503801
William J. Brennan, Jr.
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William Joseph Brennan, Jr., 1906-1997. Associate Justice, Supreme Court of the United States. Mint signature, Wm J Brennan Jr., on a 3½" x 5" card, with a small photograph of Brennan mounted in the upper left corner.
Brennan, a Democrat, was the most liberal, and most influential, justice of the modern Supreme Court. The Republican who appointed him, President Dwight D. Eisenhower, publicly complained later that the appointment was a mistake. But in a tribute to Brennan following his death, Harvard law professor Laurence H. Tribe called Brennan "the principal architect of the nation's system for protecting individual rights." Brennan, he said, "played the pivotal role in . . . building an enduring edifice of common sense and uncommon wisdom that transformed the landscape of America.”
The American ideal of democracy—one person, one vote—flows from Brennan’s opinion in Baker v. Carr (1962), which allowed a federal constitutional challenge to a Tennessee apportionment statute denying equal protection of the laws. Brennan articulated the modern conception of free speech, weighing the rights of the press against the rights of public persons, in New York Times Co. v. Sullivan (1964), which held that, under the First Amendment, public officials may not recover for defamation unless the speaker either knew that his statements were false or acted with reckless disregard for whether they were false. Brennan was typically eloquent in Texas v. Johnson (1989), which held that the state could not punish a person for burning the American flag in protest. He wrote:
We are tempted to say . . . that the flag’s deservedly cherished place in our community will be strengthened, not weakened, by our holding today. Our decision is a reaffirmation of the principles of freedom and inclusiveness that the flag best reflects, and of the conviction that our toleration of criticism . . . is a sign and source of our strength. . . . The way to preserve the flag’s special role is not to punish those who feel differently about these matters. It is to persuade them that they are wrong. . . . [P]recisely because it is our flag that is involved, one’s response to the flag burner may exploit the uniquely persuasive power of the flag itself. We can imagine no more appropriate response to burning a flag than waving one’s own, no better way to counter a flag burner’s message than by saluting the flag that burns, no surer means of preserving the dignity even of the flag that burned than by—as one witness here did—according its remains a respectful burial. We do not consecrate the flag by punishing its desecration, for in doing so we dilute the freedom that this cherished emblem represents.
Brennan, the son of Irish immigrants, grew up in New Jersey. He graduated from Harvard Law School in 1931. He practiced law in New Jersey before being appointed a state trial judge. He became an appellate judge in 1951, and the next year he was appointed to the New Jersey Supreme Court. Although Brennan was a Democrat, President Eisenhower appointed him an Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court in 1956.
During nearly 34 years on the Court, Brennan served with 22 other justices, one-fifth of those who had ever served. He wrote an astounding 1,573 opinions: 533 majority opinions, 694 dissents, and 346 concurrences.
Brennan has boldly signed the card in blue. The signature is in mint condition.
Unframed.
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