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send an e-mail to [email protected]
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Please Reply To:
Henry Hamilton III
6602 N. 60th Street
Milwaukee, WI 53223
(414) 760-2347
September 4,
2001 (Original Submission)
John Linehan
Emily Koczela
Nancy Bornstein
Superintendent
President
Member
Shorewood School District
Shorewood School Board
Shorewood School Board
1701 E. Capitol Dr.
4259 N. Larkin
3536 N. Frederick
Shorewood, WI 53211
Shorewood, WI 53211
Shorewood, WI 53211
Ruth Treisman
Mark Freding
Member
Member
Shorewood School Board
Shorewood School District
2701 E. Beverly
4132 N. Maryland Ave.
Shorewood, WI 53211
Shorewood, WI 53211
RE: Open
Letter Regarding Tradition of Excellence Award
On
September 14, 2001, the Shorewood School District intends to present United
States Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist the district’s first “Tradition of
Excellence Award.”
Rehnquist, as a clerk to Justice Robert Jackson, wrote
the memorandum “A Random Thought on the Segregation Cases,” wherein he advised
Justice Jackson to reaffirm Plessy v. Ferguson and its endorsement of
state supported segregation and its acceptance of the Jim Crow “separate but
equal” principle.
Rehnquist testified under oath that the memorandum did
not reflect with his views, but rather the views of Justice Jackson. Rehnquist went so far as to attribute
his statements to Justice Jackson.
Justice Jackson was deceased at the time and therefore unable to defend
himself against these attacks.
Elsie Douglas, Justice Jackson’s former secretary, defended her boss and
sharply criticized Rehnquist for smearing the name and reputation of Justice
Jackson. Several scholars have
suggested that Rehnquist may have committed perjury.
Rehnquist, as law clerk for Justice Jackson, wrote
memoranda endorsing Texas’ white primaries and Texas’ practice of restricting
the rights of blacks to vote in private primaries. Rehnquist wrote “I
take a dim view of this pathological search for discrimination. . . and as a
result I now have a mental block against the case.” In another memo he wrote: “The
Constitution does not prevent the majority from banding together, nor does it
attaint success in the effort. It
is about time the Court faced the fact that the white people of the south don’t
like the colored people; the constitution restrains them from effecting thru
(sic) state action but it most assuredly did not appoint the Court as a
sociological watchdog to rear up every time private discrimination raises its
admittedly ugly head.”
As
President Nixon’s Assistant Attorney General, Rehnquist wrote a proposed
constitutional amendment designed to limit the enforcement of Brown v. Board
of Education. According to
Rehnquist, the amendment was designed to permit northern schools to preserve de
facto segregation through “neighborhood schools” initiatives. He believed the amendment would allow
gerrymandering of schools districts even if the neighborhood plan was “adopted
by the local school board at least partly because they would make some schools
largely white, and others largely black.”
Rehnquist fought passage of a Phoenix, Arizona
ordinance permitting blacks to enter stores and restaurants. He
appeared before the Phoenix City Council voicing opposition to the city’s
proposed public accommodations ordinance.
Additionally, he wrote a letter criticizing the council’s decision to the
Arizona Republic after the ordinance was passed.
Rehnquist was actively involved in operation “Eagle Eye”
which harassed minority voters in Arizona.
James Brosnahan, a former assistant U.S. attorney in Phoenix from 1961 to
1963, said in a statement to Congress that on election day in 1962 he and
several assistant U.S. attorneys were assigned the task of reviewing complaints
alleging illegal interference with the voting process. Brosnahan visited a precinct in
South Phoenix. When he arrived he
saw Rehnquist. Brosnahan said the
complaints involved Rehnquist.
Brosnahan did not witness Rehnquist engage in harassing conduct. Several witnesses stated they personally
observed Rehnquist harassing minority voters in Arizona. Indeed, former Arizona State Senator
Manuel Pena reported that poll watchers had to physically push Rehnquist out of
a polling place to stop him from interfering with the voting rights of the
minority citizens. Rehnquist
denied under oath that he was personally involved in harassing
voters.
Rehnquist owned one or more properties with restrictive
covenants barring the sale of his property to nonwhites and Jews. Rehnquist, a sophisticated lawyer,
professed ignorance of the restrictive covenant.
Justice Rehnquist voted to grant Bob Jones
University tax exempt status. In
1970, the IRS ruled that Bob Jones University could not enjoy tax exempt status
because of its racially discriminatory policies. Bob Jones University began admitting
blacks on a limited basis. For
instance, Blacks could enroll at the school, but only if they were married to
other blacks or promised not to date or marry outside the black race. Bob Jones University applied for
tax exempt status and was denied.
Bob Jones University sued to restore its tax exemption and won. The case went before the U.S. Supreme
Court. The Court in an 8-1 decision
held that the university’s policy violated deeply accepted views of elementary
justice and therefore it could not enjoy tax exempt status. The Court held that nonprofit private
schools that prescribe and enforce racially discriminatory admission standards
on the basis of religious doctrine do not qualify as tax‑exempt organizations
under the Internal Revenue Code, nor are contributions to such schools
deductible as charitable contributions.
Justice Rehnquist was the sole dissenter!
Chief Justice Rehnquist in Bush v. Gore
disregarded his longstanding approach to Equal Protection analysis; ended the
2000 Election by stopping the Florida hand count in the name of Equal
Protection, which effectively disenfranchised thousands of African-American
voters; and as Justice Stevens so eloquently stated damaged the “Nation’s
confidence in the judge as an impartial guardian of the rule of law.” More than
670 legal scholars stated that this was a ruling, not of a court of law, but of
political partisans.
For
the above reasons, we, the undersigned members of an ad hoc coalition protesting
Chief Justice Rehnquist’s receipt of the Tradition of Excellence Award,
respectfully request the Shorewood School District to reconsider its decision to
present the district’s Tradition of Excellence Award to Chief Justice Rehnquist,
and urge it to present the award to an individual or group more reflective of
the values the Shorewood School District represents. In the event the school district refuses
to reconsider its decision, we request that the students be given equal time and
access to civil rights lawyers from the Milwaukee Branch NAACP, the Milwaukee
Chapter of the National Lawyers Guild and/or the Individual Rights and
Responsibilities Section of the State Bar of Wisconsin who are critical of Chief
Justice Rehnquist’s record.
Respectfully
submitted,
Atty. Michael Cohn
(Shorewood resident)
Atty. Colleen
Cote’
Wendy Daniell (Shorewood
resident)
Atty. Micabil Diaz (Legal
Dir., American Civil Liberties Union of Wisconsin)
Atty. Laurence J. Dupuis
(Shorewood resident)
Julie Enslow (Shorewood
resident)
Bob Fertik (Managing Partner
Democrats.com)
Gary Grass (Shorewood
resident)
Babette Grunow (Shorewood
resident)
Atty. Henry Hamilton
III
Atty. Arthur Heitzer (National
Lawyers Guild - Milwaukee)
Atty. Jake Herro (Shorewood
resident)
Rev. Earl
Kammerud
Robert Koss (Shorewood
resident)
Bob Kunst (President Oral
Majority)
Robert
Madison
Will Maier (Shorewood
resident and S.H.S. student)
David Novick (Shorewood H.S.
Alumnus)
Jennifer Olenchek (National
Organization for Women – Milwaukee)
Jennifer
Plevin
Dan
Pryzbyla
Michael R. Rhodes (Shorewood
resident)
Marc Sanders (Shorewood
resident)
William Sell
Liz Taylor (Shorewood
resident)
