Answering the Call: Leaving the Bench to Serve the President— James F. Byrnes and Franklin D. Roosevelt, 1932–1945

SIDNEY M. MILKIS AND NICHOLAS F. JACOBS

Perhaps no President in American the first woman ever to serve as a Cabinet history has figured so prominently in the Secretary, and who used her office to development of constitutional democracy as secure the rights of organized labor; and, of did Franklin D. Roosevelt. At no point in the course, the indomitable First Lady Eleanor country’s history did its leaders grapple with (the White House’sgadflyinitsreluctanceto challenges more profound than those faced take on the most controversial liberal causes, during the 1930s and 1940s, as they sought especially civil rights). These and other stalwart to come to terms with the disruptive effects New Dealers were critical FDR allies in of industrialization, mass migration, and the constructing a liberal Democratic Party and rise of totalitarian‐populism overseas. Given forging an executive‐centered administrative the ambitious reform program he envisioned, state that would make the aspirations of its Roosevelt could not have acted alone. There partisan objectives possible. was his “Brains Trust”—the group of university However, only one New Dealer worked professors who formulated some of the most as diligently, persevered for so long, and revolutionary schemes to revive the nation’s remained so committed to the success of economy. There were Roosevelt’s famed Roosevelt’s “revolution,” as he routinely administrators—Harry Hopkins as the chief referred to the New Deal: James Francis engineer of the Works Progress Administration; Byrnes. Only he was bedizened by Roosevelt Harold Ickes as the relief coordinator for the as “The Assistant President.” Byrnes and Public Works Administration; Frances Perkins, FDR were an odd couple: Roosevelt, the 72 JOURNAL OF SUPREME COURT HISTORY

New York patrician who relished the ex- Second World War just three months into ercise of power, and Byrnes, raised in South his tenure on the Court. After months of Carolina by his widowed mother—a hard- informally advising the President and the working dressmaker of such modest means Attorney General on the most important that her son dropped out of school at matters related to economic mobilization for fourteen to seek gainful employment—who total war, Justice Byrnes left the Court to styled himself an honest broker, rather than a serve officially in the administration: first mover, of government action. Yet, in first as Director of Economic Stabilization spite of their economic and cultural differ- and then as Director of War Mobilization, ences—or perhaps because they so well both positions having been intentionally complemented each other—Byrnes and created to take advantage of Byrnes’ rare Roosevelt formed a relationship that, combination of savvy politician and astute although largely forgotten today, is of legal mind. immense importance for understanding the FDR’s and Byrnes’ fruitful partnership scope of New Deal reform at home and the was so strong because, as different as they eventual triumph of American liberalism were, they shared the view that the New Deal abroad. Their partnership and genuinely represented a new understanding of the warm friendship also personifies the social contract—one that required the extraordinary tension within New Deal national government to assume new respon- liberalism—a conflict between its nationalist sibilities at home and abroad. FDR gave aspirations and a reverence for America’s voice to this new understanding of rights in constitutional legacy that still animates our his iconic State of the Union message of political travails today. 1941. Traditional freedoms like speech and Roosevelt—the President of the United religion, he argued, needed to be supple- States who audaciously broke the two‐term mented by two new rights: “freedom from tradition set by George Washington and want” and “freedom from fear.”2 These new served for just over twelve years—was the freedoms, representing for all intents and center of American life around which the purposes the charter of the modern American fundamental political controversies of the state, were given institutional form by the 1930s and 1940s swarmed. Byrnes remained welfare and national security states. Im- behind the scenes yet omnipresent—serving bedded in a modern executive office and a in all three branches of the federal growing national bureaucracy during the government while Roosevelt was President. presidencies of Roosevelt and Truman, these A first‐term junior Senator from South pillars of the New Deal political order Carolina at the birth of the New Deal, he transcended partisanship. The New Deal rose to become one of the most important state was embraced by Democrats and leaders in steering key reform legislation Republicans alike in the aftermath of World through a fractious Congress. In 1941, he War II. President Dwight D. Eisenhower, the moved to the Supreme Court and, although first Republican elected after the New Deal, his tenure on the bench was a brief 452 days bestowed bipartisan legitimacy on the liberal (only one other Justice in American history, political order. Two years after his 1952 Thomas Johnson, has spent less time on the campaign victory, with bipartisan coopera- Court), he wrote several important opinions tion, he pushed through Congress an expan- during his brief stint that helped codify the sion of Social Security. The popular “Ike” new constitutional order.1 But Byrnes’ most also sustained Roosevelt’s and Truman’s important duty occurred in the wake of Pearl commitment to liberal internationalism, the Harbor, which pulled America into the view that America and her allies (particularly ANSWERING THE CALL 73 in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization) A Junior Senator Becomes a President’s could be—must be—a force for good in the Trusted Ally world. Byrnes was such a critical ally to Yet this partisan consensus eventually Roosevelt because in Congress, the Court, unraveled, in large part due to the emergence and the executive branch he provided a of civil rights as a contentious, riveting critical link between the White House and drama during the 1950s. When Byrnes the bloc of impregnable Southern Democrats resigned as Truman’s Secretary of State in who posed the greatest opposition to the January 1947, he returned to his home in New Deal. As Thomas Stokes, the Pulitzer South Carolina to become a vociferous critic Prize–winning journalist from Georgia, of the President and the Democratic Party. wrote, Southern Democracy (dedicated to Elected as Governor in 1950, he became a the states rights philosophy of Jefferson) was leader of the massive resistance to the Brown the “ball and chain which hobbled the v. Board of Education decision, which saw a Party’s forward march.”3 Among the few unanimous Supreme Court denounce the Southerners who supported the New Deal invidious myth that separate could be equal. through thick and thin, Byrnes was the Byrnes not only joined most other Southern President’s most important ally in his governors in lambasting the decision, he also determination to keep the South in the fold became a leading architect of the Southern of a transformed, reimagined nation. Further- Strategy the Nixon Administration pursued more, Byrnes’ pragmatism—his willingness to realign partisan politics below the Mason‐ to support what Roosevelt dubbed “bold Dixon Line. Having abandoned the New persistent experimentation”—expressed the Deal Democratic Party he had so diligently President’s hope that the New Deal might worked to build, Byrnes supported Repub- forge a transformed coalition in the South lican presidential candidates until his death dedicated to economic security. Byrnes on April 9, 1972. shared Roosevelt’s belief that the New It is only by taking stock of this momentous time in history that we can Deal could work just as well for the share- cropper in low country South Carolina or the begin to make sense of this special relation- millworker in the state’s new boomtowns as ship between Byrnes and Roosevelt, a it could the urban factory worker. Both critical but uneasy partnership that illus- hoped that this new politics would compete trates both the great potential and stifling with and then perhaps displace the virulent limits of progressive reform in twentieth racial conflict that long had dominated and twenty‐first century America. Viewing democracy below the Mason‐Dixon Line. history through the lens of this alliance Central to Roosevelt’s New Deal Southern sheds important light on the effort of a strategy, Byrnes was a permanent fixture in President and his assistant president to meet the White House during the early years of the profound challenges of economic cata- ’ strophe and the rise of totalitarianism in FDR s presidency, even spending Thanks- giving with the President before his inaugu- Europe. And it leaves us with a new vantage ration to advise on Cabinet appointments and point to better grasp the causes of our their prospects for Senate confirmation.4 present political discontents: to understand ’ how a transformed Democratic Party almost Byrnes political savvy proved indis- succeeded in forging a new national com- pensable to Roosevelt as the President fi munity, but in the end, tragically failed to sought to bring the executive of ce closer make the South an enduring partner in the to the American people in a time of want fi New Deal political order. and desperation. During the rst press 74 JOURNAL OF SUPREME COURT HISTORY conference of his administration, which controversial measures that sharply divided inaugurated the practice of inviting partici- the Democratic Party and aroused cries that pation by all correspondents regardless of he was a “dictator”—an indictment so their political posture toward the White resonant that the President had to go on the House, Roosevelt requested that Byrnes radio and formerly deny it. This program attend and evaluate his performance. After included the Executive Reorganization Act, all the newspapermen had left, Roosevelt announced in January 1937, and the “Court‐ asked him how he did. Byrnes, having packing” plan, proposed just a few weeks watched the President handle a cascade of after the administrative reform program. inquiries on a wide range of topics with The plans to reorganize the federal seeming aplomb, responded that “it was fine judiciary and executive branch were bold for the reporters, but I fear the effect efforts to increase the President’s personal [on you].” In this display of wit and policy influence over a rapidly expanding national dexterity, Byrnes saw clearly that Roosevelt government, one that laid greater claim to intended to lead—to draw unprecedented promoting its citizens’ welfare. They marked attention to the executive office. This ambi- an effort to transform a decentralized polity, tion would give Roosevelt the unique dominated by localized parties and court opportunity to “enlist support for his pro- rulings that supported property and states’ grams”; at the same time, Byrnes, seeing the rights, into a more centralized, bureaucratic President’s hand trembling and his shirt form of government that could deliver the drenched in perspiration, recognized the goods championed by the New Dealers. strain this enhanced responsibility would Programmatic rights like Social Security place on Roosevelt and the hard challenges and collective bargaining, Roosevelt be- he would face in laying the cornerstone of a lieved, would not amount to anything— modern executive office.5 would not fulfill the freedom from want— The strengthening of the presidency in unless new institutional arrangements were the face of the imposing domestic and established to redistribute powers within the international issues the country confronted government and permanently secure these bespeaks the special importance of the new commitments inside the federal Roosevelt‐Byrnes alliance. The relationship bureaucracy.6 Moreover, as early as 1937, between FDR and Byrnes only grew stronger Roosevelt anticipated that it would be and more essential to the preservation of the impossible to stay out of the battles erupting New Deal during Roosevelt’s controversial in Europe and Asia: as he told Byrnes, the second term. Roosevelt’s first term was rise of fascism and imperialism, even more dedicated to the enactment of programs like than the challenge posed by the Great Social Security and the Wagner Act (Labor’s Depression, required the strengthening of Magna Carta). These new programmatic executive power—to give it the capacity to rights were the signature New Deal policies protect the freedom from fear. that would secure freedom from want. In the Byrnes had serious reservations about midst of terrible economic despair, these Roosevelt’s institutional reform program. innovations drew widespread support, even He was an adamant defender of Congress among many recalcitrant Southern Demo- and its constitutional prerogatives, which crats. But Roosevelt pursued an institutional Roosevelt’s commitment to executive program during his second term that cast a dominion threatened. When reflecting on brighter light on the constitutional transfor- his long career in politics, he most fondly mation that he sought. Startling allies and remembered his time in the Senate—a place enemies alike, he pursued two highly where “there was independence of action, ANSWERING THE CALL 75 and there was the pleasure of competing with Executor v. United States8 and Schechter men who displayed good sportsmanship, and Poultry Company v. United States,9 both of whose friendships enriched my life.” Coin- which imposed constraints on the President’s cidently, his office was the former robing personal power. Byrnes was not the only room of the Old Supreme Court chamber in Southern congressman to support Roosevelt the Capitol. He loved this place, one of the during the Court‐packing ordeal, but the perks that came with being a committee esteemed Senator from the front lines of chairman. His memoirs detailed the fine opposition to the New Deal was the most historical eccentricities that decorated his important. legislative domain, especially the old White In fact, FDR chose Byrnes to give a House chandeliers and the painting that hung nationally broadcast speech to defend the on his wall of Henry Laurens, a South Court‐packing plain against the fierce attack Carolinian and the only American ever to be of his close friend, the unreconstructed imprisoned in the Tower of London.7 Byrnes opponent of the New Deal, Virginia’s even enjoyed the chore of responding to Senator Carter Glass. For Glass and other constituent letters, taking the time to draft influential Southern and border‐state Sena- lengthy responses to inquiries whether they tors, such as Josiah Bailey of North Carolina, came from mayors of South Carolina towns Harry Byrd of Virginia, and Millard Tydings or factory workers in the textile mills. When of Maryland, the Court‐packing plan ex- he joined the Supreme Court, he had to posed the President’s dangerous centralizing confess dutifully that it was inappropriate for ambitions that threatened not only judicial a Justice to interfere with the same matters as independence but also the constitutional he did when he was a Senator. Yet, taking prerogatives of Congress. The South, as the advantage of the knowledge he had gained on vanguard of a “conservative manifesto” the front lines of legislative oversight, Byrnes proclaimed in 1937, was largely united in usually made sure to point his fellow South seeking to “restore to Congress its proper Carolinian to the appropriate source of responsibilities in making laws and enun- influence deep inside the federal bureaucracy. ciating policies for the country.”10 Southern Despite his love of congressional poli- resistance to legislation that would result in a tics and its traditions, Byrnes nevertheless more liberal Supreme Court, which propo- shared Roosevelt’s belief that the national nents and adversaries alike anticipated would government needed to be strengthened, lest issue decisions more favorable to African the United States fall prey to a more radical Americans in civil rights litigation, placed solution to the crises at home and abroad. Byrnes squarely in opposition to powerful The first true test of the Roosevelt‐Byrnes political strains in his home state. The entire alliance developed during FDR’s ill‐fated Supreme Court of South Carolina wrote Court‐packing plan in the spring and summer directly to Byrnes in opposition to the of 1937. Almost all of Byrnes’ fellow President’s plan. And, as a testament to Southern and border state Senators, as well how public and rancorous the Court‐packing as many very vocal South Carolina consti- issue became, a missive arrived shortly tuents, viewed the Court as Horatio at the thereafter at Byrnes’ Washington office that Bridge—the final line of defense against was an ominous reminder of local politics the rising tide of national statism. Significantly, back home: a single sheet of paper dis- the two Supreme Court decisions that playing an image of the Hooded White enraged Roosevelt the most—handed down Knight of the KKK, with the red boldfaced on May 27, 1935, soon known to New Dealers words, “Hand’s Off the Supreme Court,” as “Black Monday”—were Humphrey’s written underneath a watchful eye.11 76 JOURNAL OF SUPREME COURT HISTORY

Senator James F. Byrnes received this ominous missive from a constituent in South Carolina in 1937 after he announced his support for Franklin D. Roosevelt’s proposal to enlarge the Supreme Court.

Despite the political pressure to oppose tional government. “The real dangers of Roosevelt’s controversial second‐term initia- dictatorship will not come from the most tives, Byrnes remained committed to the democratic President we have ever had,” institutional bulwarks of New Deal liber- Byrnes argued: alism. Roosevelt argued that the Court had to be transformed to restore effective govern- Nor will they come from younger ment in the face of aggressive totalitarian men on the Federal courts. The real forces in Europe—at a time when represen- dangers of dictatorship will come tative democracies were widely thought to be from Justices who forget the weak and incompetent as compared to warning of Chief Justice Marshall assertive regimes led by new dictators. that the Constitution should be Echoing the President, Byrnes argued that "adapted to the various crises in court “reorganization” was indispensable to human affairs." They will come the preservation of representative constitu- from those lawyers, who, jealous ANSWERING THE CALL 77

and fearful of the loss of prestige of Roosevelt, “why run for a train after you’ve their profession, want us to post- caught it?”14 But recalling the Court’s9‐0 pone social justice for years while decision in the Schechter decision, Roosevelt they strive to block it forever. They believed that he still needed at least a will come from those who are blind modified version of the plan, which would to the fact that at this stage of world allow him to appoint two or three Justices, to history time is of the essence, and secure a majority that would accept the that the difference between keeping constitutionality of the New Deal state. “The faith with the people in 1937 and unanimity of the Court,” Barry Karl ob- hoping to keep faith with them in served about the judiciary’s firm rejection of future years may be the difference the administrative discretion Congress between a triumphant democracy, granted the President to deal with the which works, and a disillusioned economic crisis, “properly emphasized the democracy, which fails.12 singularity of the issue among the many divided opinions of the opposition between Although the Court‐packing bill died in the Court and the New Deal.”15 Congress, Roosevelt claimed that the highly It is a testament to the strength of the contested initiative did its work. By April Byrnes‐Roosevelt relationship that neither 1937, the Supreme Court began to uphold bore the scars of a protracted and bitter fight. the constitutionality of important New Deal Byrnes was frustrated by Roosevelt’s refusal legislation. “A switch in time saves nine,” to declare victory and withdraw the highly was the by word of relieved congressional contentious bill. However, he continued to Democrats who viewed the pivot of As- support the President’s court‐packing plan sociate Justice Owen J. Roberts from the through July, when the death of Democratic conservative to the liberal side of the Court a majority leader, Joseph Robinson, who had prudential strategy that would defuse the been promised a Supreme Court appointment constitutional crisis. There is considerable if he obtained Senate passage of a revised scholarly dispute about whether Roosevelt’s court bill, effectively killed any hope that assault on the Judiciary influenced Roberts; Roosevelt’s plan would ever pass the Con- but there is no gainsaying that in rapid gress. Nevertheless, starting with the retire- succession the Justices approved a minimum ment of Van Devanter, Roosevelt was able to wage law in Washington state very similar to appoint a total of eight new Justices to the a New York statute they had found uncon- Supreme Court, thereby transforming the stitutional just a year earlier and, more judiciary into a critical partner of the New significantly, upheld both the Wagner Labor Deal, and cementing the “Constitutional Relations Act and the Social Security Act. “I Revolution of 1937.” know not what effect the Wagner decision will have on the court plan,” Byrnes told reporters, “but it seems that the court plan From the Senate to the Supreme Court already had some effect on the Court.”13 With the Court’s apparent acceptance of Roosevelt rewarded Byrnes’ stalwart the New Deal interpretation of the Constitu- loyalty by making him one of those new tion, Byrnes thought Roosevelt had little Justices in 1941, replacing conservative reason to continue his fight, especially after stalwart James C. McReynolds. FDR knew one of the President’s nemeses, Associate that appointing Byrnes would pay off a large Justice Willis Van Devanter, announced political debt and save Byrnes from facing a his retirement in May. As Byrnes asked possible difficult re‐election in 1942. But, 78 JOURNAL OF SUPREME COURT HISTORY like his appointment of another Southern FDR’s faith that the New Deal could hold Senator, Hugo Black, in 1937, Roosevelt’s the North and South together—and that selection of Byrnes testified to his belief that eventually New Dealers could build a it was especially important to have loyal national state dedicated to extending the allies below the Mason‐Dixon Line. Many new constitutional order and overwhelm the ardent liberals urged FDR to forget about the stubborn tumor of racial prejudice. Byrnes North‐South alliance—first forged during the did not have as substantial an influence on 1790s in the mating dance between Thomas the Court as did Black, but two of his Jefferson and Aaron Burr—that underpinned important majority opinions supported a national Democratic coalition. Yet Roosevelt’s reformist aspirations. Roosevelt was hopeful that, with the help of In Edwards v. California, Byrnes upheld effective allies like Byrnes, the deep South the rights of individuals to travel freely would support a liberalized Democratic from one state to another.17 As poignantly Party—and remain in the fold—even if it depicted in John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of celebrated Roosevelt rather than Jefferson as Wrath, during the Great Depression, its patron saint. Roosevelt and Byrnes shared California treated desperate migrants, the belief that conservative democracy in this many of them victims of the Dust Bowl, poorest part of the country was not an harshly. A prime example of California’s economic conservatism but rather was firmly hospitality was the so‐called “Okie Law,” establishedinreactiontothePopulist which made it a misdemeanor to bring into movement at the end of the nineteenth century California "any indigent person who is not a andbythenear‐constant exploitation of racial resident of the State, knowing him to be an prejudice. As Byrnes stated in a speech in indigent person.”18 In pursuance of this Charleston on August 8, 1936: statute, California prosecuted as a criminal offense attempts by its residents to bring It is my opinion that for the last unemployed relatives or acquaintances to twenty‐five years, we have, in live with them if the residents were unable to South Carolina, in political discus- provide for the migrants’ cost of living. The sions, devoted too much time to law was a deliberate attempt by the “likker [liquor] and nigger,” and too California government to reduce its relief little time to those matters that roles, even though the federal government vitally effect the welfare and happi- provided much of the social welfare benefits ness of the men, women and that indigent Californians received. Edwards children of the state. In the heart was a Californian who had driven to of each of us there are certain Texas and returned with his unemployed prejudices. It is the duty of a good brother‐in‐law. He was tried, convicted and man to endeavor to control and given a six‐month suspended sentence. subdue those prejudices; and I have Departing from the advocacy of states’ little respect for a man who knows rights and opposition to an expansive welfare better, and for political gains, is state, to which most of his Southern brethren willing to appeal to that which is adhered, Byrnes, in his first majority opi- worst in men, rather than that which nion, declared the California law unconstitu- 16 is best in men. tional. He argued that the Interstate Com- merce Clause of the Constitution guaranteed During his short stay on the Court, individual men and women the right to move Justice Byrnes showed that this was not freely from one state to another. More to the merely rhetorical flourish. He vindicated point, Byrnes tied this broad defense of ANSWERING THE CALL 79

President Roosevelt chose Senator Byrnes to give a nationally broadcast speech to defend his Court‐packing plan against attacks by other Southern senators who felt the President's plan threatened not only judicial independence but also the constitutional prerogatives of Congress. While Byrnes was not the only Southern Senator to back FDR's initiative, he was probably the most powerful. This cartoon shows FDR asking Congress to allow him to add up to six new justices under the plan. the Commerce Clause to the New Deal’s wholly to assume it, has been reinterpretation of the social contract. recognized not only by State gov- Pushing back against California’s argument ernments, but by the Federal gov- that economic relief was purely a local affair, ernment, as well.19 Byrnes, taking note that the plaintiff had been supported by the New Deal relief Byrnes also wrote a majority opinion agencies, wrote in a revealing obiter dicta: that dovetailed with the work of the Fair Employment Practices Committee, which The nature and extent of [Califor- Roosevelt had created in 1941 to address nia’s] obligation to afford relief to racial injustice in the defense industry and newcomers is not here involved. the criminal justice system. In Ward v. Texas, We do, however, suggest that the decided in 1942, police in Texas had taken an theory of the Elizabethan poor laws accused African American, William Ward, no longer fits the facts. Recent from the church he was attending in the years, and particularly the past county where a white man had been decade, have been marked by a murdered. Handcuffing the defendant and growing recognition that, in an moving him without a warrant, police carried industrial society, the task of pro- Ward more than a hundred miles, over a viding assistance to the needy has period of three days, to a series of Texas ceased to be local in character. The jails, ostensibly to protect him from pursuing duty to share the burden, if not lynch mobs. Such good intentions, however, 80 JOURNAL OF SUPREME COURT HISTORY were suspect, given that, during this odyssey, concurring one), seldom participated ac- Ward was deprived of sleep and allegedly tively in the discussion of cases in Con- tortured until he confessed—an admission of ference, and was impatient with—indeed guilt that led a jury to convict him of murder. alienated from—judicial procedures that Byrnes wrote for the Court, which reversed were so far removed from the hurly‐burly the murder conviction on the grounds that of politics that he had mastered. moving “an ignorant Negro by night and day To be sure, Byrnes found his colleagues to strange towns and telling him of threats of convivial. “Contrary to popular impression,” mob violence and questioning him continu- Byrnes wrote in his memoirs, “justices are ously” had resulted in an “inadmissible very human, and during my service, at least, confession.” The use of such a forced they were very sociable.”22 Moreover, he confession, Byrnes concluded, “is a denial believed that someone of his background of the due process and the judgment of the could make an important contribution to a conviction must be reversed.”20 judicial system increasingly faced with the The term “ignorant Negro” grates, a sign task of making legal sense of a modern state that Byrnes—and the Court—still held a and its expanding and complex body of patronizing attitude toward African Americans. programs and policies. As an ever‐increasing But Byrnes’ decisions on civil rights, which amount of the Court’s work involved inter- included a concurring vote in a case finding an preting congressional statutes, Byrnes ar- all‐whitegrandjurytobeprima facie evidence gued, “When the language of a statute is of racial discrimination against a black such as to create doubt as to the intent of the defendant, appeared to support FDR’sbelief law‐making body, it seems to me a knowl- that the Court’s insulation from South Carolina edge of the mechanics of legislation should politics—so rooted in race—would free his be helpful.”23 Nonetheless, he fretted that an valued ally to confirm his commitment to the individual who served on the bench for years New Deal ambition to foster a new sense of “necessarily becomes, to a degree, isolated national community.21 from the people.”24 When the Mississippi Byrnes’ brief stint on the Supreme Court born reporter, Turner Catledge of the New was important, but in truth, he was never at York Times, paid him a social visit at his home in this chamber, perhaps seen in that Supreme Court chambers, Byrnes urged him only eleven pages, of the over 400 pages in to stay longer than the journalist—sensitive his memoir, are devoted to his time on the to a judge’s busy schedule—thought appro- bench. Unlike Hugo Black, another self‐ priate. Yet Byrnes urged him to stay a while made lawyer who passed the bar without —admitting: “I get so damn lonely here.”25 going to college or law school, Byrnes did not participate actively in the formulation of a new interpretation of the nation’s legal From the Supreme Court to the White doctrine. Throughout his brief tenure, Byrnes House was more dedicated to the broader constitu- tional issue raised by the New Deal: how Roosevelt also experienced a strong America could accept the authority of a sense of loss when his hitherto constant national state and still stay true to its deep‐ political companion entered the Court. Yet, rooted commitment to individualism and Byrnes’ leave of absence from political regional diversity. Preoccupied with that matters was short lived. In fact, part of his challenge, which was made all the more isolation in chambers was due to his important with the approach of war, Byrnes “answering the president’s call” to help wrote few opinions (he never wrote a with the war effort. With the formal ANSWERING THE CALL 81

Two days after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, FDR called Associate Justice Byrnes to the White House to ask him to lend his legislative expertise in shaping the laws and executive orders that would mobilize the government and economy for total war. After months of unofficially assisting the chief executive, Byrnes resigned from the Supreme Court on October 5, 1942 to become director of the Office of Economic Stabilization. FDR created the agency for Byrnes (pictured), who led the task of arbitrating the near constant government infighting over program jurisdiction and the distribution of resources between civilian and military production. declaration of war in December 1941, it is departments and agencies. Transforming not at all surprising that Roosevelt came what had been a modest office into an calling on the sitting Justice. The impending institution, administrative reform gave the war would stress the capacity of presidential President the power and support staff to truly government, just as it had for previous become the Constitution’s national office, an executives. And, just as he had been at the office capable of fulfilling the promise of the vanguard of Court reform, so Byrnes had New Deal to provide security at home and been essential to modernizing the presiden- abroad. tial office. Indeed, few knew the inner Byrnes helped to imagine and reify mechanics of modern administration better, Roosevelt’s vision of an executive‐cen- because few had such a hand in crafting tered administrative state that would be them. Administrative reform—embodied by accountable to, but not dominated by, the 1937 executive reorganization bill—was, Congress. Ever sensitive to the “conser- as Roosevelt put it, at the “heart” of the New vative” aspect of the New Deal revolution, Deal’s constitutional re‐founding. Enacted he drafted a lengthy history of adminis- only after a bitter two‐year struggle in trative organization that contributed to Congress, the 1939 Executive Reorganiza- Roosevelt’sargumentthatanenergetic tion Act created the Executive Office of the and independent presidency would renew President, which included the newly formed and enlarge rather than destroy the Amer- White House Office (the West Wing) ican Constitutional tradition. In spirit, if and a strengthened and refurbished Bureau not in name, he tapped into Alexander of the Budget. The administrative reform law Hamilton’s claim that Presidents should also strengthened the Chief Executive’s pursue “extensive and arduous enterprises control over what was becoming a maze of for the public benefit.”26 82 JOURNAL OF SUPREME COURT HISTORY

The Hamiltonian executive forged by would have: telephoning Senators and House the Byrnes‐FDR partnership was firmly leaders, whipping votes, and taking pleasure established as an essential feature of that the bills “passed Congress in record American constitutional government during time.”28 World War II. Franklin Roosevelt called After months of unofficially assisting Byrnes to the White House two days after the Chief Executive, Byrnes resigned from the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, hoping the Supreme Court on October 5, 1942, the Associate Justice would give him the writing each of his “dear Brethren” that benefit of his legislative expertise in shaping “only a sense of duty impelled me to resign the laws and executive orders that would from the Court.”29 Using the power granted mobilize the government and economy for by the 1939 Executive Reorganization Act, total war. Byrnes had just written his first Roosevelt created a new agency designed Court opinion, but after the White House for and by Justice Byrnes: the Office of called on him to assist in the war effort, Economic Stabilization. As director of this he devoted every available minute to the agency, Byrnes assumed the task of “extracurricular activities” of his justiceship, arbitrating the near constant government as he called them. The relationship between infighting over program jurisdiction and the the President and the Justice marked the sort distribution of resources between civilian of rare partnership that James Madison, at and military production, all of which the time of the writing of the Constitution, threatened to hamstring the administra- hoped would become a regular feature of tion’s wartime efforts. While Roosevelt American constitutional government. Byrnes was dedicated to the art of diplomacy in not only had the constitutional acumen from his dealings with Churchill and Stalin, and years of service in the U.S. Congress, but the art of war in liberating North Africa, now as an Associate Justice, he was and then Europe, he needed the impartial particularly well‐suited to advise the admin- leadership only a former Justice could istration on the constitutionality of proposed provide. It was more than a courtesy administrative actions. Roosevelt’s Attorney owed to a former member of the Supreme General, Francis Biddle, was in constant Courtthatthememorandathatpouredinto communication with Byrnes throughout Byrnes’ small White House office always December 1941 and the following January. were addressed to the “Justice.” As Roose- Their task was to weed out all “serious velt put it to Byrnes, “In these jurisdictional interferences with our war effort” and to disputes, I want you to act as a judge and I strengthen the executive’s control of the will let it be known that your decision is my federal apparatus. Indeed, Roosevelt insisted decision, and that there is no appeal. For all that all persons proposing new executive practical purposes you will be assistant powers or the reorganization of different President.” 30 departments had first to “talk to Jimmy As his title foretold, Byrnes commanded Byrnes and Francis Biddle about it.”27 an extraordinary amount of power to oversee Roosevelt even gave Justice Byrnes final the nation’s economy. The New York Times approval on the wording, legal rationale, and labeled him “Our No. 1 Stabilizer,” while the message to Congress explaining an executive liberal newspaper, PM, celebrated this order on wage freezes. But most important to Southerner as “America’s No. 1 Inflation‐ the administration was Byrnes’ active in- Stopper.”“He simply went to work,” the volvement in getting the set of War Powers papers reported, “He did not make a radio Acts through the Congress. Here Justice speech or pose for pictures”; “No one has Byrnes responded just as Senator Byrnes taken a job in the war machine with less ANSWERING THE CALL 83 fanfare.”31 Byrnes’ willingness to operate strikes, including four general walkouts, behind the scenes, his attention to detail, and continued, at times involving over a half his mastery of both administrative and million coal workers. Consequently, steel parliamentary procedure helped the federal output dropped and unrest over wage government stabilize the nation’s economy. demands spread to rubber and engineering Although Roosevelt had delegated pro- plants. The government’s battle with the digious authority to Byrnes, the assistant United Mine Workers and federal control of president was in constant communication many mines persisted well into 1944. During with the President. Roosevelt was especially this long struggle, Roosevelt relied on dependent on the success of the controversial Byrnes not only for his efforts to control war‐time production policy that Byrnes organized labor—a nettlesome but valued implemented—the President’s “Hold the political ally—but also to deal with the Line” order. As the name suggests, during mine owners, who deeply resented the the war the overarching mission of every government’s operation of their property. federal agency was to prevent price increases Caught in the middle of this contretemps, on the home front. This meant that wages Byrnes began to fear that his principal would hold constant, even if defense role in enforcing wage and price controls industries were ordered to work a would hurt Roosevelt’s political standing, forty‐eight‐hour week or if unions had especially with labor. It did not help that he negotiated annual increases; rationing would hailed from the South, which was at the continue to prevent the hoarding instincts of a forefront of opposition to an emerging generation who lived through the Depression; industrial labor movement. As a supporter and prices for crops would be set by the of the New Deal, Byrnes was relatively government, even if market demand allowed sympathetic to workers’ rights. He had voted farmers to charge more.32 for the Wagner Act and, while on the Court, The greatest challenge in enforcing Roo- had written an opinion that circumscribed the sevelt’s Hold the Line Order—the most scope of the Anti‐Racketeering Act of 1934, troublesome task in negotiating the tension a key initiative in the government’s efforts to between Dr. New Deal and Dr. Win the War— prevent strong‐arm union tactics.35 But his was the coal miner strikes of 1943 and 1944. long‐standing opposition to sit‐down strikes, Led by the powerful and controversial head of which were so central to labor’s triumphs in the United Mine Workers, John L. Lewis, the the late 1930s, and the leading role he played strikes threatened to upend the President’swar in enforcing FDR’s “Hold the Line” order efforts and Byrnes’ economic policies.33 By the placed Byrnes in a vulnerable position. end of April 1943, Byrnes feared that the A sign of how important the assistant United States might not have enough coal to president was to Roosevelt is that the continue to fight a world war. At his urging, President not only kept Byrnes in charge President Roosevelt issued an executive order of war mobilization, but he also increas- on May 1, followed the next evening by a ingly sought to draw on his valued partner’s powerful fireside chat, ordering the Interior vast experience in foreign affairs. With the Department “to take possession and operate the support of Cabinet members like Harry coal mines for the United States Government” Hopkins and the Attorney General, Byrnes and to “call upon all miners who may have sketched out a new role as Director of War abandoned their work to return immediately to Mobilization, a position he officially as- the mines and work for their Government.”34 sumed on May 27, 1943. It is hard to A compromise agreement was even- imagine that Byrnes’ charge in serving the tually secured, but official and unofficial President could expand, but as Director of 84 JOURNAL OF SUPREME COURT HISTORY

On May 27, 1943, FDR appointed Byrnes Director of War Mobilization, a newly created position in which he would be at once responsible for controlling wartime wages and prices while simultaneously managing the nation’s defense industries. On behalf of the President, he oversaw the addition of $20 billion worth of industrial investments to speed up production; the manufacture of nearly $64 billion worth of armaments; the additional employment of 18 million persons in war industries; and the exportation of $24 billion worth of goods to America’s allies.

War Mobilization, he enjoyed a realm of Byrnes’ lead role in mobilizing the discretion unavailable to him when he was economy and the arsenal of democracy was brokering disputes between different de- a dramatic success. However, this was not partment heads and competing economic the first time in modern history that the interests. Byrnes was now at once respon- American economy had successfully demon- sible for controlling wartime wages and strated itself on the battlefield. Both Byrnes prices while simultaneously managing the and Roosevelt experienced the economic and nation’s defense industries. On behalf of the social convulsions at the end of the First World President, he oversaw the addition of $20 War and they understood the challenge of billion worth of industrial investments to restoring some separation between state and speed up production; the manufacture of society, a barrier breached by the pressures of nearly $64 billion worth of armaments; the total war. It was with the particularly difficult additional employment of eighteen million problems of de‐mobilization, or reconversion, persons in war industries; and the exporta- where the assistance of Byrnes made the tion of $24 billion worth of goods to greatest difference. Failure to maintain high America’s allies.36 levels of employment as millions of men came Indeed, with Roosevelt increasingly back to work, failure to keep prices stable when abroad in late 1943 and 1944, Byrnes in the Army and Navy stopped buying goods, and effect became the Czar of the wartime the “economic defeatism” that would no doubt economy. Significantly, as an extra precau- affect many returning veterans adjust to the tion, the President before traveling out of the uncertain conditions of peace were challenges country left Byrnes with “an interesting form that,asByrnesputit,createda“crossroads” of blank check.” These were official papers, to “nobly gain or meanly lose the hope of signed by the President and locked in the world.”38 Byrnes’ safe, on which executive orders With hindsight, we know how this story might be issued in case of emergency. If ends: nearly twenty years of unparalleled such a grave situation arose, Byrnes, after prosperity and the crystallization of New consultation with Roosevelt by cable, was to Deal liberalism. But it was a fraught unlock the safe and fill out the executive transition that preoccupied the President order, calling for whatever actions he and his assistant president for the remainder thought necessary.37 of Roosevelt’s life. The last memorandum ANSWERING THE CALL 85

Byrnes sent to Roosevelt, six days before the war. Southern Democrats, with deep‐rooted President’s death, concerned the need to ties to Great Britain and great faith in an avoid duplication in the federal govern- assistant President who was a South ment’s planning obligations, a redundancy Carolinian, gave Roosevelt steadfast support Byrnes proposed to solve by making an as he maneuvered an isolationist country example of himself. Given the President’s toward support of England in its desperate desire to bestow planning authority on the hour, participation in World War II, and Bureau of the Budget after the war, Byrnes plans to maintain a strong presence in world declared his intention to resign from the affairs after the struggle with fascism in administration.39 In returning to a peacetime Europe and imperialism in Asia ended. Just footing, in restoring a degree of separation as the North and West invested their faith in between government and business, these two Freedom from Want, so the South became a strange bedfellows confirmed that a strong bedrock of Freedom from Fear. Would a presidency, one that could provide for a partnership between Roosevelt and Felix greater sense security at home and abroad, Frankfurter—clearly a competent and trusted need not become a dictatorship. ally to the New Deal—have accomplished this delicate joining of the two pillars of the New Deal Charter? This is a counterfactual worth pondering, one that offers insights into Conclusion: Byrnes, Roosevelt, and the indispensable alliance between the Partisanship in Modern America patrician and, as the Saturday Evening Post The Byrnes‐Roosevelt partnership re- described Byrnes, the “sly and able” vealed both the great strength of the New politician from the heart of the Confederacy.40 Deal and a powerful fault line that eventually Of course, the “Negro Question”—as fractured it. This odd coupling of two men New Dealers described the obstinate practice was so essential because Roosevelt’s con- of racial segregation—was the serpent in the stitutional revolution might never have New Deal Garden of Eden. Knowing this, gotten off the ground without an ally from Roosevelt took pains to avoid a direct the South, which was ground zero of the confrontation with the race issue, even opposition to Roosevelt’s grand experiment maintaining a deafening silence as an anti‐ in forging a presidency‐centered democracy. lynching bill, which had been before Con- Byrnes’ partnership with Roosevelt did not gress since the beginning of his presidency, prevent Southern resistance to his most was killed by a Senate filibuster in 1938. The ambitious plans. But support by the highly Fair Employment Practices Committee he regarded Byrnes for the constitutional trans- formed was a modest measure—one that formation Roosevelt heralded—in particular ultimately disappointed civil rights activists, his support of the Constitutional Revolution such as A. Philip Randolph, who pressured of 1937 and the Executive Reorganization Roosevelt to create the Committee as a sign Act—went far to ensure that the New Deal that the New Deal really could advance a would not, like Lincoln’s Republican Party, greater sense of security. In truth, FDR be confined to the North. Rather, the New shared Byrnes’ position that Jim Crow was a Deal was born and became part of America’s problem “to be solved by the White people living Constitution with, for a time, strong of the South.”41 Roosevelt’sso‐called 1938 multi‐regional support—the embodiment of purge campaign, which saw the President a newly imagined national community. interfere in several primary campaigns with The national scope of the New Deal was the objective of defeating Southern and border especially important with the approach of state conservative Democrats, especially those 86 JOURNAL OF SUPREME COURT HISTORY

Secretary of State Byrnes left the Truman administration in 1947 and returned to South Carolina to become governor. He became a leader of the massive Southern resistance movement to civil rights reform and criticized the Supreme Court’s Brown v. Board decision in an interview with U.S. News and World Report in 1956. He also became a leading architect of the Southern Strategy the Nixon Administration pursued to realign partisan politics below the Mason‐Dixon Line. who voted against the court‐packing and Seeing how intransigent was the tension executive reorganization initiatives, showed between his Northern and Southern flanks, all too clearly that there would be strong Roosevelt accepted the civil rights leaders’ resistance below the Mason‐Dixon Line to a veto of his desire to place the assistant national effort to breach the color line. president on the ticket with him in 1944, Although he focused intently on economic turning instead to the border‐state moderate issues in that campaign, Roosevelt’s effort to Harry Truman. Deeply embittered by purge Byrnes’ South Carolina colleague, Roosevelt’s spurning of his candidacy, made “Cotton Ed” Smith, the sort of race‐baiting worsewhenTrumansoquicklyascendedto politician whom Byrnes scorned, brought, as the White House, Byrnes had a troubled two journalists reported, “racial hatred to a relationship with the new President. He served peak which had not been reached since the Truman well as Secretary of State for two palmiest days of Pitchfork Ben Tillman.”42 years, playing a key role in negotiating ANSWERING THE CALL 87 difficult deals with an expansionist Soviet senior Republican leader who in partnership Union in the lead up to the Cold War. But with Nixon achieved “in only eight years when Truman, pressured by a rising civil what Republican leaders since Rutherford B. rights movement, made the first important Hayes in 1876 had desired: the retrenchment assaults on the ramparts of Jim Crow, most of the Republican Party from a position of notably in integrating the armed services and racial issues more liberal than that of the supporting an amicus curiae brief in the Democrats, and the rebuilding of the South Supreme Court in favor of the NAACP’s as a solid GOP electoral base.”46 suit against forced segregation in education, The fulfillment of Byrnes’ ambition to Byrnes cut his ties with the President. end the Democrat’s Southern monopoly It was this extension of the New Deal to ultimately led to the dramatic political civil rights, above all, that aroused Byrnes’ realignment that pulled the modern execu- desire to return to South Carolina, a hotbed tive into the vortex of a fierce partisan of the fierce resistance to civil rights reform. struggle for the services of the executive‐ Four years into his term as governor, the centered national state—a state that he, as Supreme Court, in the landmark case of Senator, Justice, and assistant president, had Brown v. Board of Education, ordered the played such a pivotal part in creating. Yet end to the egregious “separate but equal” amid this struggle, which has left the North doctrine that sustained white supremacy in and South as estranged as these regions the South. Like many Southerners, Byrnes have been since the Civil War, the institu- lambasted the decision.43 But he drew on his tion of the modern presidency remains at experience as a former Justice of that Court, the center of the current political storm. All to showcase its supposed folly. Sounding a elected Republican Presidents since the message that resembled more the idea of a cosmic crack‐up of the New Deal state— “concurrent majority” that his home state’s Nixon, Ronald Reagan, the Bushes, and fabled Senator John C. Calhoun prescribed Donald Trump—have embraced the modern than FDR’s New Nationalism, Byrnes urged presidency, even as they have sought to the South to adhere to its states’ rights redeploy it as a force for conservative doctrine and to abandon the Democratic causes: wars against communism and ter- Party in presidential elections. When rorism, law and order, and the protection of Eisenhower won in 1952, Byrnes declared “family values.” This is the ironic denoue- it the South’snew“Independence Day”— ment of the highly consequential relation- freed from the trappings of a wayward, ship between Franklin Roosevelt and progressive Democratic Party.44 Proudly pro- Jimmy Byrnes. This is the political conun- claiming himself an “Independent Democrat,” drum they left us to solve. Byrnes helped to groom a generation of Author’sNote: The authors wish to would‐be segregationists and abandoned the express their appreciation to James Cross, New Deal coalition he had long nurtured.45 the manuscript archivist in Clemson Uni- Byrnes’ final political act was to help versity’s Special Collection Library, who Richard Nixon and his political allies devise patiently helped us navigate the James a Southern strategy that encouraged the Francis Byrnes Papers. We also want to growth of the Republican Party in the South. thank Brenda Burke, Head of Special With the erosion of the Democrats’ lock on Collections, for her gracious hospitality as Southern politics, the party’s national we worked in the Clemson archives. Clare standing faltered and the extent of the New Cushman and Stephen L. Wasby provided Deal revolution waned. Officially spurning excellent editorial counsel during the final the Democrats in 1960, Byrnes became a preparation of this article. 88 JOURNAL OF SUPREME COURT HISTORY

ENDNOTES Papers, Series 9, Box 2, Folder 18. “Likker” is the colloquial spelling of “liquor,” and refers to anti‐ 1 Thomas Johnson served nearly a year before being Catholic prohibition ordinances. officially sworn in. But at 436 days his tenure is still 17 Edwards v. California, 314 U.S. 160 (1941). shorter than Byrnes’ by several days. 18 § 2615 of the Welfare and Institutions Code of 2 Franklin Roosevelt, Annual Message to Congress on California, St. 1937, p. 1406. the State of the Union, January 6. 1941, http:// 19 314 U. S. 175. www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=16092. 20 Ward v. Texas, 316 U.S. 547, 555 (1942). 3 Thomas L. Stokes, Chip Off My Shoulder (Princeton, 21 Robertson, Sly and Able, p. 302. The case was Hill v. NJ: Princeton University Press, 1940), p. 503. Texas, 316 U.S. 400 (1942). 4 James F. Byrnes, All in One Lifetime (London, UK: 22 Byrnes, All in One Lifetime, p. 136. Museum Press Limited, 1958.), pp. 66‐69. 23 James F. Byrnes to Clint T. Graydon. July 25, 5 Ibid., p. 74. 1941. In James F. Byrnes Papers,Series3,Box3, 6 Sidney M. Milkis and Marc Landy, “The Presidency in Folder 5. History: Leading from the Eye of the Storm,” in 24 Byrnes, All in One Lifetime, p. 140. Michael Nelson, ed. The Presidency and the Political 25 Robertson, Sly and Able, p. 307. System, Eleventh edition (Washington, D.C.: CQ Press, 26 Alexander Hamilton. 1788. “Federalist 70: The 2018), 114: 93‐130. Executive Department Further Considered, March 18.” 7 Byrnes, All in One Lifetime, p. 135. In 1935, the Available through the Avalon Project: http://avalon.law. Supreme Court moved from its quarters in the Senate to yale.edu/18th_century/fed70.asp. “the veritable palace of white marble” on First Street 27 Francis Biddle to James F. Byrnes. December 16, just across from the Capital Plaza. As Byrnes recounted, 1941. In James F. Byrnes Papers, Series 3, Box 2, the shift from his Senate quarters, although commo- Folder 12. dious, to the Supreme Court Building marked a great 28 James F. Byrnes to Alben Barkley. January 10, 1942; change. The new judicial quarters “reflected a dignified Oscar Cox to James F. Byrnes. January 14, 1942; Oscar strength and even aloofness far removed from the Cox to James F. Byrnes. January 20, 1942. In James F. organized confusion of the Hill.” As we shall see below, Byrnes Papers, Series 3, Box 6, Folder 16; Byrnes, All Byrnes was greatly honored by his appointment to the in One Lifetime, p. 149. Court, but disconcerted by its insulation from the rest of 29 James F. Byrnes to Members of the Supreme Court. government and public opinion. October 5, 1942. In James F. Byrnes Papers, Series 3, 8 Humphrey’s Executor v. United States, 295 U.S. Box 7, Folder 3. 602 (1935). 30 Byrnes, All in One Lifetime, p. 155. 9 A.L.A. Schechter Poultry Corp. v. United States, 295 31 Delbert Clark. “Our No. 1 Stabilizer,” October 18, U.S. 495 (1935). 1942, The New York Times, Oct. 18, 1942, p. SM5; the 10 Congressional Record, 75th Congress, Second PM article is one of few clippings saved by Byrnes: Session, 1: 934‐937. Henry Lieberman. “America’s No. 1 Inflation Stopper,” 11 Note is preserved and contained in the James F. PM, Oct. 23, 1942, in James F. Byrnes Papers, Series 2, Byrnes Papers, Series 2, Box 44, Folder 9. Box 1, Oversize File. 12 “Reorganization of the Federal Judiciary: Radio 32 “The War Against Inflation.” February 9, 1943. In Address of Hon. James F. Byrnes.” February 17, 1937. James F. Byrnes Papers, Series 9, Box 5, Folder 18; Printed in the Appendix to the Congressional Record, 75th “Hold the Line Order.” April 1943. In James F. Byrnes Congress, Session 1. February 19, 1937, pp. 276‐278. Papers, Series 9, Box 5, Folder 20; Walter Brown to 13 Quoted in David Robertson, Sly and Able: A James F. Byrnes. April 16, 1943. In James F. Byrnes Political Biography of James F. Byrnes (New York: Papers, Series 4, Box 10, Folder 10. Norton, 1994), 260. 33 James F. Byrnes to Franklin D. Roosevelt. May 14, 14 Cited in: James T. Patterson. 1967. Congressional 1943. In James F. Byrnes Papers, Series 4, Box 1, Folder 4. Conservatism and the New Deal: The Growth of the 34 Executive Order 9340 on Seizure of Coal Mines, Conservative Coalition in Congress, 1933‐1939 May 1, 1943. (Lexington, KY: University of Kentucky Press), p. 120. 35 United States v. Teamsters Local 807, 315 U.S. 15 Barry Karl, “Constitution and Central Planning: The 521 (1942). Third New Deal Revisited,” The Supreme Court Review. 36 Problems of Mobilization and Reconversion: First Eds., Philip B. Kurland, Gerhard Casper, and Daniel Report to the President, the Senate, and the House of Hutchinson (Chicago and London: University of Representatives, January 1, 1944. Office of War Chicago Press, 1989), 197: 163‐201. Mobilization. In Walter Brown Papers,Clemson 16 James F. Byrnes, Senate Campaign Speech in University Archives, Box 9, Folder 24. Charleston, South Carolina, Radio. In James F. Byrnes ANSWERING THE CALL 89

37 Byrnes documents in his memoirs how Roosevelt left 41 Congressional Record, Appendix. 76th Congress, him blank checks and the practice is corroborated in his Session 1. January 4, 1939, p. 16. personal papers, All in One Lifetime, p. 239. 42 Allan Michie and Frank Ryhlick, Dixie Demagogues 38 “Problems of Reconversion.” September 27, 1944. In (New York, NY: The Vanguard Press, 1939) p. 266. James F. Byrnes Papers, Series 9, Box 6, Folder 13. 43 James F. Byrnes. “The Supreme Court Must Be 39 James F. Byrnes to Franklin D. Roosevelt. April 6, Curbed.” May 18, 1956. U.S. News & World Report, 1945. In James F. Byrnes Papers, Series 4, Box 12, Special Reprint. Folder 2. 44 “Victory for Eisenhower.” November 5, 1952. In 40 Joseph Alsop and Robert Kintner, “Sly and Able: The James F. Byrnes Papers, Series 9, Box 13, Folder 8. Real Leader of the Senate, Jimmy Byrnes.” Saturday 45 Robertson, Sly and Able, Chapter 19. Evening Post, July 20, 1940. 46 Ibid., p. 540.