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An Address before the Canadian Bar Association

I value your invitation, not only as a personal honor, but as an expression of your esteem for the Court on which I sit and of your good will towards the legal profession in the United States. A sense a brotherhood, based on common tradition, always had animated the bars of our two countries.

American Courts

Over the next half century I cannot foresee, of course, the kind of world that will surround us at our work. We know that courts do not function well in an atmosphere of pressure and tumult and passion. Some people are voicing fears, or hopes, that the post-war world will move sharply to the right; and others thing, to the left.

Thomas Jefferson

It was the high character of the man that captivated even his rivals and left an imperishable impression on American history. He was pitted against the severest competition. Not only did able men from the North, such as Hamilton, Franklin, and Adams- measure their talents against his, but Virginia itself provided such contemporaries as Washington, Madison, Mason, Henry, Monroe, and many others in whose company it would be hard for any man to distinguish himself. However, we appreciate the true stature of Jefferson the more when we stand him beside the other strong men of his time.

Decline of Stare Decisis is Due to Volume of Opinions

The Institute is recognition that the practicing lawyer as well as the legislator and the judge, share responsibility for the state of the law. In fact, our system of public justice presupposes the private law office. We speak of people's going to court. But first they go to a law office.

The Churchman Address

The most fundamental certainty about the post-war world is in some ways the most discouraging one- it will be inhabited by people, mostly by the same people who populate it now. It is their suspicions and fears and ancient hatreds and conflicts in ambition and economic interest that have wrecked previous plans of world organization.

Tribute To Country Lawyers

Judge Powell's book reminds us who come from rural backgrounds that our way of life was much the same all over America. Judge Powell and I are a generation apart, but country living changed little between his youth and mine. Its real transformation came with the automobile, the gasoline engine, the telephone, radio, electric power, and mechanization, all of which were unavailable on the farm when I was born.

Full Faith and Credit

A namesake lecture in memory of Mr. Justice Cardozo is an undertaking of more than ordinary challenge to a Justice of a succeeding generation. Even choice of a fitting subject has difficulties. One related to the work of the Court on which he and I both have served might seem appropriate. But Judge Cardozo's most significant contributions to the law are not to be found in the reports of the Supreme Court. He was preeminently a devotee of the common law, while the Supreme Court has never been distinguished as a source of common law and during his time renounced independence of judgment as to what the common law is or should be in the class of cases that most often invoked it.

Franklin Roosevelt

No other event could bow so many human heads in a common sorrow and a sense of personal loss. Throughout the land, by countless humble firesides people feel less secure today because he is gone; for, while he walked with Kings, they knew that he never lost the common touch; that he was their friend and advocate; that while he lived there would be no forgotten man. Neither sea nor land stretched far enough to get out of range of his sympathy and understanding.

Rule of Law Among Nations

On April 13, 1945, Justice Robert H. Jackson delivered a speech at the annual meeting of the American Society of International Law in Washington D.C. This speech was given the day after the death of President Roosevelt. In the speech, The Rule of Law Among Nations, Jackson urged that any war crimes trials following the war be genuine, informed by due process and the rule of law, and not pruned proceedings, contrived to reach a designed end.

Report to the President on the Prosecution of Axis War Criminals

I have the honor to report accomplishments during the month since you named me as Chief of Counsel for the United States in prosecuting the principal Axis WAr Criminals. In brief, I have selected staffs from the several services, departments and agencies concerned; worked out a plan for the preparation, briefing, and trial of the cases; allocated the work among the several agencies; instructed those engaged in collecting or processing evidence; visited the European Theater to expedite the examination or captured documents, and the interrogation of witnesses and prisoners;...