.

In the aftermath of his defeat, Clarke reduced his participation in party politics, focusing instead on his legal work for a time. Yet Clarke was soon back in the political arena, withdrawing from the partnership with Williamson and Cushing in 1907. His relationship with Johnson suffered after Clarke supported the successful candidacy of conservative Democrat

Timothy S. Hogan
and by the spring appeared to be in danger of losing the race.

Judicial career

Federal judge

Clarke was in the middle of his primary campaign when he was appointed by

U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Ohio created by the resignation of William Louis Day. Clarke was the choice of both Woodrow Wilson and Attorney General James Clark McReynolds, who felt that the position required a "first rate appointment" to deal with the backlog in the court's docket, and that Clarke's high standing before the Ohio bar marked him out as a man of "decided ability".[4] Wilson also wanted a candidate who could be groomed as a prospective Supreme Court nominee, given the relative dearth of Democratic prospects on the federal bench after sixteen years of Republican presidents.[5] He was confirmed by the United States Senate
on July 21, 1914, and received commission the same day.

Clarke soon vindicated their hopes in him, establishing himself as an effective judge. Though considered too formal and aloof by the attorneys before him, he cleaned up the backlogged docket and won their respect for his ability. His work was of the highest quality, with only five of the 662 suits tried before him reversed, and none of these for errors in the admission of evidence. Clarke himself enjoyed his time at the district level, finding his duties not too onerous and the variety of cases before him stimulating.[6]

Associate Justice

Clarke's Supreme Court nomination

In June 1916, a vacancy arose on the Supreme Court when Associate Justice

Republican nomination for President. Wilson wanted to fill the seat by appointing his Attorney General, Thomas W. Gregory, but Gregory demurred and suggested Clarke instead.[7] After having Newton Baker (Wilson's Secretary of War and a close friend of Clarke's) speak with Clarke to confirm his opposition to trusts,[8] Wilson offered Clarke the nomination. Though Clarke was reluctant to abandon trial for appellate work, he felt he could not pass on such an honor and accepted. Wilson sent his name to the Senate on July 14, 1916, and Clarke was confirmed by the United States Senate unanimously ten days later.[9] He was sworn into office on October 9, 1916. [1]

Clarke's years on the court were unhappy ones. Having enjoyed the autonomy of a trial court judge, he chafed at the routine of the Supreme Court, hating the arguments, the extended conferences, and the need to accommodate other justices' views when writing opinions. The record of his opinions during his five years on the bench reflected this dissatisfaction. While he issued 129 majority opinions, he also dissented 57 times in his short term on the court. While he enjoyed good relations with the other justices (and developed close friendships with William R. Day and Willis Van Devanter), he had an unpleasant relationship with Justice James Clark McReynolds, one that subsequently contributed to his decision to leave the Court.[10] Such was McReynolds's animosity towards Clarke that, when Clarke resigned, McReynolds refused to sign the official letter of regret over his departure.[11]

Philosophically, Clarke demonstrated an affinity for

Bailey v. Drexel Furniture Company, supported Congress's authority under the Commerce Clause (in the Hammer case) and the Taxing and Spending Clause (in the Bailey case) to address what Progressives saw as a major social problem. He also demonstrated his opposition to monopoly in United States v. Reading Company, in a ruling that became a prominent part of anti-trust law.[12]

Resignation

Clarke's impact on the Court's jurisprudence was limited by his relatively brief service on it. On September 1, 1922, Clarke sent a letter to President Warren G. Harding announcing his intention to resign from the Court. His decision was motivated by a number of factors. Apart from his dissatisfaction with his work as a justice and his ongoing difficulties with McReynolds, Clarke had recently suffered the loss of his sisters Ida and Alice. Moreover, having witnessed the physical decline of Chief Justice Edward Douglass White, he wished to avoid a similar deterioration while on the bench.[13] Clarke would have few regrets about his decision, and informed his successor, George Sutherland, that the latter was embarking on "a dog's life."[14]

Later years

Time Cover, 11 Feb 1924

Campaigning to join the League of Nations

In an interview three days after submitting his resignation, Clarke outlined a new cause he wanted to pursue – convincing Americans that the United States should join the League of Nations. At the time, prospects for League entry were at a low ebb, its proponents having suffered the dual setback of the Senate's rejection of the Versailles Treaty and the election of the anti-League Republican Warren G. Harding as president in 1920. Clarke's public pronouncements gave their cause a new life, and in October 1922 he became the president of a new organization, the League of Nations Non-Partisan Association. Modeled after the British League of Nations Union, the Association's mission was to awaken the underlying support for joining the League that its founders believed existed within the United States and mobilize it to overcome the opposition to League participation. Through it, Clarke quickly emerged as Wilson's successor in the campaign for League membership.[15]

Though Clarke committed himself to the cause with a series of speaking tours, he soon faced a number of challenges. Expenditures quickly outpaced the Association's funding, with limited resources squandered on building up an extensive organization. Though Clarke organized a restructuring in June 1923, a far greater problem lay in his underestimation of the task he faced. Contrary to Clarke's expectations, there was no latent undercurrent of support for joining the League, only skepticism and hostility to the idea. Addressing this required a far different level of commitment than Clarke expected to make, forcing him and the rest of the Association leadership to scale back on their goals. Focusing on the issue of entry into the World Court, Clarke continued to campaign for American involvement in international organizations and agreements for the remainder of the decade.[16]

Retirement

By the end of 1927, Clarke's growing

Supreme Court "packing" plan
, and at Roosevelt's request Clarke made a radio broadcast in March 1937 in which he defended the constitutionality of the proposal.

In 1931 Clarke moved from Cleveland to San Diego, where he lived in the El Cortez Apartment Hotel. It was there that he suffered a heart attack and died on March 22, 1945. He was later honored by his alma mater by having a residence hall, Clarke Tower, named after him on the Case Western Reserve campus.[17]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b "Justices 1789 to Present". Washington, D.C.: Supreme Court of the United States. Retrieved February 16, 2022.
  2. ^ "Supreme Court Justices Who Are Phi Beta Kappa Members" (PDF). Phi Beta Kappa website. Archived from the original (PDF) on September 28, 2011. Retrieved October 4, 2009.
  3. ^ Warner, Hoyt Landon (1959). The Life of Mr. Justice Clarke. Cleveland, Ohio: Western Reserve University Press. pp. 48–9.
  4. ^ James Clark McReynolds to Woodrow Wilson, July 2, 1914. Quoted in Warner (1959), 60
  5. ^ Warner (1959).
  6. ^ Warner (1959), 61-2
  7. ^ Woodrow Wilson to Edward M. House, July 23, 1916. in The Papers of Woodrow Wilson, vol. 37, ed. Arthur S. Link (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1981), p. 467
  8. ^ Newton D. Baker to Woodrow Wilson, July 10, 1916. In Link (1981), p. 397-8.
  9. ^ 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 16, 2022.
  10. Macmillan Publishing Company
    . p. 413.
  11. ^ Warner (1959), p. 115.
  12. ^ Bickel and Schmidt (1985), p. 192-7, 452-454
  13. ^ Warner (1959), p. 112-113.
  14. ^ Quoted in Joel Francis Paschal, Mr. Justice Sutherland: A Man Against the State (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1951), p. 114.
  15. ^ "A New Leader". Time. Retrieved 2007-03-05.[dead link]
  16. ^ Carl Wittke, "Mr. Justice Clarke--A Supreme Court Judge in Retirement", The Mississippi Valley Historical Review Archived 2017-04-24 at the Wayback Machine, 36:1 (June 1949), 37-40
  17. ^ "Namesakes-John Hessin Clarke, Clarke Field and Clarke Tower". Case Western Reserve Archives. April 25, 2014. Archived from the original on May 19, 2014. Retrieved April 22, 2017.

Bibliography

Wikimedia Commons has media related to John Hessin Clarke.
  • Bickel, Alexander M.; Benno C. Schmidt Jr. (1985). The Judiciary and Responsible Government 1910-21 (History of the Supreme Court of the United States). Macmillan Publishing Company.
  • Pratt, Walter F. Jr. (1999). The Supreme Court under Edward Douglass White, 1910-1921. University of South Carolina Press.
  • Warner, Hoyt Landon (1959). The Life of Mr. Justice Clarke. Cleveland, Ohio: Western Reserve University Press.

External links

Legal offices
Preceded by Judge of the United States District Court for the Northern District of Ohio
1914–1916 		Succeeded by
Preceded by Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States
1916–1922 		Succeeded by
Awards and achievements
Preceded by Cover of Time
February 11, 1924 		Succeeded by
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