Owen Josephus Roberts
Owen Josephus Roberts (
May 2,
1875 –
May 17,
1955) was an
Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court for fifteen years. He also led the fact-finding commission that investigated the
attack on Pearl Harbor.
He was born in
Philadelphia and attended
Germantown Academy and the
University of Pennsylvania, where he was awarded a law degree in 1895.
He first gained notice as an assistant district attorney in Philadelphia. He was appointed by
President Harding to investigate
oil reserve scandals, known as
Teapot Dome Scandals. This led to the prosecution and conviction of
Albert B. Fall, the former
Secretary of the Interior, for
bribe taking.
He was appointed to the Supreme Court by
Herbert Hoover after Hoover's nomination of
John J. Parker was
defeated by the Senate.
On the Court, Roberts was a swing vote between those, led by Justices
Louis Brandeis,
Benjamin Cardozo, and
Harlan Fiske Stone, as well as Chief Justice
Charles Evans Hughes, who would allow a broader interpretation of the
Commerce Clause to allow Congress to pass
New Deal legislation that would provide for a more active federal role in the national economy, and the
Four Horsemen (Justices
James Clark McReynolds,
Pierce Butler,
George Sutherland, and
Willis Van Devanter) who favored a narrower interpretation of the Commerce Clause and a believed that the
Fourteenth Amendment Due Process Clause protected a strong "liberty of
contract." In 1936's
United States v. Butler, Roberts sided with the Four Horsemen and wrote an opinion striking down the
Agricultural Adjustment Act as beyond Congress's Commerce powers. Roberts switched his position on the constitutionality of the
New Deal in late 1936, and the Supreme Court handed down
West Coast Hotel v. Parrish in 1937, upholding the constitutionality of minimum wage laws. Subsequently, the Court would vote to uphold all New Deal programs. Since President Roosevelt's plan to appoint several new justices as part of his "
Court-packing" plan of 1937 coincided with the Court's favorable decision in Parrish, many people called Roberts's vote in that case the "
switch in time that saved nine." Roberts wrote the majority opinion in the landmark case
New Negro Alliance v. Sanitary Grocery Co., (1938), safeguarding a right to
boycott and in the struggle by African Americans against
discriminatory hiring practices.
Roberts was appointed by Roosevelt to head the
commission investigating the
attack on Pearl Harbor; his report was published in 1942 and was highly critical of the
United States Military. Perhaps influenced by his work on the Pearl Harbor commission, Roberts dissented from the Court's decision upholding internment of Japanese-Americans along the
West Coast in 1944's
Korematsu v. United States.
In his later years on the bench, Roberts was the only Justice on the Supreme Court not appointed by President
Franklin D. Roosevelt. Roberts became frustrated with the liberalism of Roosevelt's nominees and their willingness to overturn precedent. He also became embroiled in a personal feud with Justice
Hugo Black. Roberts resigned from the Court in 1945; Black refused to sign the customary letter acknowledging Roberts's service on his retirement.
He later served as the Dean of the
University of Pennsylvania Law School.
He died at his Pennsylvania farm after a four month illness. He was survived by his
wife, Elizabeth Caldwell Rogers, and daughter, Elizabeth Hamilton.
His name was adopted as the name of a
school district in
Pottstown, Pennsylvania.
