|
| |
This WEBSITE is published monthly as an official publication of the
Grand Encampment of Knights Templar of the United States of America.
Sid Cornelius Dorris III, Grand Generalissimo and Publisher,
2007 Brenthaven Drive, Mount Juliet, TN 37122
John L. Palmer, PC, KCT, - Managing Editor
P.O. Box 566, Nashville TN 37135-0566
(615) 283-8477 (telephone), (615) 283-8476(facsimile)
E-mail: ktmagazine@comcast.net
"Tell US What YOU THINK"
Joan B. Morton Assistant Editor
Mail materials and correspondence, to:
Editor, Grand Encampment of Knights Templar
Post Office Box 478448, Chicago, IL 60647-8448
phone and fax: (773) 489-0689
Material for the Grand Commanderies' two-page supplements
is to be directed to the respective Supplement editors.
Supplement Editors are encouraged to create their own sites
or submit "NEWS" to kych52va@aol.com
Address corrections from members are to be sent to the local Recorders LISTED HERE [.pdf]
SEPTEMBER:It begins with our Grand Master’s Message for SEPTEMBER 2008: “Reflections”, then the Managing Editor John L. Palmer introduces members of your editorial board, HERE, and the schedule of department conferences for the rest of the year is listed on the Grand Recorder’s page. This month we are introducing two new features for your consideration. You will find a “letters to the Editor” feature and a special type of crossword puzzle with the answers found HERE; BOTH are in [.pdf] formats. Sir Knight Pruitt shares with us a glimpse of the past as he takes us back in time to the Grand Encampment Triennial Conclave of 1904. An interesting poen, "KNIGHTS TEMPLAR" by Sir Knight Edgar A. Guest. Don’t miss Sir Knight Tribe’s biography of Sir Knight Robert H. Jackson. If you have considered submitting an article for publication, check out the information HERE from the editorial review board.
  
Grand Master's Message for September 2008
“Reflections”
One year ago on August 28, 2007, my good friend, Sir Knight Richard B. Baldwin, GCT, resigned as Grand Master for reasons of health. As I look back on this past year, it is both with sadness that my friend could not complete his journey and appreciation for his foresight in laying out a plan for this triennium.
Dick communicated regularly with his officers and shared the formulation of his plan for this triennium. That sharing has ensured that his vision will be continued even in his absence.
“Vision 64” was Dick’s theme and defined his hopes for this 64th Triennium. His military background mandated that he include his subordinates in his hopes and dreams for the fraternity he loved. We who followed him are doing our best to bring those plans to fruition. The goals defined in the January Knight Templar issue will be reported on in the December issue, but this month, it is appropriate to mention our appreciation to Dick for laying a firm foundation for those goals and allowing his officers to be a part of that plan.
The centerpiece of Sir Knight Baldwin’s “Vision 64” will occur in less than a year. The 64th Triennial Conclave of the Grand Encampment will be held in Roanoke, Virginia on August 15 – 19, 2009. Information will be forthcoming in January both on line and in this publication. The Virginia Conclave Committee put in place by Sir Knight Baldwin has been hard at work to provide for your enjoyment. The committee and your officers are committed to making this event a tribute to Dick, to his contributions to our beloved order and to a celebration of his vision.
Roanoke, Virginia, is a beautiful area to visit and a wonderful place to spend a few extra days. Please keep the dates in mind, and make plans to attend.
 
Sir Knight William H. Koon II, GCT
Grand Master
TOP
 A Chat With The Managing Editor
ktmagazine@comcast.net - John Palmer, PC, KCT
This month we will be featuring two more members of our editorial review board, Sir Knight Aaron Shoemaker and Sir Knight Rex Hutchens.
Sir Knight Shoemaker is a Regional Grand Commander of the Grand Commandery of Knights Templar of the State of Missouri. He has served as a member of the Masonic Education Committee of the Grand Lodge of Missouri and on the Library Committee of the Grand Lodge of Kansas. Aaron is Past President of the Kansas Lodge of Research, a member of the Missouri Lodge of Research, a life member of the Scottish Rite Research Society, and a Founding Fellow of the Masonic Society. He has presented papers before numerous Masonic bodies around the United States and delivered the opening lecture at the premier conference of the Rose Circle Research Foundation in Bayonne, New Jersey in 2006. Several of his papers have been published in national Masonic publications such as Amicus, a publication of the Southern Jurisdiction of the A.A.S.R. and Miscellanea, the annual publication of the Allied Masonic Degrees. Aaron is the Librarian and Historian of the Valley of Kansas City (Missouri) Scottish Rite bodies. Aaron is in management at Handmark, Inc. where he provides strategic advice and direction to a geographically dispersed team of customer experience experts located in the United States and Europe. We are most fortunate to have Sir Knight Aaron serving on our board.
Right Eminent Sir Knight Rex Hutchens is the editor of Heredom: The Transactions of the Scottish Rite Research Society and author of A Bridge to Light, A Glossary To Morals And Dogma, and Pillars Of Wisdom - The Writings Of Albert Pike. He transcribed and annotated Albert Pike`s Lecture on Masonic Symbolism and A Second Lecture on Symbolism, The Omkara and Other Ineffable Words and collaborated in the publishing of The Book of the Words (Sephir H`Debarim). As one of the world’s premier Masonic scholars, we are privileged to have him leading our board.
Next month we will tell you a little about our remaining two board members. I am excited about the improvements we are planning to implement during the next several months and even more excited to be working with this board, with the editors of our state supplements, and with each of you Sir Knights. Keep those suggestions coming in!
John L. Palmer
Managing Editor
4 September 2008
TOP
Reminder - Department conference schedule for the rest of this year is listed below. During these meetings, there will be a separate session with the managing editor for the state supplement editors and for anyone else interested in contributing to the magazine. State editors, please make plans to attend this informative session and assisting in achieving one of our Grand Master’s goals for the year! Please see the Grand Encampment web site for detailed informantion on these meetings, www.knightstemplar.org
Lawrence E. Tucker GCT
Grand Recorder
Northeastern Department, September 5-6, 2008...Albany, New York Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts/Rhode Island, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, and Vermont
Right Eminent Department Commander - John M. Lewis Email: jlewis@pa.net
South Central Department, September 19-20, 2008......Manhattan, Kansas
Arkansas, Kansas, Louisiana, Missouri, Oklahoma, and Texas
Right Eminent Department Commander:
F. Douglas Mitchell Email: dandcmitchell@yahoo.com
Mid-Atlantic Department, October 3-4, 2008.....Roanoke, Virginia
Delaware, District of Columbia, Maryland, North Carolina, Virginia, and West Virginia
Right Eminent Department Commander:
Vaughn F. Shafer Email: wuneff@verizon.net
Northwestern Department, October 16-18, 2008....Boise, ldaho
Alaska, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, Washington, and Wyoming
Right Eminent Department Commander - James C. Herndon Email: dajudge@ida.net
North Central Department, October 24-25, 2008....Fargo, North Dakota
Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska, North Dakota, and South Dakota
Right Eminent Department Commander:
Jeffrey N. Nelson Email: jnelson@state.nd.us
Southwestern Department, October 31-November 1, 2008.... Henderson, Nevada
Arizona, California, Nevada, New Mexico, and Utah
Right Eminent Department Commander - Robert C. Coe Email: rccoe@aol.com
Sir Knights,
Corrections to the address where you receive the Knight Templar magazine and reports of the death of a Sir Knight should be reported to the local Commandery Recorder who will send the information to the Grand Encampment office. Please do not bypass your local Recorder and go directly to the magazine editor or to the Grand Encampment office.
TOP
This poem was submitted some years ago by Sir Knight P. Raymond Johnson of Bolder Colorado.
He indicates that the author is Sir Knight Edgar A. Guest.
KNIGHTS TEMPLAR
Three by three in line they come
courteous men of templardom!
Christtian men who’ve bowed the knee
At the cross of Calvary,
Each with dedicated sword
to the glory of the Lord.
Guarding still the faith they hold
as was done in days of old.
For their history trails away to the dark and bloody day
When the Christians made their stand In the troubled Holy
Land And the followers of the Christ Ruthlessly were sacrificed.
There amid the inky gloom shown the Templar’s spotless plume.
Now this need for strife has gone,
Still the templars follow on,
Though their swords in silence sleep,
Still beneath the glittering arch candidates
for knighthood march, And by taper
and by sword, Pledge allegiance to the Lord.
Templars all, my hand I wave Be you steadfast,
be you brave! Old the order! Old the need!
For the valiant Christian deed Bigotry no more
holds sway. But for valiant knights today And
for christian gentlemen
Still the need is now, as then.
TOP
 Letters to the Editor
I don’t remember seeing letters to the editor in the Knight Templar magazine.
I thought that since we are asking for your input about the magazine, it might be good to share some of your responses with everyone.
Letters to the editor should be sent to me, the managing editor,E-mail: ktmagazine@comcast.net
If you want your name withheld, please tell me when you send the letter. We will not publish the address of anyone who sends us a letter. I reserve the right to edit your letter for size and clarity before I print it. I will try to preserve your intent. Here are a few we have already received.
John
I would like to ask you if you could print the names of the government leaders of the United States who are Masonic Brothers. Years ago, I believe these were included.
Richard R. Day
Sir Knight Day,
I discussed this with the Editorial Review Board and we came to the conclusion that some of these Brethren might not want their names published. There are all sorts of conspiracy theories flying around on the internet and it might be harmful to the Brethren or create the impression that we are involved in politics.
We have always been a private fraternity and I am sure that any list I might obtain, would not be comprehensive - sorry!
I have always enjoyed the Knight Templar magazine in its present form. Whatever you do, please do not change the Knight Voices section. I have made lots of friends and bought a lot of Masonic literature, pins, and information by using it.One suggestion might be brought to your attention. Almost all articles about anyone political in the magazine are about
conservative ones who haven’t been very notable except for being Knights Templar. My state has two former U.S. Senators who are Knight Templar Masons and very effective liberals. Other states, I am sure, have the same. Profiling these men would bring more balance to the magazine.
Also, why not get some of the young men who are joining the fraternity to write some articles for the magazine?
Name withheld
Dear Sir Knight,
I was not sure I could read your signature well enough to spell your name properly so I didn’t print it.
Although I am the new kid on the block, I don’t believe that any of my predecessors selected articles based on the political inclinations of the subject matter.
I believe it was more a function of what was submitted. Although we will not become engaged in any sort of political activity, we will consider any article submitted about anyone impartially. We would like our subject matter to have more to do with Templary, and we would love to have some articles from our younger Sir Knights.
TOP
How to Submit an Article to the Knight Templar Magazine
by John L. Palmer, Managing Editor
So you want to submit an article for publication in the Knight Templar magazine?
Well, here’s how to go about it. We accept basically two types of articles; news items and feature articles.
News items should be related to Knight Templar activities, relatively current, and of interest to Sir Knights all over the nation, not just in your area. Articles of interest to Sir Knights in your area only should be submitted to your state supplement editor. Please do not include group photos or photos of presentations being made. Try to catch the Sir Knights in action.
Feature articles should relate to Templar, Masonic, or Christian philosophy, symbolism, and history. Preference will be given to Templar articles. A typical feature article will run from 500 to 2,000 words depending on the number of photos or illustrations.
Please try to submit your material including photos and illustrations electronically if at all possible. The best way is to e-mail them to ktmagazine@comcast.net. Photos should be in .jpg or .tif format and have a resolution of at least 300 pixels per inch. The preferred format for drawings and other illustrations is .eps. Text should be submitted in Microsoft Word format, pdf format, or rtf format.
If you cannot e-mail your submission, send it through the mail on an optical disk.
As a last resort, send us typewritten material and photos in the mail. Please do not fax your articles unless requested to do so.
Finally, it is very important that we have permission to publish any material you send us. We respect the intellectual property of all authors. If the material you send us is not original material from you or if it does not clearly belong to you, please make sure and tell us where you got it so that we may contact the owner and obtain permission to publish it. This also goes for photos and illustrations. Make sure that if you quote someone in your material or use reference material, that proper permissions are obtained, and that the source of quotes are properly noted.
When your submission is received, the managing editor will acknowledge receipt back to you, and send it to the editorial review board, which makes the final decisions about what gets published. You can expect to receive notification from the managing editor about the disposition of your article within a month of submitting it.
We hope that many of you will choose to contribute to the Knight Templar.
TOP
MEMORIES OF THE 1904 GRAND ENCAMPMENT TRIENNIAL
By W. Bruce Pruitt, KGC, Right Eminent Past Grand Commander, California
The most unforgettable event that took place in the city of San Francisco, California, in the year 1906 was the infamous arthquake and fire. However, two years earlier, in 1904, the most significant and memorable event was the very impressive assembly of Knights Templar of the Grand Encampment of the United States. San Francisco was literally “turned over” to host the twenty-ninth Triennial.
Only a few examples of the opulent treatment given by the city will demonstrate the importance attributed to the event. Market Street, the major street of San Francisco, was lined with columns capped by Templar crosses. The Ferry Building, at the foot of Market Street and perhaps the most dominant structure at that time, was outlined with lights and had a lighted Knight Templar cross on the side facing the city. The Grand Lodge of California building was outlined at every corner with lighting including the square and compasses, Templar cross, cross and crown, etc. (This beautiful structure, on Market Street, was destroyed by the earthquake and fire two years later.) Golden Gate Park was profuse with floral arrangements orming Masonic symbols of all types. Business sessions were held in Golden Gate Hall, and the San Francisco Pavilion was
greatly decorated for events. The festivities extended from August 31 to September 6 and culminated with an amazing parade through the length of Market St. to Van Ness Avenue.
The medal from California Commandery No. 1 Knight Templar
Many, if not all, attending Commanderies produced souvenir medals to commemorate the experience. One personal enjoyment engaged in by the Knights was to exchange medals and accumulate a collection to take back home.
The presiding Most Eminent Grand Master was Sir Knight Henry Bates Stoddard of Texas. He was greeted in Oakland by the
Grand Commander of California, Past Grand Master Reuben H. Lloyd, the Commanders of California Commandery No. 1 and Golden Gate Commandery No 16, and an escort of Sir Knights. He then proceeded across San Francisco Bay by ferry to the Ferry bilding, where he was met by an even more elaborate escort. The record states: “At the Ferry Station, companies A, B, C, D, and E of California Commandery mounted on finely caparisoned black chargers and under the command of Sir Knight Rueben P. Hurlbut, Captain General (on a snow-white charger -- ed.) were drawn up in line for escort duty.” The Grand Master, Past Grand Master, Grand Commander, and Commander of California Commandery proceeded in a carriage drawn by four white horses. Several other carriages followed.
The delegation from Great Britain was given special attention: “Great deference was paid to the distinguished delegation from the Great Priory of England during the stay of the members in San Francisco. The visit itself was a distinction, representing the fraternal relations existing between the governing bodies of the greatest two Grand Jurisdictions of Tmplars in the world. In another sense it was highly representative in that in his official capacity the Earl of Euston was the personal representative of Edward VII, King of England, who for many years was the active head of Craft Masonry in England and who has ever been a patron of the Order in that jurisdiction.”
The drill competition was held on the multi-acre Recreation Ground of Golden Gate Park. Awards were won by Ivanhoe Commandery No. 24 of Milwaukee, Wisconsin; Malta Commandery No. 20. of Binghamton, New York; and Louisville Commandery No. 2 of Louisville, Kentucky.
The launching of the armored cruiser Milwaukee was timed to occur during the time of the Conclave. It took place at the Union Iron Works along the shoreline of San Francisco Bay. Naturally it was of special interest to the delegation from the state of Wisconsin.
A beautiful, leather-bound record was produced to commemorate this Triennial. That book is truly a treasure and a collector’s item. A review of the photographs in this volume is the only way one can appreciate in any way the extent of effort and involvement that went into this assembly. Those pictures help one to enjoy, in particular, the final parade of Sir Knights. The number of mounted companies, the sizes of the delegations, and the number of spectators lining the streets make one really appreciate those “glory days” of Templary. Oakland Commandery No. 11 seemed to extend for over a block. San Jose Commandery No. 10 was almost two blocks long. California Commandery was resplendent in their unique uniform, and made up a fully-mounted troop. Even though there were, of course, larger groups from California, every Grand Commandery made an impressive appearance. The Grand Commandery of Pennsylvania, mounted on matching black steeds, did their part to impress the on-lookers.
We now arrive at the real purpose for this article. The above discourse is intended to give you a brief, cursory idea of
the 29th Annual Conclave. You will, I am sure, enjoy a personal tribute of the event. It seems that Sir Knight Fay Hempstead, then Grand Recorder of the Grand Commandery of Arkansas, made friends with Sir Knight Milton A. Boulware, Recorder of San Jose Commandery No. 10. They carried on a correspondence for some undetermined period of time. He wrote poems for Sir Knight Boulware. Those poems express his appreciation and fond memory of his attendance at the 29th Triennial
Conclave. They experss, in a sincere and impressive manner, how much he was touched by the hospitality he had enjoyed.
TO CALIFORNIA
BY FAY HEMPSTEAD
Land of the ruby and golden glow;
Jeweled in mountain and valley below;
Rich, surpassing all human ken;
AND GRANDLY RICH IN HER. SPLENDID MEN:
Fair as the land of Eden; fair
As the isles that lie in the Orient air;
Great in her trees; and the rose’s perfume;
In the wondrous wealth of her fruit and bloom;
But yet, O Land of the Western sea,
A higher crown I proffer thee;
A crown of an even juster pride,
In that thou holdest, on every side,
Jewels greater than these by far,
IN THE SPLENDID TYPES THY DAUGHTERS ARE.
Land lit up by the Sun’s last ray,
In this thy chiefest pride display;
That, great as thy wealth from Nature’s store,
THY SONS AND DAUGHTES ARE EVEN MORE.
A MEMORY OF A WESTERN JOURNEY
by Sir Knight Hempstead.
Glint of gold on a sapphire sea;
And a pleasant memory comes to me;
Of the glorious stretch of a beryl bay;
And the frowning heights of Tamalpais;
Of the swish that the curling breaker has,
By the prison isle of Alcatraz;
Of the oak and the eucalyptus, seen
Through their pendant walls of living green;
Of the walk through the cedar-scented air,
In the hills of Berkeley, brown and bare;
Of the stream that sings to the sliding moon,
From its tortuous channel, boulder-strewn,
That lies in many a fold and twist,
By the hills that are hued like the amethyst;
Of the peak that lifts from the vale below,
With its beetling turrets clad with snow;
Then the mist creeps inward, heavy and dull,
Hiding the haunts of the sea and the gull;
And the blackened walls of the night retire
In the lengthened stretch of the street of fire;
With its myriad colored lights that dip,
From miles away to the ferry slip;
And the land is light to the harbor’s lip.
Again; where the fissured cliff-rocks reach
To the wide expanse of the lonely beach;
And the desolate waste draws on to be
By the shores of the lifeless inland sea;
Or there, where out in the dazzling day
An army marched with banners gay;
With the steeds, and the show of martial pride,
And the populace banked from side to side;
With cheering that echoed far and wide.
Or more. Of the concourse vast and gay
In the monster hall, at the head of the way;
Where the redwood branches intertwine
With the fragrant leaves of the mountain pine;
Of the welcome that sat in eye and hand
From the best to the least in that favored land:
Prompt to Comply with the farthest demand;
Where the word of request was the voice of command.
Glinting of gold on an azure sea,
I welcome the memory thou bringest to me;
As I gaze on the fading lights that end
Where the sea and the sky-line together blend!
Recognition is given to
Sir Knight Edwin Clarke, former Recorder of San Jose Commandery No. 10
for providing the archival material on the poems
What a precious memory these poems give us, to appreciate the true brotherly-love and enjoyment of that happening.
I would like to close with one very personal observation. Triennial Conclaves of the Grand Encampment of the United States in recent years may not be as elaborate as the one held in San Francisco in 1904. Nevertheless, I have never ceased to be impressed with the fellowship and sociability that I have enjoyed at each one that I have attended. Extensive planning effort has gone into the preparation and execution of the details. Most of all, it has been interesting to participate in the decisions of the Grand Encampment, and to witness the hard work of the leaders of our order. I sincerely recommend attendance at a Triennial Conclave as often as possible.
TOP
SIR KNIGHT ROBERT H. JACKSON:
Supreme Court Judge and Prosecutor at Nuremberg
by Ivan M. Tribe, K. Y. C. H., 33o , K. C. T.
1930 Brother Jackson speaks for FDR as governor in Jamestown
FDR congratulates Sir Knight Jackson as his new Supreme Court Judge while his family looks on
1938: Cartoon views Jackson public appointments as stepping stones to the White House.
It never happened !!
1837 Cartoon views Jackson as a Roosevelt puppet.
In 2003, William E. Leuchtenburg, a well-known historian of the New Deal Era, wrote "Robert Houghwout Jackson is the most important public figure of the twentieth century no one has ever heard of." This may be something of an exaggeration as he is a familiar name to legal scholars and mid-century historians, yet he is forgotten among the general populace. In his day Sir Knight Jackson served in a Presidential Cabinet, on the U. S. Supreme Court, and perhaps most significant of all, as United States Chief Prosecutor of Nazi war criminals.
Robert Jackson was born in Spring Creek, Pennsylvania on February 13, 1892, to William E. and Angelina Jackson. As a child the family moved to Frewsburg, New York. After high school, the youth went to work as a clerk for an attorney cousin and prominent Democrat in nearby Jamestown. Although he later attended law school in Albany for a year, Robert was essentially a product of a vanishing system whereby one studied law as an apprentice for another lawyer. During his time in Albany, he made the acquaintance of a young state senator and Mason named Franklin D. Roosevelt. After passing his bar exams in 1913, Jackson began to practice law and within a few years became one of Jamestown's, and indeed far western New York's, leading barristers. He also became somewhat active in Democratic politics and bar association activities. Throughout his law career, he kept a caption on his wall with a quote from Brother Rudyard Kipling that read "He travels fastest who travels alone," a phrase he exemplified in the progress of his own life. In 1916, Robert married Irene Gerhardt and the couple subsequently had a son and a daughter.
During his years in Jamestown, Robert H. Jackson became a member of Mount Moriah Lodge No. 145. He received his degrees on September 17, October 1, and October 22, 1929. In November 1930, Jackson took the Scottish Rite degrees in the Valley of Jamestown, New York. He also joined the York Rite bodies in Jamestown including Jamestown Commandery No. 61. In 2001, his framed Knight Templar sword had an honored spot in the Jamestown Masonic Temple. He ranks with cartoonist Brad Anderson, creator of the Great Dane with a human mind set, Marmaduke, as Jametown's most famous Mason to the outside world.
Brother Bob Jackson began his political life when Franklin Delano Roosevelt was elected Governor of the Empire State in November 1928, becoming a key advisor to FDR. Nonetheless, he remained in western New York until FDR entered the White House.. In February 1934, he took a position as general counsel in the Treasury Department, a job that concerned litigation in tax collecting. It was in this circumstance that he led in a civil suit against Brother Andrew Mellon, a super-wealthy former Republican Secretary of the Treasury, on charges of underpayment of taxes. This high-profile case led to a March 1936 promotion and transfer to the Justice Department as an assistant attorney general in the Tax Division, and still later in charge of the Antitrust Division. In these jobs, Jackson argued cases before the Supreme Court.
In March 1938, Jackson was appointed Solicitor General. From that point on, he was often seen as on the fast track for higher rewards within the administration. Associate Justice Louis D. Brandeis observed that he should be made Solicitor General for life. Meanwhile, for a time, pundits began to see the New Yorker as possible future governor of New York and even as a potential President. The chief's top political advisor, Jim Farley, argued that Jackson was insufficiently known.
Roosevelt himself eventually concluded that Jackson was too much of a "gentleman" to be a succesful candidate, but he still remained in serious contention for higher appointments.
Three times, Robert Jackson was rated as a serious candidate for Supreme Court consideration. Three times, he was passed over, first for Felix Frankfurter, second by Brother William O. Douglas, and then by Attorney General Frank Murphy. The latter appointment, however, led to Jackson being named to the cabinet in January 1940 as a replacement for Murphy. A little over a year later Chief Justice Hughes retired and the President subsequently elevated Justice Harlan F. Stone as his replacement and then named Jackson as the new Associate Justice.
In his early years on the High Court, Jackson found himself having to make some challenging decisions balancing the needs of national security and civil liberties. When the national interest was not at stake as in the famous case of West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette (1943), he came down forcefully on the side of liberty. For those who may have forgotten, this was the famous case that held one could not be required to salute the flag if it conflicted with his/her religious views.
Yet free speech should also have its limits. In a case that might be worth revisiting in more recent times, Jackson held in a dissenting opinion in the case of Terminiello v. Chicago (1949) that "if the court does not temper its doctrinaire logic with a little practical wisdom, it will convert the constitutional Bill of Rights into a suicide pact."
Although a staunch New Dealer, some court observers began to think that Judges Jackson and Felix Frankfurter had moved more toward the center of the legal philosophical spectrum, while Hugo Black, William O. Douglas and Franklin Murphy remained committed liberals. In fact, Black and Jackson had an uneasy relationship for a few years in the later forties although they remained outwardly civil. Perhaps it was because of this difference that Jackson jumped at the opportunity to take a leave of absence from the high court to serve as chief prosecutor at the Nuremberg trials. He subsequently described this duty as "infinitely more important than my work on the Supreme Court." In his closing speech in July 1946, Jackson made the eloquent conclusion that if "you were to say of these men that they are not guilty, it would be as true to say that there has been no war, there are no slain, there has been no crime." While his overall performance was not without criticism, it did result in nineteen convictions and three acquittals.
Chief Justice Stone had died in April 1946. Jackson apparently felt disappointment that the President named his Treasury Secretary Brother Fred Vinson of Louisa, Kentucky to lead the Court and probably thought that his quarrel with Black might have been responsible. Nonetheless, he returned to the Fall term of the Court in October and generally maintained a discreet silence in his public pronouncements concerning his views on the Alabama judge. One might add that there were other Masons on the Court in those years besides Jackson and Vinson, including Hugo Black, William O. Douglas, Sherman Minton, Harold Burton, Tom Clark, and after Vinson's death, Sir Knight Earl Warren.
Jackson's significant judicial decisions in those latter years included his upholding the 1949 conviction of Communist Party leaders in Dennis v. United States in 1951, coupled with his dissent in government efforts to inquire about private thoughts of suspected Communists in 1950 in American Communications Ass'n v. Douds. Put simply, Jackson upheld the right of Communists (or anyone else) to think as they wished, but not to actually "advocate the overthrow of the government." In another important 1952 decision, he concurred with a court majority in its invalidation of government seizure of private steel mills during the Korean War in Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer.
In what may have been the most significant case of the mid-century, Brown v. Board of Education (1954), Jackson had some doubts, but ultimately joined in the unanimous verdict. He had been hospitalized but was present when the court reached the monumental decision on May 17 to overturn the old decision rendered in Plessey v. Ferguson (1896) and outlawed segregated public schools. Ironically, by that time Jackson had increasingly leaned toward what became termed the doctrine of "judicial restraint." Jackson himself realized that this may have seemed at variance with his earlier endorsement of FDR's 1937 court reform plan, but nearly two decades of experience had tested and altered his philosophy These later theories were exercised in practice by Jackson's law clerk in the early fifties, William H. Rehnquist, who as a protege, spent some thirty years on the Federal Bench including nearly two decades as Chief Justice.
Sir Knight and Justice Jackson died a few months later on October 9, 1954 after suffering a second heart attack. While his fame may not be as great as many of his fellow judges, his significance is no less a celebrated one. His court opinions have been cited as among the most eloquent and well-reasoned in court history. This alone would lend strong support to William Leuchtenberg's view expressed at the beginning of this article.
Note: A full-length biography of the judge is Eugene C. Gerhardt, America's Advocate: Robert H. Jackson (1958). More useful for this brief article is the sketch by Douglas P. Woodlock in American National Biography (2000), and the introduction by William Leuchtenberg to Jackson's That Man: An Insider's View of Franklin Roosevelt (2003), published nearly a half-century after his death. Jackson's blue lodge, Scottish Rite and Shrine record is found in William R. Denslow, 10,000 Famous Freemasons (1958), II, p. 286. Jerome Erickson, Nicholas Andin, and Robert Cave have been helpful in their search for his still incomplete York Rite records.
TOP
  
<![CDATA[<BGSOUND SRC="http://www.knightstemplar/music/bcmarch.mp3">]]>
"Boston Commandery March/Onward Christian Soldiers"
| |
