#louis brandeis

[ryanhamiltonwalsh]

Walking by the court house in Dedham, MA the other night, I started thinking about Sacco & Vanzetti again, and their infamous, shameful trial in the same building where—despite a mountain of evidence and worldwide protests in their favor—they were found guilty and subsequently executed in 1927.

Woody Guthrie wrote an entire album about it, and if you've never heard the folk legend sing the town name Dedham ("we're stuck here in this dark Dedham jail"), you can remedy that here.

At the time, a Supreme Court justice owned a second home in Dedham, just a few yards away from the jail in question. Louis Brandeis, appointed by Woodrow Wilson, was a Supreme Court Justice of the United States from 1916 to 1939. A good summary of Brandeis, and why he was controversial, came from a fellow justice and went like this: "Brandeis was a militant crusader for social justice whoever his opponent might be. He was dangerous not only because of his brilliance, his arithmetic, his courage. He was dangerous because he was incorruptible … [and] the fears of the Establishment were greater because Brandeis was the first Jew to be named to the Court."

Brandeis adored Dedham, telling his brother, "Dedham is a spring of eternal youth for me. I feel newly made and ready to deny the existence of these gray hairs." I didn't know it until recently, but I walk by this house once a week on my hometown walk-route with my friend Julia. 195 Village Ave.

Louis Brandeis's wife, Alice Goldmark Brandeis, was perhaps even more progressive than her husband, well known as a vocal proponent of women's rights and labor causes. During the trial of Sacco & Vanzetti, she permitted Sacco's family to stay in their Dedham home to make visits to the jail easier. And get a kleenex ready, because one detail related to that you simply must know is: "Sacco's seven-year-old son, Dante, would sometimes stand on the sidewalk outside the jail and play catch with his father by throwing a ball over the wall." Additionally, Alice made a significant donation to their defense fund.

The entire case is fascinating, multi-faceted, full of twists and turns and potential evidence tampering by law enforcement, and in that way (and only that way), it is similar to what's being tried there right now. Officer Albert Hamilton tried to walk out of the court room with Sacco's gun, only to be stopped at the last moment by the judge. Post-trial, police Captain Van Amburgh took Sacco and Vanzetti's guns and bullets home, where they stayed until 1960 (!) until the Boston Globe uncovered the scandal. If you're curious, I recommend reading Tragedy in Dedham by Francis Russell.

They were found guilty. Worldwide protests erupted. Bombs were mailed. 20,000 gathered at Boston Common. Pleas for clemency abounded.

"Sacco and Vanzetti’s lawyers, rebuffed by the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, aimed at convincing a justice to issue a temporary stay of execution until the U.S. Supreme Court could fully review whether the two men had received a fair trial. ...Louis Brandeis, another progressive justice, recused himself from the case, because his wife, Alice, had made a significant donation to Sacco and Vanzetti’s defense fund." — SCOUTSblog

This is all to say, hey, how about that? Recusing yourself from an issue because of your wife's strong, public opinions on the matter? Justice Alito and Thomas wouldn't be worthy of cleaning Brandeis's toilet.

[cygneeclectique]

"We must make our choice. We may have democracy in this country, or we may have great wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can't have both."

Louis D. Brandeis, as quoted by Raymond Lonergan in Mr. Justice Brandeis, Great American (1941, p. 42)

[bennettmarko]

The most important political office is that of the private citizen.

- Louis Brandeis

[linusjf]

Brian K. Blackden: Justice and privacy

“Justice: To seek it, one must be willing to give up the right to privacy, as nothing more private will become more public.” —Brian K. Blackden.

[brieucgwalder]

Warhol: ten portraits

It was a somewhat disappointing expo in Paris, last September. “Gertrude Stein and Picasso” at the Musée du Luxembourg, at the back of the Palais du Luxembourg where the French Senate is housed. I’d been “had” before in the same place. Only a couple of rooms with “non-essential” works. For the price of a ticket to Orsay. Oh well. Curators have to justify their wages I guess. Then came the Biiig…

[aunti-christ-ine]

[galerymod]

Our government... teaches the whole people by its example. If the government becomes the lawbreaker, it breeds contempt for law; it invites every man to become a law unto himself; it invites anarchy.

Louis D. Brandeis

As long as injustice exists, resistance is the duty of every humanistically socialized person, because it is the only way to ensure that history changes for the better.

mod

[bostonwalks]

[victorinoxghoul]

TEHEE

leave my house little man

[waiting-eyez]

If we desire respect for the law, We must first make the law respectable.

(Louis D Brandeis)

[filosofablogger]

Just HOW Did We Get Here??? Ask Thom ...

The following article by Thom Hartmann is lengthy, but I believe worth taking the time to read.  Mr. Hartmann very accurately pinpoints how we have become, in essence, a nation ruled by the obscenely wealthy.  I tried, in the interest of brevity, to edit this piece, to cut out some parts, but in the long run I felt everything he said was necessary to our understanding.  I do hope you’ll take the…

[bouncinghedgehog]

[postersbykeith]

[spacelazarwolf]

in honor of that anon who said jews have done nothing for the world, here’s a non exhaustive list of things we’ve done for the world:

arts, fashion, and lifestyle:

jeans - levi strauss

modern bras - ida rosenthal

sewing machines - isaac merritt singer

modern film industry - carl laemmle (universal pictures), adolph zukor (paramount pictures), william fox (fox film forporation), louis b. mayer (mgm - metro-goldwyn-mayer), harry, sam, albert, and jack warners (warner bros.), steven spielberg, mel brooks, marx brothers

operetta - jacques offenbach

comic books - stan lee

graphic novels - will eisner

teddy bears - morris and rose michtom

influential musicians - irving berlin, stephen sondheim, benny goodman, george gershwin, paul simon, itzhak perlman, leonard bernstein, bob dylan, leonard cohen

artists - mark rothko

actors - elizabeth taylor, jerry lewis, barbara streisand

comedians - lenny bruce, joan rivers, jerry seinfeld

authors - judy blume, tony kushner, allen ginsberg, walter mosley

culture:

esperanto - ludwik lazar zamenhof

feminism - betty friedan, gloria steinem, ruth bader ginsberg

queer and trans rights - larry kramer, harvey milk, leslie feinberg, abby stein, kate bornstein, frank kameny, judith butler

international women's day - clara zetkin

principles of journalizm, statue of liberty, and pulitzer prize - joseph pulitzer

"the new colossus" - emma lazarus

universal declaration of human rights - rene samuel cassin

holocaust remembrance and human rights activism - elie wiesel

workers rights - louis brandeis, rose schneiderman

public health care, women's rights, and children's rights - lillian wald

racial equity - rabbi abraham joshua heschel, julius rosenwald, andrew goodman, michael schwerner

political theory - hannah arendt

disability rights - judith heumann

black lives matter slogan and movement - alicia garza

#metoo movement - jodi kantor

institute of sexology - magnus hirschfeld

technology:

word processing computers - evelyn berezin

facebook - mark zuckerberg

console video game system - ralph henry baer

cell phones - amos edward joel jr., martin cooper

3d - leonard lipton

telephone - philipp reis

fax machines - arthur korn

microphone - emile berliner

gramophone - emile berliner

television - boris rosing

barcodes - norman joseph woodland and bernard silver

secret communication system, which is the foundation of the technology used for wifi - hedy lamarr

three laws of robotics - isaac asimov

cybernetics - norbert wiener

helicopters - emile berliner

BASIC (programming language) - john george kemeny

google - sergey mikhaylovich brin and larry page

VCR - jerome lemelson

fax machine - jerome lemelson

telegraph - samuel finley breese morse

morse code - samuel finley breese morse

bulletproof glass - edouard benedictus

electric motor and electroplating - boris semyonovich jacobi

nuclear powered submarine - hyman george rickover

the internet - paul baran

icq instant messenger - arik vardi, yair goldfinger,, sefi vigiser, amnon amir

color photography - leopold godowsky and leopold mannes

world's first computer - herman goldstine

modern computer architecture - john von neumann

bittorrent - bram cohen

voip internet telephony - alon cohen

data archiving - phil katz, eugene roshal, abraham lempel, jacob ziv

nemeth code - abraham nemeth

holography - dennis gabor

laser - theodor maiman

instant photo sharing online - philippe kahn

first automobile - siegfried samuel marcus

electrical maglev road - boris petrovich weinberg

drip irrigation - simcha blass

ballpoint pen and automatic gearbox - laszlo biro

photo booth - anatol marco josepho

medicine:

pacemakers and defibrillators - louise robinovitch

defibrillators - bernard lown

anti-plague and anti-cholera vaccines - vladimir aronovich khavkin

polio vaccine - jonas salk

test for diagnosis of syphilis - august paul von wasserman

test for typhoid fever - ferdinand widal

penicillin - ernst boris chain

pregnancy test - barnhard zondek

antiretroviral drug to treat aids and fight rejection in organ transplants - gertrude elion

discovery of hepatitis c virus - harvey alter

chemotherapy - paul ehrlich

discovery of prions - stanley prusiner

psychoanalysis - sigmund freud

rubber condoms - julius fromm

birth control pill - gregory goodwin pincus

asorbic acid (vitamin c) - tadeusz reichstein

blood groups and rh blood factor - karl landsteiner

acyclovir (treatment for infections caused by herpes virus) - gertrude elion

vitamins - caismir funk

technique for measuring blood insulin levils - rosalyn sussman yalow

antigen for hepatitus - baruch samuel blumberg

a bone fusion technique - gavriil abramovich ilizarov

homeopathy - christian friedrich samuel hahnemann

aspirin - arthur ernst eichengrun

science:

theory of relativity - albert einstein

theory of the electromagnetic field - james maxwell

quantum mechanics - max born, gustav ludwig hertz

quantum theory of gravity - matvei bronstein

microbiology - ferdinand julius cohn

neuropsychology - alexander romanovich luria

counters for x-rays and gamma rays - robert hofstadter

genetic engineering - paul berg

discovery of the antiproton - emilio gino segre

discovery of cosmic microwave background radiation - arno allan penzias

discovery of the accelerating expansion of the universe - adam riess and saul merlmutter

discovery that black hole formation is a robust prediction of the general theory of relativity - roger penrose

discovery of a supermassive compact object at the center of the milky way - andrea ghez

modern cosmology and the big bang theory - alexander alexandrovich friedmann

stainless steel - hans goldschmidt

gas powered vehicles

interferometer - albert abraham michelson

discovery of the source of energy production in stars - hans albrecht bethe

proved poincare conjecture - grigori yakovlevich perelman

biochemistry - otto fritz meyerhof

electron-positron collider - bruno touschek

[linusjf]

Louis D. Brandeis: Sin Of Neutrality

“Neutrality is at times a graver sin than belligerence.” —Louis D. Brandeis. http://www.gettyimages.com/detail/96795389

[philosophicalconservatism]

"Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the government's purposes are beneficent. Men born to freedom are naturally alert to repel invasion of their liberty by evil-minded rulers. The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well-meaning but without understanding"

Louis Brandeis (1856-1941) U.S. Supreme Court justice