FELIX FRANKFURTER
Signed Supreme Court card, affixed to a page with two pictures of him
Supreme Court Card signed: "Felix Frankfurter", 4¼x3¼, affixed to 8½x11 page with brief typed biography, a captioned newspaper photo, and a color magazine illustration. Associate Justice FELIX FRANKFURTER (1882-1965) served on the U.S. Supreme Court from 1939-1962. As a member of the Harvard Law School faculty (1914-1939), Frankfurter had intensively sought to overturn the murder convictions of two Italian anarchists, Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti. Frankfurter did not attempt to define the defendants' guilt or innocence; he considered the Sacco-Vanzetti trial a test case for the objectivity of legal procedure and intolerance of the establishment. Frankfurter's efforts were in part financially supported by U.S. Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis, who gave him an annual stipend for legislative research and activities dealing with social and political importance. Frankfurter's liberal reputation was derived from his many involvements: he helped found the American Civil Liberties Union in 1920, and Frankfurter actively supported the Zionist movement and labor unions. He also served as advisor to President Woodrow Wilson at the Paris Peace Conference (1919) and advised Franklin D. Roosevelt during both his governorship and presidency. FDR appointed Frankfurter to the Supreme Court in 1939. While on the Court, Frankfurter emphasized the Court's function to base all rulings on constitutional law instead of personal opinion. From the private collection of Ralph Errington Ward (1926-2009). Ward, a fighter pilot and squadron commander in the China-Burma-India Theater of World War II, went on to become President and CEO of Cheseborough-Ponds, Inc., transforming the cosmetics firm into a major home product conglomerate. Edges lightly toned. Fine condition.