ASSOCIATE JUSTICE FELIX FRANKFURTER - NEWSPAPER PHOTOGRAPH SIGNED - HFSID 83246

FELIX FRANKFURTER
Black and white 5¼x5¾newspaper photograph shown wearing a three-piece suit and sitting next to his wife Marion
Newspaper Photograph Signed: "Felix Frankfurter", 5¼x5¾ overall, image 4½x4½ (one surface). Captioned: "THE COURT WAS A PRISON at first to Felix Frankfurter, accustomed to the congenial life of Harvard's most famous law professor. He liked to visit with boys he had placed in Roosevelt's Brain Trust, and to spend an occasional afternoon beside the refrigerator of Jack Garner - who calls him 'Cardinal.' When he became a justice, he became a recluse. But now he has emerged from his cell, and he and his wife, Marian [sic], go to the theatre and dine out regularly." A renowned legal scholar, Frankfurter (1882-1965, born in Vienna, Austria) influenced Supreme Court decisions for more than 20 years (1939-1962). A former advisor to the NAACP and co-founder of the American Civil Liberties Union, Frankfurter had affirmed that any form of discrimination against Blacks violated the 15th Amendment (Lane vs. Wilson, 1939). Believing that the Court should not interfere with laws established by the people's elected officials, he upheld President Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal legislation. In the realm of civil liberties, Frankfurter would play a pivotal role in deciding the famous school desegregation case Brown vs. the Board of Education (1954), ensuring its historic importance by securing a unanimous decision. He dissented when the Court overturned Minersville West Virginia State Board of Education vs. Barnette (1943) and when it ruled in favor of legislative reapportionment (Baker vs. Carr, 1962), which he felt was strictly a political problem to be solved by the legislature, not the judiciary. Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, the staunch advocate of judicial self-restraint stabilized the liberal Earl Warren Court and promoted "procedural fairness" in criminal cases. Frankfurter was presented the Medal of Freedom by John F. Kennedy in 1963. Lightly toned and stained. Signature has bled but is legible. Adhesive residue on verso, which shows through and discolors paper and touches signature. Tear near upper left corner. Irregular edges. Folded once and unfolded. Otherwise, fine condition.