Irwin Goldbloom Complete Oral History

Oral History Project
The Historical SocietY of the
District of Columbia Circuit
United States Courts
District of Columbia Circuit
Irwin Goldbloom, Esquire
Interviews conducted bY:
Elizabeth Sarah Gere, Esquire
of the Dirh.cl
* *
February 1, March 28, and October 3Lrl992
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Preface ………………………………………………………. 1
Oral History Agreements
Irwin Goldbloom, Esq. . ……………………………………… ii
Elizabeth Sarah Gere, Esq . …………………………………… vi
Biographical Sketches
Irwin Goldbloom, Esq . ……………………………………… x
Elizabeth Sarah Gere, Esq. …………………………………… xi
Oral History Transcript of Interviews on February 1, March 28, and
October 31, 1992 …………………………………………… 1
Index ……………………………………………………… Al
NOTE
The following pages record interviews conducted on the dates indicated. The interviews
were electronically recorded, and the transcription was subsequently reviewed and edited
by the interviewee.
The contents hereof and all literary rights pertaining hereto are governed by, and are
subject to, the Oral History Agreements included herewith.
@ 1996 Historical Society of the District of Columbia Circuit.
All rights reserved.
PREFACE
The goal of the Oral History Project of the Historical Society of the District of Columbia
Circuit is to preserve the recollections of the judges who sat on the U.S. Courts of the
District of Columbia Circuit, and judges’ spouses, lawyers and court staff who played
important roles in the history ofthe Circuit. The Project began in 1991. Most interviews
were conducted by volunteers who are members of the Bar of the District of Columbia.
Copies ofthe transcripts of these interviews, a copy of the transcript on 3.5″ diskette (in
WordPerfect format), and additional documents as available – some of which may have
been prepared in conjunction with the oral history – are housed in the Judges’ Library in
the United States Courthouse,333 Constitution Avenue, N.W., Washington, D.C.
Inquiries may be made of the Circuit Librarian as to whether the transcript and diskette
are available at other locations.
Such original audio tapes of the interviews as exist as well as the original 3.5″ diskettes of
the transcripts are in the custody of the Circuit Executive of the U. S. Courts for the
District of Columbia Circuit.
-l–
The Historical Society of the District of Columbia Circuit
Oral History Donation Agreement of
Xl2VJD! oNnor Na in6e (PCXrintedD) €LOf)V1
CI, oIrluwminb iGa oCldirbcluoiot,m W, Easshqi.n ,g dtoon h, eDre.Cb.y a gnrda nitts aenmdp cloonyveeesy, taog Tenhtes ,H suisctcoersicsaolr sS aoncdie atyss oigfn tsh e(h Derisetirniacftt oefr ncooltl elicmtiivteeldy ,t o” tdhieg iStaolc ireetcyo”r)d ainllg sm ayn rdi gchatsss, ettittele t,a apneds )i natnedre tsrta nins ctrhiep tvso oicfe m rye coorradli nhgisst o(irnyc ilnutdeirnvgie bwust pasr edseersvcaritbioend ainnd S pcuhbeldicualeti oAn ohfe rmetyo ,o rinalc hluidstionrgy .l iterary rights and copyrights, for the purpose of
All copies of such recordings and transcripts are subject to the same terms herein provided.
Ifo urnmd eorrs tafonrmd tahta, t itnhcel uSdoicnige typu mblaiyc adtuiopnli coant et,h eed iItn, toernr peutb. liIs hp esurmchit r ethceo rudsien gosf a snudc thr arnesccorridpitnsg isn aanndy transcripts in any manner that the Society considers appropriate.
I waive any claims I may have or acquire to any royalties from such use.
rI erceosredrivneg sfo arn dm tyrsaenlsfc arinpdts toan tdh eth eexire ccountoter not fa ms ay reesstoauterc oe nfolyr tahney nboono-ke,x pclaumsipvhel erti,g ru::htthl to ,4􀃮C. 1&Vyp writing of which I or my executor may be the author or co-auth . ..:·’ ,,􀃰􀃯 … .o..r.. o..t.h…e./,:,.. 􀃱’,/, -,,
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i”. h. / ·ry’-SUBSCRIBED be1ore me t 1s / f ,'”-,Al ,11.1” 􀀄0£. day o •£pl ·rv1 b-<lI” . 1.v 􀃳
Notary Public
My Commission expires: JI /ly/;{17,S
TAhCeC HEiPsTtoEriDca tlh Siso ct,&iety􀀃 of yth oef D istrict f Co􀃴lumbia C i2rc􀃵uit. by James E. Rocap, III, President of
ii
iii
Historical Society of the District of Columbia Circuit
Agreement
1. In consideration of the recording and preservation of my
oral history memoir by the Historical Society of the District of
Columbia Circuit, Washington, D.C., its employees and agents
( hereinafter II the Society 11) I, X ew, v 60£-J:> 8L—DO..v\
do hereby grant and convey to the Society, its successors and
assigns, the ownership of the tape recordings and transcripts of
interviews of me ·as described in Schedule A hereto, except as
otherwise provided herein. I also grant and convey to the
Society all right, title, and interest I might have in such
tapes, transcripts and their content, including literary rights
and copyrights. All copies of the tapes and transcripts are
subject to the same restrictions.
2. I have not previously conveyed, assigned, encumbered or
impaired my rights and interest in the tapes, transcripts and
their content referred to above, except as may appear in prior
works of mine.
3. It is agreed that access to the aforementioned tape
recordings and transcripts shall be preserved and made available
in accordance with the direction and control of the Society and
subject to terms to be set by the Society. I authorize the
Society, subject to the above and to any exceptions contained
herein, to duplicate, edit, publish, or permit the use of said
tape recordings and transcripts in any manner that the Society
considers appropriate, and I waive my claim to any royalties from
such use.
4. I reserve the right to use the tapes and transcripts and
their content as a resource for any book, pamphlet, article or
::::􀀅 J!􀀃 ;:i􀀌:: an au􀀍i􀀎-
@􀀂 􀀅.,,,􀀆s- 􀀇 U1 􀀁 Date: I
DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA; S’S:
President
Historical Society of the
District of Columbia Circuit
Subscribed and sworn to before me this 24th day of January, 1994.
My commission expires: 3/14/94
iv
Notary Puic
Schedule A
Tape recording(s) and transcript resulting from
interviews conducted by
on the following dates:
Elizabeth Sarah Gere
February 1 , 1992, March 28, 1992 and October 31 , 19S
v
The Historical Society of the District of Columbia Circuit
Oral History Donation Agreement of
r:1.:J 12-tlbe-/h ✓-u· Y7″, ),, G,:, ir,
-C/\,/ £,,\; ‘ l, I’ e.,
Donor Name (Printed)
I, Elizabeth Sarah Gere, do hereby grant and convey to The Historical Society of the District of
Columbia Circuit, Washington, D.C. and its employees, agents, successors and assigns
(hereinafter collectively, “the Society”) all my rights, title, and interest in the voice recordings
(including but not limited to digital recordings and cassette tapes) and transcripts of the oral
history interviews I conducted with Irwin Goldbloom, Esq., as described in Schedule A hereto,
including literary rights and copyrights, for the purpose of preservation and publication of the
oral history oflrwin G0ldbloom, Esq ..
All copies of such recordings and transcripts are subject to the same terms herein provided.
I understand that the Society may duplicate, edit, or publish such recordings and transcripts in
any form or format, including publication on the Internet. I permit the use of such recordings
and transcripts in any manner that the Society considers appropriate.
I waive any claims I may have or acquire to any royalties from such use.
I agree that I will make no use of the oral history, or the information contained therein, until it is
concluded, edited and published by the Society, or until I receive earlier permission from the
Society.
SWORN TO AND SUBSCRIBED bofo,e m• this q–tt; of. M;J-,-# ).J,,
Jo-1!.–k-Ai J2 W c;JQ_) 5-
Notary Publi ( ,, (i ;, ‘ .er’ ‘fc ‘./ii,,.._
‘
My Commission expires: 0 !/{)// 1.o l-/
fl- ,. ’77􀀇 ACCEPTED this 21L day of 􀁳 {. 20:;i,y James E. Recap, III, President of
The Historical Society of the Distric of Columbia Circuit.
Vi
Schedule r,. 10 Oral History Donation Agreement of
f£J ,-z…Q.be!A, 5q r.Q. t,. G:e<“if…
Donor Name (Printed)
Voice recordings (Including but not limited to digital recordings and cassette tapes) and
transcripts resuhlng from the oral history interviews of Irwin Ooldbloom, Esq. conducted by
Ell211beth Sarah Gere on the followlns dates:
Interview No. Date
2
3
·February l, 1992
March 28, 1992
October 2 l, 1992
Destrlptlon ot Media
Contalnln; Voice
Recordings
Transcript Pace
Nurnbers
1-S4
S5-68
69-92
vii
Historical Society of the District of Columbia Circuit
Agreement
1. In consideration of the recording and preservation of
the oral history memoir, prepared by Irwin Goldbloom and
Cmier, cubiyt t, hWe aHsihsintgotroinc,a l DS.oC.c,i etity so fe mtphleo yDeeiss traincdt aogefn tCso lu(mhberiae inafter “gtrahne tS oancdi etcoy”n)v eyI , to Etlhizea bSeotch iSeatrya,h Gietrse successors and asdos ighenrse, byt’h e odwesnecrrsihbiedp ionf Stchhee dtualpee Ar ehcoerrdetinog.s Ia ndal stor angsrcarnitp tasn do cf oinnvteeyr vtio ewtsh e as. Staopceiset, y tralaln scrriigphtts, atnidt let,h eianrd c oinntteerntes, t iIn cmluidgihntg hlaivtee irna rsy urcihg hts saundb jceocpty rtoi ghtthes .s amAel lr ecsotpriiecst ioofn st.h e tapes and transcripts are
impair2e.d Im y harvigeh tnso t apnrde ivnitoeurselsy tc ionn vtehyee dt, apaesssi, gtnreadn, scenrciupmtbse raendd or their content referred to above.
record3i.n gsr t anisd targarnesedcr itphtast sachcaelsls b et oi tn haec caofrordeamnecnet iwiotnhe dt thea pe dsietr ecbty iotnh e aSndoc iceotnyt.r olI oafu tthhoer Siozcei tehtey Saoncdi estuyb,j escutb jteoc tte rtmo s tthoe be paubbolvies ha,n d ort o pearnmy ite xctehpet iuosne so fc osnatiadi ntedap eh erreeicno,r dtinog sd uapnldi cate, edit, tanrda nIs crwiapitves miny calnayi mm antnoe ra nyt hrato yatlhtei eSso cfiretoym csouncshi duesres. appropriate,
Date: 􀀆 ltJ, /’19’/
) DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA) ss.:
)
Ac􀂖ledged before me this or JClJY\􀀄 , 1994.
/L􀀃 day
􀀂 k 􀀃 NOTARY PiiB􀂗􀂘􀂙 1n CARNAHAN
􀂚N”=o-rt-=a􀂛r–=-=y—;::;P:-:-u-;:-b,l-,-i-c-=-􀂜-=-=..:…,:=-;;􀂝􀂞—-‘-Ml’..l.y.LJ,c,…,o,#.71VJ.,4,M\1f..μ;:fSSION dSTRICT OF COLUMBIA XPIRES APRIL 15, 1995
viii
HPirsestiodreincta l Society of the District of Columbia Circuit
Schedule A
Tape recording(s) and transcript resulting from
interviews of Irwin Goldbloom
Elizabeth Sarah Gere
conducted by
on the following
dates: February 1, 1992, March 28, 1992 and October 31, 1992
ix
as of October 25, 1993
Full Name: Irwin Goldbloom
Address: 1001 Pennsylvania Ave., N.W.,
Suite 1300
Telephone:
wa·shington, D.C. 20004
Office: 202-637-2200 Home: 301-986-8746
Date and Place of Birth: Syracuse, New York, July 11, 1931
Parents:
Father:
Born:
Harry Goldbloom
March 15, 1883
Mother:
Born:
Esther Goldbloom
September 18, 1893
Primary and Secondary Education: Public Schools, Syracuse, NY
Higher Education: Syracuse University, A.B. (1955), L.L.B. (1958)
Positions Held: Attorney, Special Litigation Counsel and Deputy
Assistant Attorney General, Civil Division, U.S. Department of
Justice, 1958-1978; Partner, Latham & Watkins, 1978 to Present
Military Service: U.S. Army, 1952-1954
Other Government Service:
Civic and Community Activities:
Honors and Awards: Attorney General’s Exceptional Service Award,
1978
Spouse: Margaret Goldbloom
Children: Donna, Abby, Claire, Moira and Gwen
Publications: —
x
Elizabeth Sarah Gere has been a member of the D.C. Bar
since 1973 and is currently a partner at Ross, Dixon &
Mashack. Her practice includes civil litigation with a focus
on defense of professionals and insurance coverage matters.
Prior to private practice, Ms. Gere was with the Department of
Justice in Washington, D.C. for 7 years and served as an
Assistant U.S. Attorney in the Southern District of Ohio for
five years.
Ms. Gere was a law clerk to the Honorable June L. Green,
United States District Court Judge for the District of
Columbia from 1972 to 1975. Ms. Gere has been a member of the
D.C. Circuit Judicial Conference in 1975-1980, 1984 and from
1986-present.
Ms. Gere is a·member of the United States District Court
for the District of Columbia’s Committee on Pro Se Litigation.
She is also an adjunct professor at Georgetown University Law
School, where she teaches trial practice. Ms. Gere is a
Master in the Charles Fahy American Inn of Court.
Ms. Gere is a 1969 magna cum laude graduate of Denison
University and a 1972 cum laude graduate of the National Law
Center at George Washington University.
xi
This oral history was conducted for t.he District of
Col-umbia Federal Court Oral Hist.ory Proj ect on February 1,
L992 at the Law firm of Ross, Dixon & Masback. The subjecL is
Irwin Goldbloom (I). The interviewer is Sarah Gere (S) .
S
I
Good morning Mr. Goldbloom.
Good morning.
Let’s begin our inLerview at the beginning
were yciu born?
July 11, l-931 .
Where were you born?
Syracuse, New York.
S:
r:
e.
I:
S:
When
I
TeIl me a lit,tle bit about your family were they
from Syracuse?
My mother was born in Syracuse and she lived there
as a young woman.
My father was born in what was Russia, the part that
eventua11y ended up as the count.ry of Lithuania. He
emigrated to the New World in 1904. He was a 2Lyear
oId young man who had an interesting
experience, at least a 1ittle bit differenE from the
typical immigrant from Eastern Europe. He had three
older half brothers. His father had married twice.
My father was the child of his father’s second
marriage. The three older half brothers had much
earl-ier left East.ern Europe to come to the New World
and settled in Canada. They stretched across Canada
from Montreal to Winnipeg to Vancouver. So my
father came to New York, Ellis Island, on a ship and.
immediately got on a train and went to Montreal
where he stayed for a few days and beyond t,hat left
and went to Winnipeg and within a matter of weeks
was in Vancouver, British Columbia. So here was a
young man from Eastern Europe finding himself in the
Pacific Northwest, and working for a brother in the
Pacific Northwest who was a fur trader. My father
worked for him as sort of a salesman and helper in
the fur trade business, Eraveled around all parts of
the Pacific Northwest. He traveled up to Alaska,
traveled into the United States, Montana, Idaho, and
the states of Washington, Oregon. He basically had
no relationship to the eastern part of the United
States at all until much later. He lived in Canada,
became a Canadian citizen. Eventually he had a
falling out, as I recall from hearing about it as a
little boy, with his brother because hj-s brother
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wanted him to go to Alaska for business. It. was at
the time of Lhe year when if you wenL to Alaska in
the winter time you had to stay there for 5 months
because either the roads or the railways were
impassable. He just didn’t want to stay there for 6
whole months. So he had a falling out and
eventually ended up crossing the border and spending
time in Wa11ace, Idaho, and He1ena, Montana. He
eventually gravitated into other parts of the States
and ended up living in Kansas City, Kansas. Somehow
or other I think he, and I don’t know the real
details, but somehow or other he came East and met
my mother, I think through some mutual friends, and
they got married. This is about. 1-92L when they were
married and he took her back to Kansas City, Kansas.
My mother had always lived in Upstate New York and
she was taking off for the Midwest, Lo a strange and
to her a very foreign place.
I have two older siblings, a brother and sister both
of whom were born in Kansas City, Kansas. My
parents’Iived there for about B or 9 years,
Then, one time when my mother was back East
her parents, she had several siblings, in Up
New York, ffiy fat.her happened to be mugged on
He was not seriously hurt, but he was just h
and robbed by someone. When my mother came
Kansas City and she found out about it, she
are going back to Syracuse
Enough of the Midwest
I guess.
visiting
state
e night.
eId up
back to
said we
s
I Enough of the Midwest and she wasn’t going to stay
there any longer. She convinced my father to pack
up and go back to Syracuse. That was around 2 years
or so before f was born. I was born in Upstate New
York in Syracuse in 1931. So this is the brief
history of my family how I was born in Syracuse.
S: What did your parent.s do in Syracuse?
I: My father was sort of a salesman, he sold clothing
and traveled around a bit. These were hard times
for most people in the r30s. Event.ua11y, my mother
feII i1] and had Parkinsonts Disease. That was the
diagnosis at the time. My father more or less
receded from his work, somewhaL I think he was
sustained by family members, uncles and aunts who
helped support us. My mother was in the situation
where paralysis slow1y took over where she became
almost ent.irely paralyzed from Parkinsonls. She
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I
S
I
died in 1,947, and by that time my father was beyond
the age of working. He eventually got i11, he was a
diabetic, and died in l-953, dt the age of 69.
S: Are your siblings
I My siblings I have a brother who stiI1 lives in
Syracuse. He’s a bachelor. My sister is married
and lives in Hudson, New York, which is about,
30 miles south of Albany.
S: f take it then you went to high school- in Syracuse.
I went t,o high school Central High School in
Syracuse.
Have you been back at all for any reunions or do you
keep any ties with Syracuse?
I didnrt keep Loo many ties with Syracuse. I went
to the University and the Law School. I have in a
smal1 measure supported and. sent money to t.he 1aw
school as part of the alumni donation program. f
have a cousin and family and a brother up there. I
get there very rarely, very rarely. I think IIve
been to Syracuse not more than half a dozen times
over the last 15 years.
S: Of course you have to go during that smaIl window of
opportunity when there is a thaw — when you can
actually get there.
f: That’s true.
S: The high school that you went t,o f ‘m somewhat
familiar with since, ds we discovered, I went. to
the same high school. When I went there it was a
technical high school that a1so had very specifJ-c
programs for people who were not goj-ng, on to
colIege. Was Central High School like that when you
were there?
No. I don’t reca1l it as being a technical high
school. There was a technical high school in
Syracuse at the time call-ed Vocational High School
where those who were destined to be in more. technical t14pe work were, I think, directed.
Central was a high school which (now I graduated in
1″948) by that tlme, which was right after Worl-d War IT, I’d say the population in Syracuse, at. l-east t.he
demography of Syracuse, was changing somewhat. We
r
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C
had a fairly middle class, middle to middle-1ower
class population at the school. I ‘ d say roughly
maybe 10-20 percent black at the time, which was
tlpical of my educational experience throughout
el-ementary and secondary schools. There were people
there from good sections of town and people there
from modest. means. f suspect that in my high school
graduating class roughly half would go on to college
and beyond. A number of my high school classmates
are pegple that I know are docLors, lawyers,
professional people, businessmen and so forth.
There were also the typical people who would go into
jobs like secretarj-es or office people and so forth.
There were children of people who were businessmen
in town that. I think went int,o their parentsr
business. There was sort of a mix.
How did you like high school going to a place
that, has what sounds like a fairly diverse
population.
I liked “it. I liked it a lot. One of the things
t,hat I recall though about, high school as well as my years in college was that I supported myself. I
worked for an uncle who had a drugstore where I
worked after school. I thought of school as a
work/school relat,ionship. I never could dj-vorce the
idea of having to work after school or working when
I wasn’t in school from the school situation. f
didn’t have a school/play type relatj-onship or
upbringing which a lot of people I thought. from
another part. of the city had. When they weren’L in
school they were able to p1ay. When I wasnrt in
school- I was abl-e to work.
Does that mean you had l-imited involvement in school
athletics and things like that?
Wel1, I think I tended not to be involved in school
athletics because of that or extra-curri-cu1ar
activities to any great extent. Although f don’t
consider that f was devoid of that f mean I did
participate in things f had a 1ot of friends
high schooL friends I wasn’t a loner or anything
like that. My memory of it is t,hat I was always
working. That I think sort of colors my recollection during that period of time.
e
r
S: Is there any —
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I:
r
s
I
By no means was t.hat unique, I mean there were a 1ot
of people doing the same during t.hat period.
Is there one particular teacher that you recall as
being influential during high school?
There were a number of teachers. My recollection of
them is dim but now that you mention it there was a
Miss Whipple who taught Latin and I don’t know
whether she was there
No, rro, but that’s funny because we had a Miss Gates
who taught Latin and she’s one of the more memorable
teachers f can recaIl from Central.
Miss Whipple taught Latin. She was a spinster and
very obviousl-y a spinster. She was a very demanding
teacher and somewhat scornful of t.he students who
she thought. were not serious or diletLant.ish about
their studies. I remember she said something to
someone, not Lo me, but to some young man. You
donrt hdve Lo bother with this because you are just
going on to make a lot of money doing something
else. It was sort of a derisive commenL for a
teacher t.o make, buL she made it . But I always
recalI her because, to t,he extent that I
subseguently have developed any discipline about
studying or learning, I think I got something from
her because she was a hard task master and wanted
people to learn things precisely. I always believed
afterwards, to the exLenL that I had any skiI1s as
an editor of people’s writings or as someone who can
writ,e anything, I always harken back to my Latin
teachers. This is much more so than any of my
English teachers because I canlt remember ever
learning anything signifi-cant in grammar from any of
my English teaehers. I can remember a lot of
g’rammar from my l-,atin teachers. I have just lots of
memories about learning parts of speech, how phrases
go together from the Latin. That actually goes back
to junior high school weLl before I got to Central
when I was at Madison Junior High School.
They taught Latin ln junior high school?
Yes. I had a year and a half of Latin. They
started L,atin in the 8th grade, the second half of
the 8th grade and I spent the 9th grade in Junior
High School. I had the first year of Latin at
Madison ,]unior High School where f had a good
teacher but not a sLern task masLer. My
I
s
I
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S
f
recollection of learning sentence structure and
t.hings of that sort come from my Latin classes much
more so because my recollection is that most of the
English t,eachers that f ever had were very poor. I
don’t know why I think that, iL may have had to do
somewhat with the fact. that there werenrt any good
younger teachers. They had gone off to the War.
They had a 1ot. of older teachers that had come out
of retirement. I have this vague recoll-ection of
havi-ng -English teachers who spent time talking to us
about. cit.izenship, character and things of that sort
but never reaIIy taught us anything about literature
or English. The reason I say t.hat is because when I
got to college in my freshman year I had a young
woman instructor for freshman Eng1ish. She was
bright and fresh and brilliant. She was ful1 of
insights. It was almost as though a whole worl-d had
opened up for me, that I had never ever seen before.
I mean I read a 1ot as a young person. I read
books, notes, papers. f was quite a reader all
those years.
Was that an example that your parents set for you?
It wasnrt a question of setting an example for me.
I was always a reader and I always from a very early
stage, read a lot. fn fact, I was always reading
books far beyond my t.ime. f was reading bestsellers
and t,hings of that sort. f was always in the
library getting library books ouL,.
WelI now if you worked aft.er school and you did all
this reading when did you do your homework?
WeIl, therein lies the rub because in terms of being
a disciplined student, I don’t think I was a very
good student. I didn’t do as well in high school or
even in coll-ege as I could have because I wasnrt
disciplined. I spent. time worki-ng. ‘I worked and I
read and r stayed interested to skip around a bit.
I remember when f was in college I had an assignmenL
to go and read an articl-e in a book that was in the
reserved book room in the library. It was to
prepare for a test that we were going to have in
some course I canrt remember the course and I
can’t remember the subject but I remember going
to the reserved book room that evening and starting
to read the article and finding it very duI1 and
boring. I leafed around in the book which had a 1ot.
of different articles. I found two or three other
articles t,hat I was much more interested in. I sat
s
I:
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I
for two or three hours and read t,hose two or three
ot.her articles very intensively. Then they closed
the library and I left. I hadn’t read the article
that f was supposed to. I didn’t do well on the
test at, all because I hadn’t done the assignment. A
lot of my experiences were like that because I
devoted my time to things I was interested in and
coul-dn’t f ocus or be disciplined about t.he things
that I was supposed to. So I would say I was an
average student and I got by very well. I was a
decent student and teachers would say to me, oh wel-I
you get by because you know a lot,.
S: But you could do a 1ot better if you put your mind
to it,.
WeII, I could do a Iot. better if I put my mind to
it. Right.
a. While you were in high school were you beginning to
think about becoming a lawyer? Did that cross your
horizon’lcy that. point?
No. Not rea1Iy. I don’t think f rea11y thought
about becoming a lawyer until much 1ater. I worked
in t.he drugstore and my uncle wanted me very much to
go off to pharmacy school. He figured that if f
went to pharmacy school, he was married but, he had
no children, he would have someone to take over his
business. f could have gone to pharmacy school but
f wasnrt rea11y interested in it. I was always
interested in things like political science,
history, things of that sort. World politics, world
affairs. Those were the things that interested me.
I didn’t think of 1aw as a place to be involved with
the things that I was interested in because lawyers
I thought were du11 and dreary and worked with
papers that were dusty and boring.
Were t.here any lawyers in your family?
There were no lawyers in our family. There were a
number of lawyers who were friends of the family,
who were very nice, kind and gentle people.
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But you nonetheless Iooked at them as doing things
that werenrt interesting to you.
I looked at them f always thought that they were
very nice people and comforting to be around because
they tended to have very classic personalities.
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They were, I’d say, modestly successful in Upstate
New York. But there was not.hing about them f
always felt that they werenrt real1y involved in the
great. affairs of t.he world or of State or the things
that f was interest.ed in. When f was in college I
was an American Studies major. It was sort of
political science, history and things of that sort.
I never related 1aw t.o the lawyers or the lawyers
that f knew to the things that I was int,erest.ed in
except that I knew that there was something out.
there that was law that was probably of a different
variety. As a I think when I was in high school
I read either in high school or j-n college I read
the biography of Oliver Wendell Hol-mes by Katherj-ne
Drinker Bowen which was one of the earl-y biographies
of Holmes. It was a fascinating book and r can
sti1l remember much of it. Holmes became a very
fascinating figure for me as a person. But I
related Hol-mes more to the great political ideas
t.han I did to the issues about lawyering because he
was such a great jurist in that sense. So f knew
about Holmes and that leve1 of the practice. But
the lawyers that, I knew bore no relationship to
that. They all seemed t.o be doing real estate
transactions or people who got. in trouble with
speeding or drunken drivj-ng, or problems with wills
and estates, t.hings of that sort. A11 of which
didn’t seem to be very interesting.
But seemed to be, I’m sure very significant for the
insular world of Syracuse.
f: Sure
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student,, did you become interested in something that
was beyond what you were accustomed t,o? Where did
that come from?
Well, just from reading. From participat,ing in what
f thought was going on in the world. Understanding
what was happening. Our family was very you
asked earlier whether the readj-ng was an important
thing. Trm certain, I suppose I was encouraged to
read although I don’t have any recollection of that..
But our family was very much involved in what was
going on in the world. My parents read the
newspapers regularly. We always got the newspaper
and mother and fat.her both read the daily newspaper
everyday. Even today f can’t understand why I read
t,he newspaper everyday but my children come in and
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look at the newspaper and maybe look at the headlj-ne
or something but never rea1ly sit. down and attack a
newspaper on a daily basis. This was the day of
radio. We always Iistened to news broadcasts,
constantly listened to the news. I remember every
morning, the CBS B:00 news program would come on in
the morning and we list.ened to the people who
broadcast, Lhe news. Regularly. We were very
familiar with t,hat. I followed the war because my
older brother had gone off to war. I l-istened to
the news broadcasts about t,he war. f was t4 or 15
at the time. I was aware of what was going on from
that vantage point.
I suppose your listening to your father’s travels as
a young man would make you conscious of how much
else there was out there in the world.
Oh sure, sure.
exciting.
It was all very fascinating and very
So t,hen -as you finished up high school, you had an
idea that you did not want to go on to pharmacy
school, but you hadnrt quite come upon this idea of
becoming a lawyer. How did you decide what you
want.ed to do when you finished high school?
We1l, I was determined to go to college. Neither my
brother or sister before me had gone to college
direct.ly from high schooL. My brother graduated
from high school in 1939 and had gone to work again
in my uncle’s drugstore. In L943 he was inducted
into the Service. I went directly from high school
to Syracuse University. One of the things that
occumed at the time was that I had a first, cousi-n
who had lived in Syracuse r remember this very
vividly had written to my parents because he knew
that f was getting ready to go to co11ege. He
strongly recommended to my parents that I try t.o go
to some place like t.he University of Illinois or one
of the Midwestern schools like Wisconsin or Michigan
or places like that. They showed me the let.ter. I
look back upon that and f was adamant that I was
going to go to Syracuse, that f was going to go to
this University right in my home town. I just
couldn’t imagine the i-dea of going away to school
somewhere e1se.
S: Why was t.hat? To be close to your family?
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r No. f don’t know why. f don’t know why. I had
I remember that, so the reason I remember that so
vividly is t.hat. over the years if I had to if you
were to ask me did you ever make a big mistake that
you recogni-ze I always look upon that event and that
perspective, that view point, that f had as a high
school senior as being a grave mj-stake. It ga1ls me
now that I could have made such a mi-stake.
It seems so inconsistent. with your vision of want,ing
to learn more of what was in this other world beyond
the bounds of Syracuse and whaL. you knew.
We11, I think that I — I probably figured that I
could get it all- wherever I was. To be sure, no one
reaI1y encourag:ed me to do that,. it’s just that he
suggest,ed it in the l-etter. No one said well that
is what you ought to do. I rebelled against it.
Only because I thought Lhat f had everything close
at hand. In ret,rospect, if I had it to do all over
again, I would have gone away. But I didn’t. So I
stayed and went to Syracuse University.
You said that you supported yourself through
co11ege. How did you do that?
WeII, I worked in my uncle’s drugstore
Cont,inued to work?
Continued to work. Go Lo school. f was basically a cit,y student. I would go of f to classes and I would
spend time studying, trying to study.
Stil1 living at home?
Stil1 living at home. During that time frame my father got i11. College was a good experience in
many respects. I think the fact that I was working
and that my father was iIl was a distraction to me obviously. He got progressively i11 over a 2-3 year
period. But at the same time I didn’t have t.he discipline that f should have. I liked what f was studying. I did well in the things t,hat I wanted to
know about and f did poorly or modestly in other
courses, to the extent that f took science or
mathematics courses. I didn’L work at it. I didn’t
do weI1.
S: I can identlfy with that.
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science or history, I did fairly weIl. To me, that
was an opening, an awakening, and held insights into
things that I hadn’t reaIly known before.
So what did you major in then in college?
I majored in American SLudies, which was sort. of a
new major. Actually the year f elected it was t,he
first year they offered it. It was something of an
ecLectic program. You could take courses in the
English Department, Political Science, Hist,ory,
Economics, Sociology — that runs the gamut,. The
partj-cu1ar courses that they ear-marked for this
major all had to do somehow or other wit.h Amerj-can
civilization. It is sort of interesting, I don’t.
know whether I mentioned this to you before, but I
ended up taking courses in the I took a course in
sociology and I think a course in t,he Economics
Department without ever having taken the basic
courses in these departments. So T ended up in a
class irr sociology where everyone was using the
jargon of sociolog-y majors and r hadn’t the foggiest
notion of what they were talking about. f was
always running hard to catch up because they were
using this jargon. I never had a basic course in
sociology, although I had basic political science
courses. I enjoyed t.hat,. I enjoyed that a 1ot. It
got me interested in political science and the sorts
of things that made me think about. what. I wanted to
do eventually. Then I went off to the Service. I
spent al-most 2 years in the Army.
What years would that have been?
From 152-154 I was in the Army.
So now you’d finished
I didnrt quite finish. f was drafted while I was in
college and it was the height of the Korean War. I
went off to the Army and actually had a very
interesting experience from a point of view of being
in the Service during that time. f went to basic
trainlng in Virginia. Around that time my father
was i11. I went home at the end of ’52, came back
and was sent t.o the Far East and went of f to Korea.
It. was within a short period of time that I was in a
combat. zone for 9 straight months. It, was, in
retrospect, an exhilarating and exciting time
fearful and frightening in many respects. But for
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someone who wanted to see the world t.his is the way
to do it. In those days they had a rotation system
for the people in Korea in the fighting. Korea was
divided up into three dj-fferent zones which had a
so-ca1Ied 4 point zone, a 3 point zone and a 2 point
zone. Four point being the combat. area and you
needed 35 point.s to rotate ouL of the area. So if
you were in, as I was an enlisted man, you needed to
geL 36 point.s. Well I got 36 points in 9 months. I
was lucky I didn’t get wounded or injured in the
event. I rotated and I was on a ship in the middle
of the Pacific Ocean heading back to the United
States on the 18-mont.h anniversary of my induction
into the Army, having served a fuII tour of duty.
In a combat zone. I came back to the States having
been in the Service for L9 months and basically a
veteran of all these events. You got a 30-day
furlough. I was then sent to Camp Kilmer, New
.Tersey in New Brunswick, New .fersey. Basically, I
was marking time there until I got. out of the
Service. As it turned out, because of my
circumsEances of having been overseas and rotated,
t.he Army had a policy of letting people like me out
early and I was actually discharged 3 months earIy.
The origi-nal period of time that I inducted for was
2 years and acLually I got out in 21 months.
S: Oh my goodness.
T: So I had a 21- month tour of duty ln the military,
9 months of which were i-n a combat zone in Korea and
then I was out
S: What do you think was the most. significant impact
t.hat that period of time had on you?
It had a great impact on me because the military
experj-ence did somethlng for me that I hadn’t rea11y
had before. It gave me the sense of disciplining in
myself. The military discipline and the maturation
process that goes on as you go through an experience
like this affected me, by convincing me that f could
achieve what I wanted to achieve by my own resolve.
ft gave me the self confidence to know that f could
do what I wanted to do. Before that r didn’t have
the discipline. I didnrt have the motivation
perhaps to do what I wanled to do. I had some
interesting experj-ences and this had, I think some
slight impact upon my decision to go to law school.
I have an interesting anecdote, I expect. When f
was in Camp Kil-mer, New ,fersey I was assigned to Lhe
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hospitat. My military job was as sort of a medical
corpsman but. I never had true service as a medical
corpsman as such. r served act.ually in Korea
running field hospitals for Korean civilian
guerrillas who were fighting behind enemy lines. A
lot of times I was with them and occasj-onal1y behind
enemy lines. So when I got to Camp Kilmer, they
didn’t know what to do with me because I was only a
short timer. I went to the hospital, to the medical
records office, and there was the captain in charge.
He said well what. I am going Lo do with you if you
are only going to be here a couple of months. He
said I know what I’11 do. He said Itve got all of
these medical textbooks that are assigned to me as
the Chief of Medical Records and all the doctors and
dentists around this hospital have taken these
books, checked them out and I don’t know where they
are now. I am responsible for them and I would like
you to be my librarian. f want you to go and get
all these doctors and dentists, these Army officers,
to sign out for these books. I said fine. I was
only a Corporal but I was acting on behalf of the
Chief of Medical Records. Itty job was to search out
these doctors and dentists who had gott,en these
books. I remember vividly having gone to a dentist,
an Army dentj-st at Camp Kilmer, this was the I ‘ 1I
put it in a time f rame this was in 1-954, .Tanuary
or February t54. I found this Army major, Major
Peress, who had several dental textbooks. I had the
hardest time convincing him that he had to sign out
for them. f had several conversations with him. He
was sort of arrogant, with me and he was
condescending. He wouldn’t give me the time of day.
It was a sour experience just dealing with this
major. I was discharged from the Army about a month
or so later. rn the spring of L954, the major event
in American life was the Army-McCarthy hearings.
The focal point of the Army-McCarthy hearings had to
do with the fact that McCarthy, the Sbnator, was
accusj-ng the U.S. Army of having promoted a
Communj-st, who had been an army officer and given a
promotion from a captain to major and this was a
feI1ow by name of Peress.
Oh my gosh oh my!
Thj-s was the watchword. If you ever delve back into
history about the Army-McCarthy hearings, the whole
issue was McCarthyrs aLtack upon the Army for having
promoted this dentist.
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Oh my goodness!
Here f was watching this great event on television
and having had a personal relationship
First. -hand knowledge .
First-hand knowledge of this man just 2 or 3 months
earlier. When I got out of the Army, I went back t.o the University and finished up my, I had about. a year of work t.o finish up, I finished up and I think
in t.hat year I decided that. I probably wanted to go
to l-aw school.
Did you approach that 1ast. year markedly differently
from how you had done the previous ones given
your now new-found recogni-t.ion of the importance of
discipline and your exposure to a whole other world?
WeII, Lhe answer is yes. I approached it
differently because f was a solid A studenL my last
year
So it realIy did make a difference.
It really did make a difference. I think I got As
in almost everything f dld. Maybe I was clearly
a different person and it, wasnrt hard, it. wasn’t a grind or anything like that. It was just that if I
was told to read a chapter, f read the chapter. I
didn’t go and read five other chapters in the book,
which was what I had done before that. time. f found
that I could do well but it was just a question of
applying myself. It, gave me a lot of self
conf idence because I knew t,hat, this wasn’t
difficult. It was fun.
Were the people that you were in school wit,h in the
same sltuation, having come out of the military?
There were a large number of those people. In facL,
I remember vivj-dIy one class which had a whole group
of Air Force pilots who were just coming out of the
Service and who come back to school, a lot of
veterans of the Korean War.
I would think that that might have an impact, too.
You come back into an atmosphere with people with
some new resolve or having grown up.
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I I *39 getting the G.I. 8i11. So r rea11y wasnrL working in the same sense since f was enlitl_ed to
geL G.f. benefits for being a Serviceman. That. paid for schooling.
So then you could reaIly afford to focus on your
studies.
Thatrs right. Work was not something that I needed. to do. I may have worked a little bit but not
enough to distract me as I had before.
So during that, year then, that. you returned to
school-, was when you made t.he decision to go on to
law school?
Yes. I made the decision then to go to law school.
And kind of thought about t.he future. During that. year also I met and fel1 in love with a woman that I
had met in cIass. Actually she graduated in L954
and went to Florida. Her parent.s were separated or
divorced. Her mother lived in Florida and she spent
some t.ime in Florida and some time in New york. She
was from New York City. f visited her during that
year occasi-onaI1y in New York. She had relatives in
Syracuse as we11. fn that time frame I thought
about what I was going to do and decided t.hat I
would go to 1aw school and t,ook the LSAT to get into
law school. I have to say though that f Lhought at
the time that I made a decision to go to law school
I was stil1 unaware that as a lawyer I coul-d be
involved in the things that interested me. I
t.hought that 1aw school was something that I ought
to do because I was not interested in doing the
other things. I was resigning myself to the fact
that I could have two Iives. f could have a life as
a lawyer and a life of doing t,hings that I was
reaIly interested in and somehow or other I woul-d
manage in that respect. So I was opt’ing, I t,hought,
for a career that would serve me, but, not.
intellectuaIly. I didn’t think of it as an
inteLlectual challenge. I thought of it more as in
terms of that I woul-d have to learn this, I would
have to do it, and I would probably be involved with
I thought of myself of being l-ike the older
lawyers that I had known as a chiId. That. is what I
thought I was becomj-ng
Well t.hen when you were in the process of making
this decision and opting for something that was
secure, but having done your military service,
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something you knew you could do and do relatively
weII, were there other things that you contemplaled
doing that you rejected or things that seemed beyond your reach?
No. f Lhought that f remember having gott.en a flyer or some kind of an approach by an insurance
company someone suggesting well you could go out. and seII insurance. I talked to a few people about t.hat, being an insurance salesman. I dj_dn,t know an awful Iot about it. I mean the insurance salesmen
that I had known as a kid were certainly not they
werenrt of the kind t.hat they were trying to promot.e
they were going after young i:oIIege graduates who
would be out marketing j-nsurance to the business
wor1d. I menti-oned this to some friends and relatj-ves and a few of them turned their nose up at
it, it’s not. a very good life, itrs not a very good
fut.ure. In retrospect they didn’t know what they
were talking about.. One, f suspect, could do wellas
an insurance salesman in the right area. But, I
didn’L know that they didnrt know, and I didn’t know
enough about it myself . It didn’t reall-y f ascj-nate
me. I thought without overdoing it I knew that the l-aw was related to the things that I was interested in but f didn’L think that I would ever
be involved at. that level-. So it wasn’t I
thought of the law as being close.
S: At least financially could keep you a1ive.
I: Could keep me alive and to the extent that I had the
notion that I might get married at, some time in t.he
future, t.his would be a secure future for me.
Now the young woman t.hat you mentioned that you had
falIen in love with, did you discuss with her your
decision to go to law school?
Yes, and she was j-nt,erested and fascinated by it.
She was supportive, I think, although she had her
own thing. It Lurned out the year that I started
law school she went t.o graduate school at Co1umbia,
Leacher’s co11ege. We got. engaged just before I
started law school. We got. engaged in the summer of
’55. She lived in New York, and went, to the
teacher’s college for that year. She actually went
to graduat.e school in the fall- of t54/155, so we got
engaged the year she finished grraduate school
because she started teaching in New York as an
elementary school teacher.
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You had somewhaL of a commuter relationship?
We had a commuter relationship while I was in law
school.
You talked about, in looking back, t.he decision to
stay in Syracuse for college as being one that you
might noL have made today were you t,o go back. What
about the decision to stay i-n Syracuse for law
school.- Do you have the same view on t.hat?
I might at that point, ily horizon was not
anywhere as broad as it is today, of course. I
guess f thought of it in terms of the satisfaction
that I had obtained and confidence that I had gotten
from how well I was doing when I had gone back t.o
school. That steeled me to the noLion that f could
do it. But I didntt have a broad perspective and
economics playing a part I thought that f could live
in Syracuse and use the G. I. 8i11. This would take
me through the whole 1aw school period. At t.hat
point –‘ it is mind boggling the cost of education
today but in those years higher education was not
as expensive as it is now and you could do it. But
if I were t.o have gone off to another community and
had to pay living expenses plus tuition, the G.I.
Bill wouldn’t have covered it and I would have had
an added expense. As it turned out and so I
viewed Syracuse as a logical place to go to Law
school. f have had some frj-ends that had gone there
before me. f never had an experience Ehat suggested
to me that I should go to some other 1aw school
somewhere else. That. seemed fine.
When you made the decisj-on to go there to law
school-, did you anticipate at the conclusion of 1aw
school remainj-ng in the Syracuse community?
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S: So going to the law school was a logical
I: Going t.o the law school was a logical decision. I
had no thought of practicing law outside of that
communi-ty. Because, a’s f say, when I made the
decision to go to law school I sort of envisioned
that somehow or other I would be like the lawyers I
knew as a young man, as a high school student,
friends of the family so as to speak. Nice people,
very friendly, modestly successful I suspect, but, no
idea what their practice was like –f mean I can’t
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even visualize what their practice was like. But f
probably thought t,hat. I would practice in Syracuse.
Your fiancee who was teaching j-n New York concluded
t,hat she would come back t.o Syracuse when you were
f inished and ready to go int,o practice.
Right, and she had relat,ives in Syracuse. So
Syracuse was not, t,otally out. of her scope. She
graduated from t.he University and she had several
uncles’and aunts and cousi-ns that lived in the
Syracuse area. So it wasn’t a question of this
being a strange place to be. Moving back and living
in Syracuse was noL an unhappy idea. She had and, j-n f act, she liked the idea. She did not want to
live in New York.
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WeII, that was going to be my next question. Did it.
ever occur to you that you might move to New York
City and practice there?
I had atways been exposed to New York City. f’d
been exposed to New York City many times before. I
love New York City. But I never thought, of j-t as a
place to practice. When I was in law school- I
mean even the first year I was in law school I
remember the top students from the third year of
class having gone off to Dewey, Ballantine
everybody talked about this, going to Dewey,
Ball-antine. The editor-in-chief of Lhe Law Review
– most of the people in my 1aw school class thought
about and were destined to practice in t.he Central
New York area. The 1aw school basically devised its
program around the notion that people would practice
in that. area. The courses were heavily weighed
toward property and vendor/purchaser type things,
real estate transactions, zoning, things of that
sort.
S: Definitely New York State law.
Definitely New York State l-aw as opposed to any
national concept.
S: What was your law school class like? For examPle,
did you have any women in your law school class?
There were, I think, one or possibly two women in my
c1ass. There was a woman in t,he class ahead of me
and maybe one or two women in the senior class. As
I recal1, Lhere were not more than two women in my
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class and maybe one dropped out after the first
year.
Was the balance of the students men who had also
been in the military?
There were my class had a fairly good cross
sect.ion of people. There were a number of people
who had been in the military, Iike myself , been t.o
Korea or been to Germany, something like t.hat,
because military duty in that period of time
everyone went through it one way or another or had
been in ROTC. I would say I think we had about
1-20 to 125 people t,o start and I would imagine, and
this is a rough guess at this point, 25 percent had
some kind of military experience. I would say about
50 percent were people who had just graduated from
undergraduate schools either at Syracuse or some
other school-. Maybe anoLher 20 to 25 percent were
an odd assortment of people who had come back to Iaw
school from having had a career or having been out
in the world somewhere. There were two or three
people who had been in business or had worked in
some manner and now decided that they wanted to go
to law school. For example, we had half a dozen or
more people who had children and some of them were
more t.han just infants, 4 or 5 year oId kids, 5
year o1d kids. So there was an interesting cross
section of people in the class.
Are there any of them with whom you still stay in
contact?
There is one classmate from Iaw school who is in
Washington and I see him from time to time. We both
came to Washington from law school. He went to work
in the fnLernal Revenue Service. I went to work in
the ,Justice Depart.ment. He stayed there 4 years and
now he practices he is in a sma11 -f irm here. He
is basically a tax and buslness lawyer.
Occasionally, I run across classmates, sometimes
they come to town. On occasion, people have come Lo
town and asked me to move their admissi-on to the
Supreme Court or I would hear from them one way or
another. Occasionally, I get a phone call- out of
the blue. Remember me? We were classmates. ftve
got a IegaI problem with one of your partners in l-,os
Angeles. I mean this happened to me about 6 or
7 years ago when f got a call from the West Coast.
He had a case with one of my partners in Los Angeles
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and was having a hard time dealing wit.h him.
thought he could get to him through me.
S: He thought. he could use you as a intermediary.
Exact ly.
He
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S During your time
entry in Martinda
Syracuse.
Iaw school, f notice from your
, you were on the Law Review aL
in
1e
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Yes –
Do you think that that contributed significantly to
your law school experience?
Definitely. I was second in my class j-n 1aw
school from start to finish. It. was very funny.
The young chap who was first in the class was always
just that one little reach beyond me. He was a very
bright, hard working young man, Ronald Butterazzi,
young, he graduated from Le Moyne Co11ege, which is
a Jesuit school. There were a 1ot, of Le Molme
graduates in our 1aw school class who very much
proclaimed t,he values of the ,Jesuit training
program. They were good students for the most part.
As Butterazzi was young and somewhat immature, he
always had that just that littl-e bit. more ahead of
me. But. since f was a Iittle bit older and perhaps
a Iittle more mature after I made my mark, I was
given a lot of the benefits of being a top student.
I was on Law Review. I was asked to do this or to
do that. I was the Chief ‘Judge of the Honor Court.
f was into everything and I didnrt work while I was
j-n school. Although some people worked, f didn’t
want to work. I was det,ermined that I wasnrt goi-ng
to work at all while I was in school. I mean during
the year. Basically, I had been living at home, and
I moved out of my home. I went to an Aunt, who lived
near the University. She was a widowed Aunt and she
1ived, I’d say 5 blocks from the University. I
asked her if I could live in her house and have her
spare room there. She said sure, she would love it.
I said I can’t pay you but that is what I would like
t.o do. I wanted to move out of my home and I did.
Essentially, my law school experience, living as I
did in t,he room near the campus, was the substit.ut’e
for what might have been an undergraduate experience
because f was j-nto everythiirg. I was a fu11-time
participant in campus 1ife, dt least within the law
school. I studied in the library. I was always
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there. I had lots of friends who were my
cl-assmates. I did things after studying socially
with my classmates. I rea1Iy had a great time. f
also found that law school was not that difficult.
The other t.hing that I found after I got going, was
that it was so much more interesting than what I
t.hought it was going t.o be. I had no idea what it
was going to be like until I started. f mean it was
an entire awakening to me.
Is t.here any professor that. was particularly
instrument.al in opening your eyes to the parts of
the law that you rea1Iy hadn’t known were out t.here?
They were aII l-ike that.. Several of them were
good some great buL for the mosL part t.hey were
all good in my experience and judgment because they
opened up to me something that I hadn’t imagined.
Even in retrospect, I have a hard time putting
myself back into the pre-1aw school experience to
imagine what I thought it was going to be like.
Somehow’or other f had convinced myself, BS I said
earlier, that I was opting for something that wasnrt
going to be interesting and it turned out to be
fascinating. And, somet.hing that I could do.
As you were going through law school, were you
beginning to question your decision to stay j-n
Syracuse and practice t.his kind of law that real1y
hadn’t excited you?
Yes, very definitely because, I having made
achievements by being second in my c1ass, by getting
on Law Review, by being asked to participate in moot
court if f want.ed to do that , by being in the honor
society and Order of the Coif, I mean all of the
things that all the bonuses and benefits of being a
good student brought to me, it reaIIy opened up
horizons for me. I then realized that there was a
world outside of Syracuse and a world that was going
to be available to me if I wanted it. Obviously
there was a maturation process in my own mind about
what I could do or might wanL to do and I pursued ir.
How did you pursue it? What decisions did you make
t.hen that 1ed you to the ,Justice Department?
Wel1, the Justice Department at the time Syracuse
was still-, I’d say, somewhat of a regional Iaw
school wiLh somewhat, of a narrow approach looking
a.
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back on it f can’t think of anybody in my class who
became a law clerk to a federal judge, which is such
a common experience t.oday for good students in those
Iaw schools. fL’s true for Syracuse today but in
those years the opportunities that might come to
you were the Wall Street firms Lhat were beginning
to hire from our school. A few people had
interviews. f had an opportunit.y to have an
i-nt.erview with one of the Wal-I St.reet firms, and I
guess I didn’t envis j-on that that was what I want.ed
to do. The opportunity to get into t.he Honors
Program at the ,.lustice Department was sort. of a neaL
thing. I was intervj-ewed by them. It. was a prett.y
gooq interview. They made me feel that I was going
to get. an offer from them I thought f was
prett.y confident that I was going to get an offer.
I had one other opportunity that. was presented Lo me
to be a clerk for a federal district judge. This
judge was in the Southern District of New York in
New York Cit.y which really interested me. f went to
New York and had an interview with the judge down at
Foley Square. f meL him. I had gotten to him
because of my record. I remember sitting in his
chambers and he interviewed me. It was going very
well and he said Lo me what else do you have on your
platter? What other opportunities do you have? I
said well Irve been interviewed by the DeparLment of
,fustice for t.he Honors Program and I feel certain
t.hat I could get an of fer f rom them so that’s
another opportunity. He looked me in the eye and
said, weII, let me t.eIl you something. r would
recommend to you that you take that. offer because I
am going to te1l you a secret nobody knows this
– I am resigning from the bench and I am going t.o
work in the Department of Just.ice myself. And, of
course, he did just that. It was Lawrence Walsh who
was a District ,fudge in the Southern Dist.rict of New
York. He became the Deputy Attorney General under
William Rogers. Today he is t.he Iran-Contra Special
Prosecutor. He had an illustrious career as a
partner with Davis, Po1k. He was a negotiator in
the Vietnam peace t.alks in Paris with Henry Cabot
Lodge during the late 60’s and early 70ts. So that
was my clerkship which didn’L materialize. I took
t.he job at the ,lustice Department when it came
through.
S: By this tj-me, had you gotten married?
We got married after my first. year. She
live wit,h me in Syracuse. She worked as
came to
a school
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teacher the first year. We had a child after the
first. year and she reaIly didn’t teach beyond that.
S: Was she excited about the prospect of moving to
Washington?
f: Yes.
s Had you been to Washington before you decided this
was where you were going to l-ive?
f had been to Washington two or three times. The
summer of L952 when f was in the Army in basic
training, I was at Camp Pickett, Virginia, which is
down near Leesburg and would come here on a weekend
pass for a day or so. I walked around Washington as
a tourist j-n an Army uniform. I remember very
litt.le about the city at the time. I do remember
having walked up to the t.op of t.he Washington
Monument in my uniform getting soaking wet in the
middle of the summer.
S: So then
I didn’t rea11y I had not reaI1y travelled much
to Washington and didn’L know much abouL it.
So it was more the job at the Justice Department
than the city that you brought here.
Right. There was a notion that lurked in the back
of my mind at. the t.ime. I-,arge1y, I think formed by
the fact that I had known one or two people who had
been in this Program and had spent a year or two
years at the Department. and t.hen left and gone on
and done something eIse. There was a vague notion
that somehow or other I would stay in the job for
two years. It was sort of a two-year mental
commitment that I would do that for that period.
With any thought of then returning to Syracuse, or
was as far as you had gotten in your plans a
two-year commit,ment, and then a reevaluation?
That’s right a reevaluation. What I would do after
two years, we would think about it. then. WheLher I
would practice in Washington, or go to New York CiLy
or go back to Syracuse it was all very up in t.he
air we didnrt have to make a decision about that.
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s So you moved with a young family then to
Washington in what year?
r-9sB
And st,arLed at ‘Justice.
Yes, started at ,Justice.
What. did you do there? What. Divj-sion did you start
in?
f started in the Civil Division, the General
Litigation Section. At that time, the Section Chief
was Donald MacGuineas, who was an outstanding lawyer
and a model as someone to work for. He is someone
whose memory f const,antly harken back to.
Hers no longer around?
Hets no longer around. He died in 1953 of Lou
Gehrig’s disease. He had been a very, very able
lawyer, truly a lawyer’s lawyer, a non-bureaucrat..
He was truly a non-bureaucrat, buL a career
government lawyer. He had managed to argue two or
t,hree cases in the Supreme Court, very effectively.
One major case that. he had argued was over the years
a very famous argument that he had, people talked
about it. Act.ua1ly it. had not been much earLier
than when f had arrived. It was either i-n ’55 or
t 57 . But it was an argument that had been writ.ten
about extensively. The case was Harmon against
Brucker. Back in those days it was an interesting
case. The Government,, during the t50s, had a policy
in the Army of giving less than honorable discharges
to servicemen who had any kind of a left-wing or
Communi-st-related taint to thei-r record. Harmon
against Brucker had to do with the fact that
(Brucker was the secretary of the Army) Harmon had
been given a general discharge, but not an honorable
discharge even though his military service was in no
way irregular or t.ainted, but somehow or other j-n
his pre-military service he had belonged to a leftwing
organization of some sort. He was suing t,o get
an honorable discharge. The Government had been
successful all the way up to the Supreme Court.
MacGuineas was the Section Chief that had been given
the t.ask of arguing this case before t.he Supreme Court. The right that the GovernmenL wanted t.o
preserve was that the courts could not dictate the
type of a discharge that the Army would issue. That
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is simply a non-jusLiciable issue, a procedural
issue, which is not subject t.o judicial review.
There was some authority for having the courts stay
out of what the military did. But times were
changing. The fact is that the Government was noL
defending the case on the merits. MacGuineas was
ordered by the Solicitor General to disclose that
fact only if he was cornered by the Court, not to
say t.hat the Government was not defending this
decision on the merits but simply to say t.here was a jurisdict,ional issue. Well the Court badgered him
and badgered him and finally cornered him. He
admitted that the Government was not defending this
policy on the merits which, according to t.he lore of
the time, caused a major explosion in the courLroom.
It was like dropping a bomb. Several of the
Justices jumped on him and sai-d why are you saying
all of this and then there were some who were trying
to salvage t.he case. Tom Clark, who was a
conservative, and ul-timat.ely dissented in the case,
accused the Solicit.or General of having wrongly
thrown irr the sponge on the issue. In any event,
the case was lost by Lhe Government. But that
argument was always written about, it was the sort
of thing that the newspapers or the Sunday Times
would do a piece about Supreme Court arguments and
this happened to be a famous Supreme Court argument.
And that. was MacGuineas. MacGuineas was the boss.
He was a very able lawyer.
What kind of work was your section assigned to do?
Well we did the General Litigat,ion Section did a
variety of work. If you look at the Federal
Programs Branch today, it is sort of an outgrowth of
the General Litigation Section. It represents a
whole host of federal agenci-es that are sued on many
kinds of attacks upon federal programs or policies.
We did Taft-Hartley injunctions. We blso had a
strange jurisdiction in that a remnant of various
reorganj-zations within the Division brought
renegotiation cases, which were then housed in the
Tax Court. The assist.ant Section Chief was Harland
Leathers who was in charge of the renegotiation
cases. The Renegotlation Board cases were heard de
novo in the Tax Court. We tried these cases
involving excessive profits of defense contractors.
This was an opportunity for the lawyers in the
Department to actually get into court because you
had the first line of responsibility in trying a new
case. When I first went to the Department of
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‘Justice in l-958, Lhe Departmentrs ro1e, &L least
that Sectionrs role in most of work, 98 percent of
t.he cases thaL it had handled, it handled as the
middle man between the federal agencies and the
United States Attorneys Offices. Typically, the
lawyers in the Sectj-on did not get int.o courL unless
there was an opportunity that presented it.self and
that was a rare, rare occasion. We essentially were
communicating between a client agency and U.S.
Attorneys formulating defense st,rategies for the
case, $assing lltigation reports and materj-aIs back
and forth, except in the area of the Renegotiation
Act. cases where we had the primary Jurisdiction.
There was interest on the part of some to do the
renegotiation cases because it gave them an
opportunity to stand up in court. And I did that.
Some people shied away from t,hat because it was work
without a body of Iaw, so to speak, there were no
standards that would guide you. You had to be
very you were left to your own creative
imagination of how to try the case, which appealed
to some’and terrified others. Tt was like thaL
during those first years. I would say some t,ime
after I was there for about a year, there was a
major reorganization. Wel1, what had happened i-n
the Department was there had been a group of cases
that. had been handled in the Antitrust Division for
years. They were there essentially because somehow
or other they — whoever made the decision to put
them in the Antitrust Divisj-on, decided that sj-nce
they invol-ved economic regulation of some sort, that
the antitrust lawyers were more involved with
economics and that was a good place to do t.hem. I
think realistically it was because there were one or
two people over there who handled the cases. In any
event, the one or two people who handled t,hose
cases, Lhere were two large groups of cases, cases
involving transportation-ICC regulations. The other
group was the Agriculture Department Regulations
federal milk marketing cases.
I think Mr. Goldbloom that you were talking about
the kinds of cases that were going from the
Antj-trust Division to your shop in the Civil
Division.
Right. I reca1l vividly the day t.hat the Section
Chief came in, Mr. MacGuineas. Actually I think he
probably call-ed. I canrt remember if he came Lo our
office or we went to his office, buL my roommate and
T, who had come to the Department a week after I
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had, he was from Yale Law School and YaIe College
and,
This is because at ,fustice two people shared an
office, is that right?
Two people shared an of f ice. We had t,wo people in
an office and, indeed, sometimes there were three
people in an offj-ce, two attorneys and a secretary
in t.he of f ice. There was a secretary, I don’t know
that th:e secretary was in our office at that
particular time, but there were t.imes when there
were three of us in our office.
He came in and he said werre getting a whole bat.ch
of cases from the Antit.rust, Division and there are
two kinds. One is transportation and one is
agriculture, and he looked at my roommate and he
said rrltm going to make you t,he transportation
expert, tr and he looked at me and said Ir I t m going to
make you the agrlculture expert.rr I had no idea
about, agriculture at all, and within a mat,ter of
days f got a ton of cases dumped on my desk. Many
of t.hem were in mid-course because they had been
handled i-n the Antitrust Division. It turned out
that. there was a very senior attorney in the
Antitrust. Division who had essentially monitored
these cases over a period of years and was retiring.
Probably that was why they were transferred to the
Civil Division because Lhe Department realized that
there was no sense in havj-ng another att,orney
assigned to them because they had no relationship to
the basic work of the Antitrust Division. They
truly did belong in the Civil Division. Sometime
after the first year that I was there, f start,ed to
get Agricult,ure Department cases, but by no means
was that my only assignment, because I had a fuII
docket of cases of al1 sorts. Indeed, during the
first year that f was there, I got a case which f
stil1 look upon as being one of the more fascinat.ing
cases that f ever worked on. f was even thinking
about it just the other day because I was trying to
remember whether an attorney that I was planning to
call sometime in the next few weeks was the same attorney that had worked on that case with me over
the years, that many years ago.
S: What was the case?
The case was United States against the New Haven Railroad. fL involved a fascinating situat,ion.
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S:
Actually the case had been sent to the Antitrust
Division originally. It apparently sat in the
Antitrust. Division for a couple of weeks and somehow
it was decided that the Antitrust, Division shouldn’t
handle the case. It was, I believe, one of these
transport.ation cases because it came out of the ICC
and, for whatever reason, it didn’t go to my
roommate who I t.hink had lef t around t.hat time.
Somehow or oLher it was del-ivered to me. I remember
very vividly the person who came and delivered it,
to deliver it to me. ft was the Chief of the
Appellate Section in the Antit,rust Division. f
remember him introducing himself to me, Lelling me
who he was, and that he was delivering me the case.
His name was Daniel Friedman. Daniel Friedman
eventually moved from t.he Appellate Section of the
Antitrust Division to Lhe Solicitor General’s
Of f ice. He spent. many years j-n Lhe Solicit,or
General’s Of f ice as a Deput.y Solicitor General. He
argued many, many cases in the Supreme Court.
Eventually he was appointed t.o the Court. of Claims
as an atrrpellate judge and then, after the
Reorganization Act, became a member of the Court of
Appeals for the FederaL Circuit where he stiI1 is on
Lhe bench. He was the lawyer who brought. this case
into my office and handed it to me. It turned out
to be a fascj-nating case and I worked on it the
first year that I was in the Department of Justice.
It, involved a situation where the Interstate
Commerce Commissj-on had senL it to t.he Department of
Justice. What had happened was that there had been
a large group of preferred shareholders of the New
Haven Railroad that owned preferred shares, socaIIed
“EEdEerr int.erests, and they had a major say
in how the New Haven would be run because of the
voting power of their preferred shares. And the
t,hen, and f ‘ve forgotten the names of the
individuals involved, but the then management of the
New Haven, this was prior to New Haven’s bankruptcy,
had decided to get rid of this large group of
dissident shareholders. They arranged for the
purchase of this big block of preferred shares from
this group. This group was happy to seII because
the railroad’s fate was loomj-ng on the horizon as
not being very favorable. They arranged for the
sale of this block of stock for several millions of
dollars to a group of investment bankers under a
circumstance where the New Haven Railroad made a contract with t.he group of j-nvestment, bankers who
had purchased the stock. The group could put t,he
shares back to the New Haven and New Haven would buy
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the shares at a stated price. This deal went
t.hrough, and people at the Interstate Commerce
Commission heard about. it, or knew about it. They
went and looked at a statute which had been enacted
in 1,920. It had never been applied but it said that
anytime a railroad wishes to issue securities or
evidence of indebtedness that they would have to get
Commission approval to issue, under certain
circumstances. The railroad had not asked for
Commission approval and two major bureaus within the
ICC lodked at this deal and said while we donrt like
it, itts not a violation of the statute. It. doesn’t
seem to come under the statute. The General
Counsel’s office looked at it and said we think it’s
a violation of the statute. Letrs send it over to
t,he Depart.ment of ,Justice. ft came over with a
recommendation by the General Counsel of the ICC
that we should look at it and figure out whether it
was a violatj-on. It. ended up on my desk. f was a
first year lawyer. It turned out t,hat, the Assistant
Attorney General at the time had an interest in this
case, George Cochran Dobb. There \^ras a senior
lawyer who was also assigned to the case above me.
But basically it was my job to l-ook at it and to
wrj-te a memo and to figure out whether there was
somethj-ng to do. I looked at it and researched it
and l-ooked at, the materials. I thought iL was a
close guestion but I thought we could make a case
that. it was a violation of a statute that basically
had never been administered in this way before and
there was one or two vague administrative decisj-ons
at the ICC level that didn’t reall-y apply directly
to the problem. I ended up drafting the complaint,
and drafting the motion for summary judgment, which
the Assistant Attorney General- took up to New York
City and was filed in the Southern Dj-strict of New
York to chall-enge the transaction. I didn’t, get t,o
go to court. f got to hear about it afterward, but
f had drafted the complaint, had drafted the motion
papers. I do not recalI them having been
substantially modified after I drafted them,
obviously t,hey had been edited, but I always felt
that it was my complaj-nt and my motion. The
District, Court heard cross motions for summary
judgment from the other side and ruled against the
Government and said t.hat t.hls was not a violation of
the statute. At the time there had been stockholder
derivative actions pending against the New Haven in
the Southern District and they had, when the
Government had filed its suit, they had amended
their complaints to add as a count against the
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managemenL of the railroad. These additional
allegations concerned violations of Lhe Interstate
Commerce Act. It wasn’t the same lawsuit, but it,
was a related case. The GovernmenL then appealed to
the Second Circuit and the case came up before a
panel wit,h Judge Friendly one of the first cases
that Friendly had an opportunity to decide as a
Court. of Appeals Judge. To back up a littIe bit,
there had been, I believe it was the Cravath law
firm that. had advised the invesLment banking
syndicate at the time the orlginal deal was put into
effect that they didnrt. have to seek authorization
from the Interstate Commerce Commission. When the
Government sued, the banking syndicate decided that
they would change law firms because they thought
that they had gotten some bad advice from the law
flrm. I think they hired and I may have this all
wrong because I haven’t really studied it or looked
it up I think they hired Cahill, Gordon to
represent them in the Court of Appeals. The
Government prosecuted the appeal to t,he Court of
Appeals’having gotten Solicitor General approval of
the case, and after the case was argued, then there
was a decision.
Now were you invol-ved at all j-n the briefing in the
Second Circuit?
I was not involved in the briefing in the Second
Circuit. alt.hough I believe I talked to the attorneys
who worked on the case because there was an
Appellate Section lawyer and they basical-Iy took
over and handled lt. But I talked to them and
related to them, but f was not on the brief in that.
I believe the lawyer was Peter Schiff who later on
went to New York to become an attorney with the New
York Public Service Commission. Tn any event, one
of the Section Chiefs I believe argued the case in
the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and 1o
and behold a decision came out in the Second Circuit
reversing the District Court saying that this was an
evidence of indebtedness clearly in violati-on of the
st.atute. Since they hadn,t sought Commj-ssion
approval, the Government’s declaratory action was
sound and we were able to undo this transaction. At
that point, the case became even more interesting
because the story that we heard was that Cravath
then went to Cahi11, Gordon and said to them, you
know when we originally looked at this deal we
st.udied it from every angle and we found out that if
there was a case that the Government was goj-ng to
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bring they woul-d bring it in District Court, buL
Lherers t,his 1903 statut.e that. says Lhat any case of
this sort, Lhe exclusive jurisdiction on appeal is
directly Lo the Supreme Court of the United Stat’es.
We believe that the Government appealed to the wrong
courL. The next thing we knew, Cahill, Gordon had
filed a motion to vacate the court’s opinion and
judgment on t,he grounds that the court of appeals
Iacked jurisdiction because the statute says
exclusive jurisdicti-on is in the Supreme Court.
This is the case that I had worked on. I remember
being called to come in on a weekend. There was a
big library on the fifth floor of t.he Department of
,fustice and it was f i1led with appellate lawyers. I
even had a little bit. of an assignment and we were
a1l- rushing around frantically trying to come up
with an answer Lo this statute t.hat nobody had ever
focused on at the Department of ‘.fustice.
Thatrs pretty heady business for a very young
lawyer.
This was very heady business for a young lawyer, to
be sure. It was exciting. It was thoroughly
exciting. I didn’t participate in the briefing of
it, but I had a little assignment and what.ever I did
I turned over to them. I have no idea today what it
was. But t.hey went baek to the court of appeals and
they made an argument. The court of appeals then
came out with a further opinion in which they said
– and again, r haven’t read this in years but my
recoll-ection is they said something like this. It
is a good question whether or not we had
jurisdiction and there was even a suggestion, which
everybody marveled at, that somehow or other the
investment bankers had consenLed to the jurisdiction
of the court of appeals. Everybody said that you
can’t reaIly consent to jurisdict,i-on. But, they
said, after writing this second opinibn, they said
Lhere’s a good question about our jurisdiction and
therefore we think t.hat may be welL taken. But
while there may be question about our jurisdiction,
there is no question about our authority to control
the activities of t.he district courts withi-n our
Circuit,. So therefore we are vacating our decision
with instructions t,o the district court to enter a
fresh judgment against the United States from which
they could go the Supreme Court if they see fit..
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I: They directed t.he dlstrict court, because by this
time, of course, the ti-me t.o go directly t.o the
Supreme Court had long since run. They directed the
district court to enter a fresh judgment from which
t.he United States coul-d appeal. And then , of
course, there was an interesting sidelight. The
shareholders in the derivative suit had participat.ed
in the appeal. They were not. part. of the
Governmentrs case. From that appeal they got the
same decision that t.he Government had gotten. From
that appeal the railroad had sought certiorari to
the Unit.ed States Supreme Court and it was denied in
the shareholders cases. The districL judge entered
a fresh judgment and the people in the Department of
.Tustice were sitting around getting ready to file an
appeal to the Supreme Court. Some bright person
and I don’t know who it was, it wasnrt me, buL it
was somebody in the group said wait a minute, the
Supreme Court. denied cerL. in the sharehol-ders case
and that, makes it finaI. We don’t have to do
anything.
A decision was made that they woul-dnrt appeal from
the dist.rict court’s decision. We’d hear stories
about every month or so during that t,ime, about the
dist.rict judge calling the United States Attorney in
and demanding to know why they hadnrt. appealed to
the Supreme Court because he wanted to be
vindicated. The Government said we don’t have to
appeal. f was in that case as the person who had
drafted t.he complaint. and the original motion for
summary judgment.
S: You had reaIly gotten it moving.
I I had gotten it moving and that was the first big
case I ever worked on.
My goodness.
It was exciting, it, was fun. A thrilling
experience.
So you decided probably even before that that you’d
definitely made the right decision then, coming to
Washington and j oining the Depart,ment .
Oh yes. Decidedly. There were ot.her cases like
that.. As I say, during those early years
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Now, was Rogers stil-l the Att,orney General at that
point,?
Rogers was the At.torney General up until 7-96L,
January L95L, when Eisenhower left. office and ,.fohn
F. Kennedy became President. His brother became
Attorney General, Bobby Kennedy. When Bobby Kennedy
became the Attorney General there was a rather
substant,ial change in the mind set. of the DepartmenL
of ‘Justice and probably in itself was a major factor
in why’f stayed beyond the two years. I started in
July of ’58 and by ‘6!, of course, Kennedy became
President and Bobby Kennedy became Attorney General.
Bobby Kennedy was a young man. He brought in a lot
of young, vigorous people to the Department. He
started a whole different approach t,o what the
Department was all about. While I canrt say t,hat. I
personally or individually was affected by him on a
direct one-to-one basis, f can say that I benefitted
from what. he did. I saw what he did. I saw the way
he operated and felt the impact of what was felt
throughout the Department. For start,ers, gfenerally,
I mean, he had a major remake of the Criminal
Division in the sense that, the whole organized crime
concept and the task forces that eventually became a
major factor in the Department were started under
his aegis. He brought in a 1ot of young people who
started basically running investigations, running
grand juries, and doing it directly out of t.he
Department rather than having U.S. Attorneys all
over t.he country doing it. Before Kennedy, the
Department, of .fust.lce was essentially a servj-ce
agency servi-ng the U.S. Attorneys around the country
except in those little areas where there had been
traditional work done by the Department itself, such
as in the Admiralty Section of the Civil Division.
The specialized efforts
Very specialized aspects of something which U.S.
Attorneys had no interest in that had developed over
the years. Apart from that, the Department
generally was a service agiency, Bobby Kennedy, his
influence and the influence of the people that he
brought in, attempted to turn it around and make it
into something where the people of the Department
themselves not only would have the service role but
also would have a front line responsibility t.o do
t.hings directly. I remember at the time , for
example, someone whom I had known in 1aw school at.
Syracuse, who had gone on and come back and gone
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into the Crj-minal Division, and I had seen him and
he said “Oh yes, I’rt running a grand jury in
Kentucky and werre doing this investigation.rr It
was atI very excit.ing, iL was very heady stuff fot
people, and the same sort of attitude permeated into
tfre- Civil Divlsion somewhat. There was the not,ion
thaL somehow or other if you want.ed to get into
court you ought t.o have a chance to do it. There
were a number of oId time section chiefs in the
Civil Division who disdained that notion
substaritially — did everything possible to prevent
their people from getting into court. They were old
t.imers and to them it was strictly a bureaucratic
thing, you would write these memoranda, send them on
t.o the U.S. Attorneys, and keep the paper flowing.
Whereas, the young lawyers desperately wanted to get
experience and along that period of t.ime there was a
fairly subtle but certainly a clear met,hod in the
operations of many lawyers who schemed to geL into
court. They schemed with the U.S. Attorneys’
offj-ces on ways in which they could take over cases
or be called by the U.S. Att.orney. I remember
i-nstances where I would talk to an Assistant U.S.
Attorney in some far off city and say wel-l if you
reaIly want some help you’d better write a letter
and my boss will see it. It would say it would be
good for you to come out and do something. So we
would scheme to do that.
Now who was t.he Assist,ant At.torney General in charge
of t.he Civil Division?
The first, Assistant Attorney General under the
Kennedy admi-nistration, the first one was Bill
Orrick, William Orrick, I believe
Who went on to become a judge.
He went on to become a District ,Judge in San
Francisco, in the Northern District of California.
He had been with the orrick firm. I believe that he
was succeeded by ,John Douglas, who was a partner at
Covington and Burling. I don’t think there was, I’m
not sure whether there was anybody in between them,
but I think Douglas succeeded Orrick. Orrick was
t.here for a year or so and went on to become a judge. Then ,fohn Douglas came in. Douglas was
there right up through the t.ime of the Kennedy
assassination. Their atti-tude was if there’s an
opportunity f or you t.o get into court, f ine, do it . I was probably a beneficiary of that and I worked it
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to my advantage. But also it feIl my way by natural
consequences because the agriculture cases that I
started to work on durj-ng that time frame provided
me an opportunity, part.ieularly in t.he milk
marketing area, because the, those cases were
relatively complex administrative 1aw issues,
because of the nature of the regulat.ions, and I
learned t.he subject matter. When the cases came up,
it was not a difficult t.hing to have the U.S.
Attorney say rtcome and handle the case” because they
would iake one look at it and say I’d be happy to
have anybody come in and t.ry to explain this to the
judge. So, in that, respect I got, an entr6e to take
cases j-nto court. f was doing more and more of t,he
renegoLiat.ion work because I liked it. T thought it.
was interestitg, fascinating. So I got. an
opportunity to do t,hat and then there was this
general sort of philosophy about, getting people into
court. I think I managed to develop the kind of
experience that I was looking for. That is, trying
cases before judges.
Your work then took you across the country, is that
correct?
Yes. Across the country. I went, by chance, almost
anywhere during t.hat, t.ime f rame. Not, only across
the country, I went to Puerto Rico to handle a
renegotiat.j-on collect.ion well it was a col1ect,1on
case, but it stemmed out of a renegotiation case
that I was also handling in tax court. f tried a
case in Puert,o Rico, in 152 or ‘ 63 .
If you were t.here in ‘ 52, ‘ 53 , you’d gotten beyond
your two-year re-evaluation period plus a couple
more years. As time went on, were you on any
different schedule? Had you made a decision now
that you were going to stay five years or had you’d
just st.op thinking about and just started enjoying
the work?
I stopped thinking about it and started enjoying the
work. The work was exciting. ft was far more
exci-ting than anything I had ever imagined it might
be even when f came to the Department, even when I
entered the first time. It got to be far more
exciting. It was everything that I had hoped it
would be. f thought. I got good assj-gnmenLs. I
thought the work was fun. I always had the feeling
of being swamped, but at the same time f was able to
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get on with it.. I seemed to get regularly promoted
and given opport.unities, given assignments.
Did you compare the work you were doing with that of
your contemporaries to make a decision Lo stay where
you were?
Not rea11y, not reaI1y. I don’L think I mean,
I’d had weIl, that’s not fair. I-,et me put it
anoLher way. I had a frj-end who I had known in 1aw
school’who had come to Washington because his wife
was i11. She was at NIH, she had a rare form of
cancer. He had been two years ahead and had had a
smaIl town practice in Syracuse. It was a small
town business practice. He had had a couple of
business clients and he had a couple of partners who
had business activities. We got friendly. We just,
happened t,o meet. We were living rlght in the same
apartmenL complex. At some point we had tal_ked
about. him going back. He did event.ually go back to
Syracuse and he even suggested that I might wanL to
come back and go into practice with him. ,Just
hearing about t.he nat,ure of his cl-ients and the
nature of his work, f would never give it a thought a serj-ous thought because doing what I
was doing was so far superior t.o any description of
t,hat work that I just wouldntL think of it.. I was
on a high. ft was a period of time when the work that I was getting was exciting and the
responsibil-ities that f had were phenomenal, at
least from my perspective. I was learning areas. Itrs probably also fair to say that I t.hought that,
you know, there,s always this lingering thought
that, well what about private practice. What about
going into the private sect,or? At that time people
did that. Generally in my experi-ence the people-who did that from t,he Department of ,Justice went back to
some pIace. They had come to Washington. They were there for a couple of years. They then went back to St. L,ouis , or Denver, or some other community
because that,s where they wanted to go. t didn,t
know very many people who went from the ,Justice
Department to a just law firm here in Washington. ft didn’t seem to be a natural place io go. The firms here weren’t expanding that much there were a few. NoL to say that they didnrt. There were a few. I have a few friends who came to the
Department.. Maybe later on, more in the mid-60’s, *h9 stayed in the Department for a couple of years
and then went into practice, into firms here. I
mean f rve got a frj_end, for example, whors j_n a big
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Washington firm. Who’s a senior partner here, who
came to the Department of Justice for t,wo years from
some far off place and then went into practice here.
I remember when he went into the firm there was
eight people, and now therers 150. But more
typically, would be people who would go back home.
As you stayed at the Department, did your work
change over the years?
I’d say it changed only in the sense that I began to
get better cases, more responsibility. The cases
were assi-gned by the Section Chief, ot the Assistant
Section Chief, and more and more I began to get
bigger cases, hj-gher visibility cases, more
responsibility. Whether it was because I was there
or it was because they thought f could handle them,
I don’t know. f suppose it was a combination of
both. The cases got better. The responsibility got
g,reater. The fun continued. The excitement
continued.
How dj-d the change in administrations affect the
work that you did, if at all, as a l-ine attorney?
As a line attorney, the change in adminj-strations,
and I wenL through several, had virtually no effect
at all whatever. I never felt. in the Department in
all the time that f was there that in some way or
other my work was governed by political decisions.
f can only remember one or two decisions, or
attempted decisj-ons, that had political motivations
to them and they were not carrj-ed through. A
suggestion was made that t.he Department might do
something later on in the Watergat,e era, the
Government should take an appeal, or prosecut,e
something, which was motivated by something other
than just the merits of the case. But for the most part, I felt nothing different. Over the years I
did get involved in a 1ot of exciting cases,
fascinatj-ng cases, and they were, it was a turn on.
It was a cont,i-nual turn on. I felt like I had it
made because the work was just. thrilling. High
visibility cases. Fun cases. Even today, in
thinking about t.hem, they’re exciting. Post-Kennedy
assassination. I handled two. There was a statute
that all-owed the government to take the property
that had been gathered by the Warren CommisEion Lo
– the Warren Commission had all- thls evidence that
was presented to it the rifl-e, the revolver Ehat
had been used to kil1 Officer Tippit, the rifle
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that had been found in the Texas School Book
Depository Building. The Secret Service and the FBI
swooped down on Oswald’s apartment and picked up
everything in sight his clot.hes, his books, his
papers, his diary that he’d kept. in Russia,
photographs, lett.ers. A11 t.hese things were
exhibit.s t.o t.he Warren Commission report. Af ter: the
Warren Commission submitted its report, the
interested parties started to demand these documents
back, t.hese materials back. Mrs. Oswald sold her
interedt. Texas is a community property state, and
she sold her interest in the rifle and t,he revolver
to a Denver oil man by the name of ,fohn King. He pald her to buy her interest in them. And he
demanded the rifle and the revolver because the
investigaLion was over and it wasntt the
Governmentrs property. The Government went, the
administration went t.o Congress and got a statute
enacted giving the Attorney General the right to
take all these properties that had been exhibits to
the Warren Commission. The property was taken by an order issued by the Attorney General. The statute
also provided jurisdiction in the Federal District
Courts for anyone suing for just compensat,ion for
the taking of these properties. There were two
cases brought and f handled both of them. I tried
both of them.
Where were they brought?
WeIl, the first case was brought in Denver and it
was my first jury trial. I tried the case brought
by ,John King. He had originally had a case to
replewy t.he rifle and t,he revolver while t.he statute
was being considered by t,he Congress. Once the
statute was enacted the GovernmenL moved t.o dismiss the replevin action and he filed a new suit for just
compensat,ion for the takinq of the rifle and revolver. His claims were g5 million’for t,he rifle
and the revol-ver. Thi-s was a966-6’l or so. The Montreal World’s Fair, Expo r57 was about to start.
His allegation was, if I had this rifle which I am entit,led to, f would open up a stand or a place to
show this rifl-e and f would charge a do1lai a head
and f would make millions of dollars by just showing the rifle and the revolver here. So thal,s Lhe value of the rifle and revolver. I remember writing, at least, f wroLe a very lengt.hy summary judgment motion which I had done a 1ot of researih
orr, in which I argued that you can,t benefit from a crime. You cantt geL any vaIue. I cited all the
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cases about people who kiIl someone and then try t,o
coll-ect on the insurance policy, all sorLs of things
like that. r remember working on the brief very,
very intensively and I remember actually going out
and arguing it before the District ‘Judge. The ‘Judge
denj-ed the motion and wrote an opinion saying it’s
not clear. We said that they’re entitled to #29.95,
plus post.age, whj-ch was the value of the rif1e.
Thatrs what Oswald had paid for it, and some similar
amounL for the revolver because he had bought them
both tlirough the mail- order house. So the Judge
denied the motion and said t.he case has got to go to
trial. So I went out Lo Denver and took with me a
very young new attorney in the Department, David
Anderson. We had a trial in which we defended the
United States in this lawsuit. The lawyers for King
had spent about, well he had spent $l-0,000 to
purchase the interest and then with all the various
motions and cases we just sort of made a rough
estimaLe, it must have been $70,.000-80,000, maybe
$100,000 in 1ega1 fees. In any evenL we had a jury.
We decided that we were going to defend on the basis
that oswald had abandoned the rifle on the sixth
floor of the Texas School Book Depository Building.
Thatts where it was found. Since Oswald had only
paid $30 he had no intention to come back and
retrieve it, and that when Mrs. oswald had sold it,
she had nothing t.o se11 because the thing had been
abandoned. Under Texas 1aw you can abandon
property. The revolver we said I don’t know if
we had a real- defense on that. In any event, the
jury went out and came back and said nothing for the
rifle and $250 for the revolver. That was the end
of the case. The second case was down in Texas.
This was brought by Mrs. Oswald, the wife. She sued
for all the remaining property which had been taken.
Her claj-m was for, I donrt know, $2,000,000 or
$:,000,000. That case was initially assigned to a
master who came here to Washington and we had a
trial here in the U.S. Distri-ct Courthouse before a
masLer but he was serving as a master for the
Northern District of Texas where the case was pending. I’11 try to put this thing together fast.
We had had a stipulation with the plaintiffs that
t.he value of all this property and all this
property was, the intrinsic value of t.his property,
just this property, was $3,000 they were suing
for $2-3 million as I recall. The only way you
could get the $2-3 million is if you took the value
of what you could se1l it for in auction houses,
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Lhings of t.hat sort. And so we had a trial here
before the master.
We were talking about the case before the master Lo
resolve Marina oswald’s claim for some $2-3 million
f or t,he property.
Right. I remember this case very well because there
was sort of an interesting event that t.ook place in
the course of the trial of this case. I think Irve
done scjme pretty good lawyering, but every once in a
while you get a spur of the moment idea about a
lega1 issue and you go with it. I got one here. I
went with it and it was, it worked out fine. The
experts knew one anoLher. They were both experts on
rare books and manuscripts and one ran.a bookstore
in Chicago and one ran one in Boston and these were
experts on handwriting and documents and knew the
value of those. The t,ria1 was scheduled for 2:00 in
Lhe afternoon here in the courthouse. It was
decided earlier that the experts would come,
together with Lhe master, and we woul-d view the
property in t.he morning. Now, the Warren Commission
report had a number of volumes of the exhibits,
photographs of the exhibits. If you ever see the
ful1 Warren Commission report t.hese exhibit volumes
have photographs of vi-rtually all the documents and
all the things that were the subject of the lawsuit
but none of us had ever rea11y looked at it. Itrs
all over here in t,he Archives, across the street.
We assembl-ed in the Archives, went up the elevator
into the caverns of t.hat. building. The Archivist
brought. out the material and we looked at it. Here
it was 11:00 in the morning. Now I have to go back
a littLe bit. My expert had told me that based upon
his revi-ew of the exhibit. volumes of the Warren
Commission that he had looked at the various
letters, the diaries, the photographs and things,
and he had come up with a tentative valuation of
around $135,000-$150,000, if you took item by item
and tried to seII them in an auction house. These
things had been sold by Oswaldrs mother had sold
a couple of these letters and so there was a track
record. The Oswald case was made up of claims that
they were noL that they had publication rights
and somehow or other the Government had taken by
publishing these things Lhey had taken
publi-cation rights, and t.hat rs how they had gotten
their claim up into the miIlions. But, in any event,
their own expert, when f examined him, had come up
with a number t.hat, was roughly the same as my
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expert ‘ s on the vaIue, absent the publication
rights. His value was al-so in the $135,000-$150,000
rangfe. In any evenL, when we got to the Archives
that morning, w€ puIled out. all the letters and the
documents. Lo and behold we saw that it was al-l
discolored and seriously damaged by brown acidy
looking stuff on virLually all the papers, all the
materials. We all looked at it, and said to the
Archivist, what’s this? He said well that’s the FBI
had done a latent fingerprint analysis by using a
sil-ver’nj-trate solution on all of this paper while
they were looking for fingerprints to see if there
were conspirators or co-conspirators, and whatnot.
While it is possible to neutralize this solution,
they had neglected to do so and it had left all
these brown staj-ns all over the paper. Everybody
looked at it and then we adjourned and went to
Iunch. f went to lunch with the expert. f remember
sitting over lunch with him. I said what is that.
now the issue had to do with the taking of this
property and the date of taking was fixed aL the
time the Attorney General actually issued the order
on behalf of the United Stat,es to take the property,
which had been while the property was in that
condition. So I said to my expert witness over
Iunch, what does that do to the value of this
property? He said well of course it destroys the
va1ue, nobody in his right mind would pay anything
for this material t.hat’s been covered wit,h t.his
chemical that’s virtually destroying L.he paper. I
said could you give me a rough estimate as to what
the value might be. Oh, he said, probably, if you
discount everything, somewhere between $10, OO0,
$15,000-$l-7,000. I said well rtm groing to ask you,
when we put you on t,he stand this afternoon, what
its value is in its conditj-on. He said sure, fine,
I ‘ 11 testify to that. So we went back and the trial
started that, afternoon. They put their expert on.
He testified about the vaIue. I said did you value
it in its present condit,ion. Oh, ro, of course not.
f remember the lawyer for Marina Oswald going into a
rage at my even asking the quesLion, and objecting
to the quesLion on the ground that, the Government
had done this to the property had destroyed Ehis property and now was trying to take advantage of
the destruction of t.he property. So, in any event,
he got off the stand. Eventually my witness got on the stand and f asked him and I got out of him the
value, we got the value of $135,000-g15O,OOO if it
was in mint condi-tion and what its value in its
present condition was, and why it was only valued at
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hat. So the trial concluded and then we had to
brief the case before the masLer. Then I went out
and did the Iega1 research having made the spur of
the moment decision at lunch that f was going to put
on this whole line of testimony. Lo and behold, I
did come up with what I t.houghL was a pretty good
argument. That it’s like chopping down a you
know when the fj-remen chop down t.he tenement to
prevent the fire from spreading that thj-s was the
proper exercise by the FBf of its police powers.
They we’re looking for a crime. The property had no
intrinsic value at t.he time and there was nothing
wrong with their doing t.his, and j-f that was t.he
condition of the property when it was taken by the
Government, fine. The master issued a report in
which he found that there were several different
valuations. The intrinsic value was the stipulated
$3,000. The present condition value was $17,000
based upon my wj-tness’ testimony. If it were mint
condition it was something like $150,000 and if
there were publicatJ-on rights it was into the
mil1ions. From there we wenL to t.he District Court.
We went down t.o Texas and briefed the case and
argued it before the District Court in Texas. The Dist.rict ,Judge rul-ed for t.he Government and gave us
a $3,000 judgment. fn other words, he said that the
judgment. was limited to $3,000, t.he int.rj-nsic value
of the propert.y. But f need to tel-l you t.he end of
the st.ory. Marina Oswald took an appeal. The
appeal went t.o the Fifth Circuit, of course, in New Orleans. I wrote the brief . By that, t.1me, even
though f was a staff attorney in the Civil Division,
I got to do the appeals. I was basically an appellate lawyer for that practice and I was given
the opportunit.y to do my own appeals on occasion. I
remember having written the brief. I went down to
the Fifth Circuit for the argument. The case had
been put on the summary calendar, 15 minutes a side.
The practice at that point was that all the
at.torneys had to show up for the call of the
calendar at 9:30 or 10:00 in the morning and then
you would wait around until your case was argued.
And they ca11ed the calendar to make sure all the
attorneys were in the courtroom. As they called Lhe calendar, f stood up and announced. that i was ready.
The judges looked at me and said why are you here? I said I’m here to argue the case. They said, we1l
you know your opponent, the appe11ant., has submitted the case on the briefs, and he’s not showing up for
the argument. Do you want to argue the case? As I
was just about to speak the presiding judge said to
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file, oh, you dontt have to answer now, why dontt you
think about it and let us know when your Lurn comes
up. So I went. to the back of t.he courtroom and sat
there while three other cases were argued in the
Court of Appeals. f rehearsed in my mj-nd during all
those three cases, about 88 different ways of saying
f submit the case, f don’t. wish to argue the case.
Sure enough my t.ime came and I got called up. f
l-eft my papers and my briefcase and everything where
I was sitting in the courtroom, way back in the back
of the’courtroom. I marched smartly up to the
podium and announced that I wished to submit the
case on the brief s and that I didn’t care t.o argue
it. There was some buzz, buzz, buzzing on the panel
and they said, we1l, counsel, werd like to hear some
argument. f then said we1l, if you wouId, if you
don’t mind, I’d like to go back and get my notes.
They said sure, fine. So f went back, got my notes,
and f came back and argued the case. I was on my
feet for about an hour in which they questioned me.
I argued for about an hour. They analyzed this case
from every — they were very interested in it and
they analyzed it from every which wdy, and I had no
opponent. I was the last case on the calendar, and
we were up, and finally I 1eft. The decision came
out. f giuess f both won and lost the case because
t.hey reversed the Dist,rict Court. The $3,000 was
not the right amount but the $17,000 was the right.
amount. They upheld the doctrine that the chemical
applicatj-on of the silver nitrate solution was a perfectly reasonable act by t.he FBI and the
Government would not have to pay for t.hat. But the
value of the property in its then present condition
was its proper value, and not the intrinsic $3,OOO value.
And no further appeal from that.
And no further appeal
You have talked about a number of the cases t.hat you
had around the country while you were at the Justice
Department. Did you also have occasion while you
were with the Department to practice before the
Dj-strj-ct Court and the Court of Appeals here in the District. of Columbia?
I did. one big case that sticks out in my mind from this period which I think is worth mentioning, was the Rickover copyright case which f Lried before t.he District Court for the District of Columbia before
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,Judge John Lewis Smith. There are two aspect.s of
the case that are worth mentioning. I cantL
remember the year that I t.ried t.his case but. I have
a sense that it was around | 57 or ’58. The case had
been tried in the Dlstrict Court on an agreed
st.atement of facts in a suit against Rickover. The
essence of this case is worth mentioning. In fact,
there are a number of things about. the case, now
that I’m thinking about, that are worth ment.ioning,
from the District Court. leveI and the Court of
Appeals 1eve1. Rickover had been sued by Public
Affairs Press. Public Affairs Press was a smalI
publishing house here in t.he Dist.rict. run by a
fellow by the name of Morris Schnapper, whose
regular source of material was public domain
material. He would take material that was
essentially in the public domain and he would dress
it up in sime *ay a-nd then publish it. Sometimes
they were Government reports, sometimes j-t was
Government studies, and t.hings of that sort, whj-ch
are in the public domain. Therets a stat.ute which
says – – ‘which said then t.hat no publication of
the United States sha11 be copyrighted and this
statute had been in ef fect since l-903. The hist.ory
of the administration of that statute has been very
jaded and fascinating, if you want to spend any time
t.hinking about, it or looking into it. There’s some
interesting stories t,o mention, and f can mention
them, and will menti-on some of t.hem here along the
way. Nevert.heless, whaL happened here is that
Admiral Rickover, who was an Admiral in the United
States Navy, ran the whole nuclear submarine
program. He also was an official of the Atomic
Energy Commission where he ran the Naval nucfear
atomic energy program, so he wore two differenL hats
for t.wo different agencies of the United SL.at.es, the
U.S. Navy and the Atomic Energy Commission. Of
course, he was the father of the nuclear submarine.
fn some lights a great hero, in other lights a
curmudgeon who was very controversial. Rickover
regularly gave speeches. He was always around
promoting vari-ous causes of his educatj-on he made
a big thing about education about nuclear energy,
and things of that sort. He was always being
invited to various evenLs around t.he country or
elsewhere and he spoke frequently and a lot of the
t.hings he said were cont.roversial. He testif ied
before Congress regularly. He was a very well known person. Every time he had a speech, the Navy
Department issued a press release with a copy of hls
speech. One day he got a telephone call from
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Mr. Schnapper who said I’d like a copy of aI1 your
speeches,–of aII your press releases. I don’t know
it nickover got the call or somebody else in the
Nawy got t.he call. But in any event, it got, to
Rickover and Rickover said why do you want them? He
said well I’m going to put out a book of your
speeches because f think they’re very interesting-
Rickover says, weI1, like hefl you’re going to do
that. These are my speeches and if anybody is going
t.o puL.out a book, it’s going to be me. I’m going
to put’out, my speeches. They’re my speeches,
tfrey’re my property. In any event, Pub1ic Affairs
preis sued admiral-Rickover, the case was decided in
the District Court, it then went to the Court of
Appeals with a sort of a lengthy decision that was
sort of confusing. Rickover was represented by
private counsel. The Government was not involved in
the case at all. Eventually the case went to the
Supreme Court. after the Court of Appeals decided it.
When it got to the Supreme Court, the Supreme Court
decided that there was an important Government issue
involved. They invited the Solicitor General- to
file an amicus brief before they decided the case.
The Solicitor General got the order from the Supreme
Court and he started to assess the Government
interests around the various agencies of
Government the copyright office and here and
there in the various agencies. He got back such a
melange of disparate views about the GovernmenL
copyright stat.ute because it had been so
misundersLood, mismanaged and misapplied over the
years, that the Sol-icitor General threw up his hands
this was Archie Cox, by the way and told the
Supreme Court that he couldn’t fil-e an amicus brief
because he had no views that hg could present to the
Supreme Court. Well the Supreme Court decided the
case. The case is Public Affairs Press v. Rickover
in which they reversed t.he Court of Appeals and sent
the case back for trial. They said the case needs
to be tried on a full-blown record. One of the
reasons why is because t,here are important public
issues involved here and that they had been tried on
some agreed statement of facts in the trial court.
They said this is so particularly since we asked the
Sol-icitor General for his views and he can’t figure
out what. they are. Before we decide this case we
need to know rea11y what’s involved here. And so,
the case was remanded for trial. At that point the
plaintiff added several defendants. He added the
Register of Copyrights, the Atomic Energy
Commissioners, the Secretary of the Nawy and the
-45-
Secretary of Defense and whatnot. So the whole
federal government establishment was now implJ-cated
in the lawsuit and the case had been developed
somewhat by another lawyer who then transferred out.
and it was reassigned to me. I got the case shortly
after it got start.ed and basically had to get it
ready for trial.
I should interrupt myself here because yourve asked
so much about my own personal experiences and how I
felt a6out. things. As I was beginning to work on
this case as I say, at this point in my career, I
had been in the Department maybe seven, eight or
nine years the case was scheduled for trial, I
forget when, but six months away — and I was then
gearing up to work hard on it. r got called into
the Assistant Attorney General’s office and was
presented with an opportunity. I was told that the
DeparLment had an opportunity to send its people off
on a yearrs sabbatical to Princeton to get a
graduate degree at the Woodrow Wilson School,
prepaid -by the Government and that I was someone
that they had selected as being a candidate for
this, and would I like to do that? I woul-d get my
fuII pay but I would also have the opportunity to
get a degree and f’d come back to the Department
after my year. I went back home and talked to my
wife about it and thought about it. The opportunity
to try the Rickover case was so exciting to me that
I went back and t,o1d the boss that f was very
pleased and honored t.hat t,hey had considered me for
this opportunity to go off to Princeton but
S: You rea11y would rather be in court!
I: f’d rather be in court. So I turned down that.
opportunity just so that I could try this case. I
stilI t,hink was a good decision but others might
question it. In any event, we went on and prepared
for trial. The trial of t,he case was fascinating.
The historical issues about. t,he administration of
the st.atute were thoroughly fascinat.ing. The
statute had been breached constantly over the years.
To give you the best. example of the we11, Lhere
were a number of examples of its breach but. the
best example of the breach of this st.atut.e had been
during World War fI. In WorLd War II, at the
beginning of the war, President Roosevelt had asked
an historian, who was a professor at Harvard, Samuel
Elliot Morrison, Lo join the Navy and to be the
historian of the U.S. Navy during Worl-d War II.
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I
Morrison took leave of absence from Harvard and
became a Rear Admira1 in the United SLates Navy and
had an office in the Pentagon throughout World War II. He had a staff of Naval officers and Naval
enlisted men whose sole job over all this period of
time was to gather t.he history of the U.S. Navy
during World War II. At. the end of the war Morz,ison
wrote a 1″4 volume book called the History of the
United St.ates Navy in Wor1d War II. He won t.he
Pulitzer Prize for it. ft was published by Little,
Brown & Co. and considered to be his own piopert.y.
He reaped all the benefits from it. Any assessment
of the statute would have said that that’s a public
domain document since it was his job to write that
thing and he had all these government employees and
military personnel, working, whose very job was to
create t.his document. That was just one example.
There were countless others, but itrs probably the
best example of the breach of the statute. Anyway,
that was the argument the plaintif f was makj-ng. f t
was a lengthy triaI.
S: And this was before ,fudge Smith?
This was before ,fudge Smith. The witnesses were
excellent. The subject matter was fascinating. f
learned a lot about witnesses and about various
issues because virtual1y every witness that
testified for the Government had his own ax to
grind. The burden of t.he trial attorneys in the
case was to keep the witnesses on course, to keep
them from coming out with t,heir own views about what
t.hey f elt was import,ant to present to the court,.
Rickover was represented by private counsel- and by
an excellent t.ria1 lawyer. The plaintiffs were
represented al-so by an excel-lent triaL lawyer.
There was one procedural element that I think is
worth noting because frve always harkened back to
it. In context it is sort of interesting, We had
made a decisJ-on, because Rickover was represented by
private counsel and we were the Government, that the
Department of ,Justice would undertake to share the
burden of the cost of the defense of this case.
Rickover’s argumenL was that. this was his private
property and we sustai-ned that view. f should add
t.hat. by t.he t j-me the case got t,o t.riaI, Rj-ckover had
abandoned any copyright claim to 32 out of the 34
speeches. Now that number may not be right but.
there were two that were t,ried and he had abandoned
any claim to the other 30-odd speeches so the
plaintiff could have those and use them for
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whatever. And the two speeches that he had given,
one invol-ved a speech that he gave at The Harvard
Club in New York City and other one involved a
speech that he had given at a publlc power
convention in Seattle. The fact is that he had
travel-Ied both to New York and to Seattle on
GovernmenL travel. He had other Government business
in the area, which is Rickoverrs practice, and so
the case basically involved how did he happen to do
this speech? How did he get. t.o the location? What
was the subject matter of his speech? Was it part
of his responsibil-ities as a Naval officer to
deliver this particular speech? The speech at The
Harvard Cl-ub was on education. And, of course, Lhe
problem for Rickover was t.hat Rickover, who
frequently testified before Congress and was a
supreme egotist, would regularly tel1 the commitLees
that rrlrm in the education business, part of my job
is to educate Naval officers and the whoLe nuclear
Navy. t’ Of course, by giving a speech on education
at. The Harvard CIub t.he plaintiff was able to argue,
look by’his own words, he said he was in the
education business so this is part of his offlcial
duties. The plaintiff made a similar argument about
his speech before the public power convention.
Because one of his other functions in t.he Atomic
Energy Commission was to run an experimental nuclear
power plant at Duquesne Power and Light in
Pittsburgh. He was related through an experimental
private power operation. But. Lhe thing that. f
remember most vividly about. the case as a tactical
procedural event is a very mundane Littl-e t.opic.
That had to do with the fact that I got a call from
the court reporter a day or two before the trial was
to start. She knew me because there had been a
number of pretrj-al proceedings. She said to me, are
you going to order the transcript? I said, “yes, I’m going to order the transcripL. ” She said I’if
you would like daily copy it ‘ s going to be more
expensive but one thing you might want to do ls get
all three parties to share the cost and that way if
all three of you buy daily it would be the same as
if you were just buying it regular copy, and I ‘ 11 do
daily copy for you. ” So I called my co-counsel at
the time who represent.ed Rickover. As it turned out
there was a greal deal of animosity between
plaint.iff’s counsel and Rickover’s counsel. They
scarcely talked to one another civilly outside of
court and r was somewhat of the intermediary and I
would end up talking to both of them. I told him
what the reporter had said and he said why don’t you
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r
go call plaintiff’s counsel and see what he’s going
to do, how he wants to handle it.. Now, I had
already committed, f ‘d al-ready ordered the
transcript. I caIled up the plaintiff’s lawyer and
I said we can get daily copy if you wanL to pay a
third of the cost.. He said, oh no. I said wel-l
what are you going to use? He said f ‘m not goJ-ng to
order a transcript. I saj-d what are you going to
use? He said I’m goj-ng to use the courL’s copy. I
said, gh, okay. r went back and told my co-counsel
who went. int,o a blind rage at the very thought that
he wasn’L going to order t.he Lranscript because he
viewed this whole case as a grave imposition on
Rickover and all t.he rest. of it, and here he wasn’t
even going to order a transcript. It was going to
be a lengthy tria1. We knew it was going to be at
least a couple of weeks. He said I won’t stand for
this, this is outrageous. I looked at him and said
there’s nothing we can do about it. He said, “by
God there is something we can do about it. frm
going to report this to the judge. ” The morning of
the t,rial- either that d”y, or there was a pret.rial the day before or something like that,
he insist.ed that all t.hree of us go before the judge
in chambers the first thing. He asked me Lo support
him and I t.o1d him t.hat. I rea1Iy couldn’t . He was
going to complain about the fact that t.he plaintiff
was not ordering the transcript. ,Judge Smith very
properly, I thought, said weI1, thatrs very
interestirg, but f donrt
I can’L make him order it either
f can’t make him order a transcript. So we came out
of chambers where the judge had said f’m not going
to order him to order a t.ranscript. Before we got
sLarted, f met with co-counsel and he said welI, by
God, why shoul-d we order a transcript? We decided
and I went back to the court reporter’and I said I
revoke my order. So we revoked the order for the
transcript. Wel1, word of that got. to t,he judge, to
‘Judge Smith. He knew that we had originally ordered
the transcript and he knew that we now no longer had
a transcript.. We then asked I canrt remember the
timing but we had an att.orney from the Atomj-c
Energy Commission, or somebody, come down and hj-s job was to sj-t in court throughout the proceedings
and take very copious notes about what was going on.
It turned out to be a 16 day trial. As the trial
proceeded, we found out Lhat ,Judge Smith, and I had
never actually tried a case before ,Judge Smith, but
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I t.hink I had argued motions before him. But Judge
Smith, v/e realized aft.er a day or Lwo, was also
taking very, very copj-ous and detailed not,es of all
of the witnessest testimony. ft would turn out that
a witness would say somet,hing, there was an
objection about something he said, and the ,Judge
would Lhen, you could see that he had ye11ow pads
filled with very detailed notes of what the
witnesses had testified to. He made his rulings on
the basis of his own extensive notes. WelI. we came
to the end of the trial and of course we had
extensive notes of all t.he witnesses. We prepared
post-trial findings and conclusj-ons. The judge
issued an opinion ruling for Rickover and the
GovernmenL f inding t.hat, Ehese were Rickover’ s
private speeches and they were his private property
and weren’t in the public domain and refusing to
give a declaratory judgment to the plaint,iff. The plaintiff then took an appeal and, of course, the
issue came up that if he wanted to attack the
findings of the distrj-ct court he would need a
transcrj-pt. There had never been a transcript made
by the court reporter in this case. The court
reporLer had all of the not.es but they had never
been turned into a printed transcript. At that
point, f remember calling over to the court reporter
and asking her how much this would cost if someone
were to get the transcript. f think she gave me an
estimate of $25,000-$30,000 or so, because it had
been a lengt.hy trial. .fust doing it would cost a
lot of money. So we sort of sat back and said
wel-l, this is going to have an ef fect on t.he case.
The only other thing that I remember about the case
was that there was a big delay on the plaintiffrs
part in filing his brief and what not. I was
assigned to work on the appeal in the case and t.he plaintiff’s lawyer, a very capable lawyer, a very
professional lawyer but also a very vigorous
advocate. He ls the sorL of lawyer that he would
make a sLaLement and if you didn’t counter it you
may be heLd responsible for what he said j-n some
manner. Event.ual1y, there was some bi-pIay in the
court. of appeals about what had happened in the
course of preparing for the appeal. The appellant
f iled his brief but it was out. of t.ime. In the
course of the motion for filing it out of time,
there were certain statements that were made about
commi-tments that alleged1y either the Governmentts
or Rickoverrs at.torney had made about the appeal.
As I saj-d, the appellant’s brief was attached to the
motion for leave to file out of time, it clearly was
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S:
I:
S:
not timely. I remember, because f was assigned the
appeal and f sat down and immediately prepared a
response to the motion for filing out of t.ime. I
tal-ked to co-counsel who was very adamant that we
had to do this. I took my response into the Section
Chief in the Appellate Sect,ion who was my reviewer
on the appeal. I sent it into him and he sent i-t
back to me saying: No we wonrt file this. I
wenL back to him and said why not? He said, well
the brief is here and it. doesn’t make any sense to
f i1e ttiis t.hing. Itrs not going to make any
difference. The court is going to take the brief.
I sat there and for a half-hour I argued with the
section chief on why we had to file the opposition
because if you didn’t respond to t.hese statements
you might have to live with t,hem at some point later
on in the case. f don’t even remember what the
statements were but we disputed them. They were
some things that we wanted to dispute. I remember
vividly at the very end of this harangue with my
boss, he took t.he opposition paper and kind of threw
it acro$s the desk aL me and said oh aL1 right
if you want it grudgingly he 1et me file it. I
signed it and filed it. A few days 1ater, the court
of appeals dismissed the appeal for failure to file
a t,imely brief. f must say that everyone over the
years always held t.he appellate section lawyers and
t.he appellate section management in awe because they
were the elitist of the el-ite Department of ,Justice
attorneys. Whenever you had to deal- with the
appellate section t.hey took a IordIy attitude in
dealing with the commoners around the Division. You
know what I’m talking about. Of course, at thaL
point, f was a general litigation section lawyer and
somehow or other I felt that I would no longer feel
in awe of people in the appellate section because I
had at least shown them that there was a way to win
a case that was contrary to their views. And that
was the end of it.
And mooted the issue of no transcript.
It mooted the issue of no transcript,.
Do you have any particular recollections about
,fudge Smith’s conduct of the trial?
I thought ,Judge Smith was a very even-handed,
respectful, responslble jurist. He was very
dignified, he ruled firmly on matters, he showed no
emotion or bi-as about the case, he was respectful to
I;
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I
both sides. I had the feeling that, he expected
everyone of us to be professj-onal. He wasnlt an
emotional man in any respect. He was serious and
hardworking and dignified. I never had a feeling
t.hat he was biased one way or another. There was
talk about the judge generally that he might be
biased toward the GovernmenL in criminal matters and
things of that sorL but. t.his wasnrt a criminal
matter. We had no feeling whatsoever that, he was on
our side. We di-dn’t think we had this case won.
Until the case was decided we thought that the case
was up in the aj-r. We had no way of knowing. It
was a fascinating issue about Rickover and about
Government copyright issues. There were lots and
lots of fascinating f mean f told you one story
about Samuel Elliott Morrison there were
countless ot.her incidents of mismanagement of that
stat.ute so there was just no telling. Of course,
the plaintiff brought. a 1ot of that to the court’s
att,ent,ion in the briefs so there was no telling how
t.he court might decide. I thought ,Judge Smith did a
very good job. I t.hink it is worth not.j-ng that as a
dj-strict judge he was aware of t.his skirmish over
the Lranscript. because I had the feeling t,hat that
skirmish caused him to act on the Bench in the way
that he might not have acted had he thought that all
he had to do was look at the transcript that would
be prepared for him. He knew what was happening and
he was going to have his own set of notes about what
the witness testified. ft came up constantly where
there was some question what the witness had
testified to or what objections had been ruled upon.
He would always refer to his own notes and he would
say we11, this is what I think he said. And that
was it.
That f inished t.he Rickover case. IJet me go on f or
just a couple of more minutes with a few interesting
things from my perspective. As a result. of having
worked on Lhe Rickover case, I became the so-caIIed
“expertrt on copyright 1aw in the Civil Divisj-on.
That. caused me later in my career, when I was a
Deputy Assistant Attorney General a few years 1ater,
t.o be invol-ved with presenting the Department
testimony bef ore congressional commj-ttees. Durj-ng
t.he mj-d-’70s there was a lengthy process by which
the entire copyright l-aws were revised. There was a
massive revision of the copyright laws which were
held up because there were disputes about some
aspects of the copyright. laws about music, tapes and
royalties, things like that.. In any event, I relate
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this to the Rickover case, because in a sense
Rickover started me into the area of copyrights. I
hold sorL of a personal feeling about knowing
something about t.his subject,. Some of it is
historical too. One of t.he things I didn’t telI you
about was Lhat there was a famous case involving the
not.ebook of Captain Clark of the Lewis & Clark
Expedit.ion, which eventually turned into a case
because his notebook was found in an old house in
Minneapolis many years ago. It became t.he subject
of litigaLion as to who owned the notebook since
Captain Clark’s job was to go on this mission, sent
by t.he President of the United States and to keep a
record of this expedition. That’s just a Iittle
historj-cal aside. The major revision of the
copyright laws took place in the mid-r7Os. f became
the Government spokesman in testimony on more than
one occasion before congressional committees. There
are two thi-ngs that I remember the stat,ute was
very broad and many areas within the Department of
,fustice had an interest in the statute. There were
Criminal Division interests because t.here were
criminal sanctions on copyright infringements; the
Antitrust Division had an interesL in various other
provisions because of t.he antj-trust laws and some
Civil Division j-nterests because of the patent
copyrlght area of Government. contracts. When the
statute in its entirety came up for enactment, the
statute was farmed-out. to the various Divlsions in
the Department. f was the Deputy Assistant Attorney
General who was selected to be the person to give
t,he DeparLmenL’s testimony on the stat.ut.e. A lot of
other people testified. There was an awful 1ot of
legislative history on this. My own personal
knowledge was only on the fraction of my testimony
that I had prepared — maybe 20 percent of the
testimony was personal to me, the ot.her B0 percent
had been prepared by ot.her Divisions — Antitrust
and what.not. Those people came with me to the
committee hearing and were sitting at the tab1e. I
submj-tt.ed a lengthy statement for the record and I
gave a very short presentation. I was questioned by
various members of the committ.ee and indeed, I think
even some of the other Department. personnel gave
statements during the course of that t,estimony. The
revisions Lo the copyright laws were enacted.
There’s just one humorous anecdote that folIows.
Eventual-ly, I l-eft the Government and went to
private practice. I was in the firm’s library a few
years back and one of the assocj-at.es in the office
came running over to me with a vol-ume from the
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Federal Reporter. He showed it to me. f read it.
I was somewhat astounded because Lhere was a case in
the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit,
involving a copyright disput.e in which someone was
contesting, I can’t remember the case or the j-ssue
but it, had to do with a design copyright of some
sort. There was an aspecL of the application of the
st.atute about which there was a serj-ous question of
how the statute was t.o be construed. It was a 2 to
1 decision in t.he Second Circuit and my t.estimony
was being quoted by the majority and disputed by the
dissent about how the stat.ute was supposed to be
consLrued. Now as it turned out when I read the
testimony it was in this B0 percent category of
testimony that someone else had prepared and thaL I
didn’t know anything about. Yet when you read the
decision of the Court of Appeals for the Second
Circuit t.hey were arguing over what f had said even
though it wasn’t, exaclly me. That is an
interesting comment on legislative history.
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Today is March 28, 1992 and we are continuing the oral
history of Irwin Goldbloom in connection with t.he Dist.rict, of
Columbia Federal Court Oral Hist.ory Project.
S: Good morning, Mr. Goldbloom (Irwin).
Good morning, Ms. Gere (Sa1ly) .
This morning we are going to begin a new topic.
Yes, it involves a case that took place here in t,he
District of Columbia before the U.S. District Court
for the District of Columbia. ft was actually
considered by many to be part of the whole Watergate
scenario, but it did not start out that, way. The
case had a number of ramifications from both civil
and criminal aspects, ?s well- as polit,ical
overtones. The case is worth describing. The
events that led to the development of this lawsuit
occurred well over a year before the Watergate
break-in. It invol-ved the establishment of a price
support’for the Department, of Agriculture’s milk
price support program. The details of this are
somewhat vague in my mind since I have not addressed
the issue directly for a number of years. In any
event,, the case resulted from what appeared to be an
unusual circumstance in which the Department of
Agriculture had initially established a price
support number which was the number aL which milk
would be supported. This had a major impact on how
much dairy farmers would get for the milk that t.hey
produced. This is by no means, or at least. at Lhat
time during those years, it was by no means an
unimportant number. It affected the price of milk
throughout, the country. A very complicated milk
pricing system meant an awful lot to dairy farmers
because a swing of a dol1ar or more one way or the
other made substantial differences ln what dairy
farmers were able to realize for their l-abors.
f believe this took place in 1970, Lhe exact date
escapes me. There was a number that had been
established and the number appeared to be lower than
the organized dairy farmers of America had thought
shoul-d be the case. There was a guite a hit of
furor within the dalry industry or at least the
dairy farmer industry. We have to be careful
because t.he dairy industry is complex and they have
a lot. of different groups.
fn any event, organized lobbying and proLests took
place and eventually the Secretary of Agriculture
made a reassessment of the milk price support
sit.uation and raised the price by a substantial
I
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percentage. Again, I forget t.he exact details, but
he did raise the price.
When he did that, there was a great hue and cry from
other interests and as a result, a lawsuit was filed
by Ralph Nader against. the then Secretary of
Agriculture, challenging the price support decision
on t.he ground that. j-t was improper, arbitrary, and
capricious and would affect consumers in an adverse
way. This lawsuj-t was fiIed, in my recoll-ection I
may noL have the exact dat.es accurate, but it. was
filed clearly a year before the Watergat.e break-in.
So, it. is hard to see how even in itself, it is
relat.ed t.o Watergate and yet it. became an event in
the Watergate phenomenon, which strongly affected
the whole issue of the dairy price support.
We began litigating that case on behalf of the
Department of Agricult.ure and I was the principal
attorney for the Department. ft was at that time in
my vJ-ew a rather straight-forward administrative 1aw
case. ft had some interesting administrative 1aw
issues but on its face it did not appear to be
extraordinarily difficult or provocative.
There was this allegation of an improper raising of
the price and I wou1d, in the normal fashion, ask
the Department of Agriculture for a lit,igation
report and they gave it to me. It turned out that
they reported back to the Department of ,Justice that
there were good and sufficient reasons, having
reexamined the issues, when they made the original
determination. The Secretary looked at these issues
and determined that. the price should be elevated.
It j-s fair to say that there were obvious political
issues associated with the case. I am not
suggesting for a momenL, that f was oblj-vious t,o
them. Nevertheless, there are always issues about
polit.ics in major cases of administrative 1aw. You
tended to t,ake them in stride in part because of the
way that these cases got litigated during the ’70s.
There were a 1ot of public interest law firms and public interest lawyers who would raise a polit.ical
specter about virtually every governmental action.
In any event, we got the det,ails of the case and
were assured by the officials of the Department of
Agrlculture that the case was clearly defensible and
t.here was nothing inordinate about. the
decisionmaking process. In order to defend the case
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properly, as it turned out by the time the case was actually brought, there had been a change in
Secretarys at Agriculture. The Secretary that had
made thal initiil determination and then the amended
determination had left and he was now in private
industry. There was a new Secretary, and the new
Secretary was not the one that had anything to do
with it.
fn order to defend the case. it became necessary to
go out’to meet with the former Secretary and to get
his story about how the decisj-on had been reached,
and I did that. I traveled out to St. Louis,
actually f remember going with David Anderson, who
was another attorney in the General- Litigation
Section, and we visited Clifford Hardin, who had
been the Secretary of Agriculture at the time.
Secretary Hardin, prior to becoming Secretary of
Agriculture had been head of the University of
Nebraska. He t.hen became Secretary of Agriculture
and, having left that position, was working for t,he
Ral-ston ?urina Company. He was, I forget his
precise tit1e, he was Vice-Chairman of the Board and
perhaps Chief Executive Officer, or Chief Operating
Officer, something like that, but he was a major
of f icial with Ralst.on Purina. I remember fairly
well because his offices were at this building
located at Checkerboard Square in St. Louis. They
were in the Executive Suite at the very top of the
building.
Dave and I went there and we sat with the former
Secretary and discussed all- the matters about the
case. He had a fairly good recollection of the
events, because by then this was a fairly
controversiaL topic. He related all of those things
to us and we decided that we would use his affidavit
to support a motion for summary judgment on behalf
of the DeparLmenL of Agricul-ture. We sat there and,
he having told us what the facts were, wrote them
out on paper. He looked at them and made some
changes and revj-sed it. These were his views, his
thoughts and his description of the events. We came
away from that meet.ing with his affidavit which he
swore to and signed. We eventually attached that to
a motion for summary Judgment
The motion evenLually got made and one of the j-ssues
that came up j-n the case, when we were preparing our
motion, was the fact that the price support system
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was an annual determination. By t.he time we got
around t.o making the moLion, an entirely new
determination had been made for the following year.
We argued in the motion that whatever the case was,
while we defended the case on the merits attacking
the plaintj-ff’s arguments, we also had a mooLness
argument. We contended that the passage of t.ime and
the arrival of a new price support determination
mooted the case because there was nothing for the
courL !o do about an old determination.
Which courL was this before?
We were before the U.S. District Court for the
Dist.rict of Co1umbia. The judge was Wil1iam B.
,Jones, who f ‘m not sure that he was chief judge
at the time, he could very well have been t.he chief
judge but he had the case. I remember I do
noL remember the specific argument but I remember
we came out for argument and he listened to it. He
was a very able judge, extremely ab1e, very bright,
very quick, very knowledgeable, sLern and all that,
but he was just a very, very able judge in my
recollection. t believe, again I am just reaching
back from memory, that. he granted the motion for
summary judgment on the ground of moot,ness.
Essentially he said that a year has gone by and
there was nothing more for the courL to do.
The plaintiffs took the case to the United States
Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia
Circuit and, again, I can not remember if I handled
the appeal or whether the appeal was handled by
someone in the appellate section, it could very wellhave
been that I handled t.he appeal. But it came up
before a panel of three judges in t.he Court, of
Appeals and the decision is in the books, and they
reversed the mootness decision. The essential
element of their decision is the docirine of capable
of repetition yet evading review that doctrine
which t.he courLs use Lo override mootness issues,
particularly arising i-n administrative law contexts.
My reference to timing here, is not too good because
I have not gone back and put things in contexL. But
the reversal by the Court of Appeals in effect sent
the case back to the trial court. I cannot teLl
what was happening in relation to timing but I do
know that stories began Lo come ouL that major dairy
farmer groups had visi-ted Washington and protested
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the ori-gina1 decision on the price support
determination. They had actually gone to the White
House and met. with the President. There were large
groups of dairy farmers, the officials of these
three major organizations. In the course of that,
and this reminds me now because it puts it in a
better time frame. I think that the original
decision, the price support decision, was probably
made in L971- because, that was the year of the
initial decision.
The public records refl-ect.ed, that these dairy
organizations had made rather major contributions to
t.he Committee to Reelect the President. There were
a number of rumors apparent.ly out on the street,
again I am just drawing on my general recollection,
nothing from the case in particular, people were
boasting that they had made the right political
contrj-bution and they had been abl-e to affect this
decision.
Whereupdn, w€ embarked upon a series of depositions
in which plai-ntiffs’ counsel would be taking the
depositions of various high ranking members of t.he
dairy producer orgarrrzations and others who were
associated with this thing. Depositions were also
taken of members of the Whit.e House and
administ.rat.ion people, all designed to show that in
one way or another, the decisj-on regarding price
support had been basically purchased by virtue of
political contributions.
Who was representing the plaintiffs, what lawyer?
They were represent,ed by a major public interest
lawyer at the time. He represented Ralph Nader.
Those depositions were fascinating in that they
were, this j-s my own judgment, on that, the
depositions seemed inconclusive abouL who did what
and under what circumstances. Certainly, there were
a number of principals or participants in these
political discussions within these farmer
organizations where they believed that having made
these contrj-butions they had produced the result
thaL they had sought. Or putting it another wdY,
having been solj-cited for contributions, they made
the contributions and got the result that everyone
expected.
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Along about this time, the Watergate case broke.
The burglary and the invest.igat.ion and all of the
matt,ers about Watergate were in t.he press on a
regular basis. Investigative reporters became very
interest.ed. At the time of t.he decision by the
Court of Appeals, I believe t,here was a great deal
of journalistic interest in the act.ivitj-Es of these
dairy producer organizat.ions as well as generally in
Lhe subject of campaign cont.ributions which were
then beginning to get ginned up as a topic of public
interest.
One of the things that I recaIl vividly about that
time frame, ds we were then going through the
depositions, was the fact that we woul-d go out on a deposition, and t,hese deposit.ions took place all
over the country, from one end of the country t,o the
other, and I t.raveled with opposing counsel from
city to city.
The deposition would be taken, it basically took
around 3O days until the transcript was produced and
f iled with t,he court. The day aft.er it was f iled
with the courL there would be a front-page story in
the Washingt.on Post detailing the activities of the
part,icular witness in connection with either the
Dairy Producers Association or how the contributj-ons
were made or the circumst.ances associated with
meeting with them at the WhiLe House. There had
been a meeting in the Cabinet. Room of the Vfhite
House wit.h the President and the Secretary of
Agriculture, Secretary Hardin, and ot.hers. The
Secretary of Treasury, ,John Conna1ly, was al_so at
t.hat meet,ing because of the vast economic impact of
the price support decision.
In any evenE, iL was interesting because you could
almost clock it 30 days after a deposit.ion was taken, and within t.hat, 30 days f had presumably
forgot.ten the details of what had been testified to.
These depositions were illuminating but, by no
means, bombshells. They were not front-page news in
and of themselves becauie they did not, l*-far as I
was concerned, detail- specific alleged corrupt acts.
But they were interesting. They were interesting
because t.hey shed insight into political fundraising
and the machinations of the various organizations
and j-ndividuals involved. As a result, you would pick up the paper 30 days aft.er the deposj-tion was
taken and there would be a front-page story.
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Meanwhile, the Watergate investigation certainly was
heating up at that time and there were all kinds of
disputes over access to government documents, things
of that sorL. f remember, ds just as an aside here,
comj-ng before Judge ,Jones on discovery disputes of
various and sundry items. The judge was incensed,
in one way or another, about some aspect of the
governmentrs conduct, and it was clear to me that he
was reading the newspapers and that. he was getting
his information from news articl-es which had either
over-ch’aracterized or mischaracterized some of the
deposition testimony. r remember feeling very
helpless because I would st.and up before this judge
for whom I had a great. deal of respect and still do.
However, he took me Lo task for trying t.o defend
what he was viewing as conduct that had been
prompted by a bunch of rascals. These clearly
chance comments were being made, not as a result of
some intense examination of the record, but rather
based on a perusal of the newspapers. The matters
that were before him, that he had an occasion to say
these th’ings about, were never more than your
typical discovery disputes. In any event, I found
it very frustrat.ing and somewhat alarming.
Then, of course, another bombshel-I occurred in the
Watergate case when it. was revea1ed that the White
House had this taping system. Wat.ergate Special
Prosecutor Archibald Cox made efforts to get at t.he
Watergate tapes. Ultimately that turned out to be
one of the major elements in his being fired by the
Acting Attorney General. The milk case sort of
played a role in all of t.his because on the one hand
I was representing the Depart.ment of Agriculture,
actively defending this case in court, and, in a
sense, another aspect of the governmenL, the
Watergate Special Prosecutor’s staff was beginning
to get interested in political contributions.
The Watergate Special Prosecutor and his staff were
becoming interested in the affairs of t,he milk price
support program as being an element of illegal
campaign contributions, things of that sort. f felt
somehow or other f was caught in the middle because
on the one hand I was defending the government
Secretary of Agriculture, the then Secretary of
Agriculture and the Depdrtment with a plaintiff
beat.ing down on me trying to get j-nformation from me
and now all of sudden, the Watergate Special
Prosecutor was seeking to get, access to documents
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and materials that were involved in t.he case. I
have a vague recollecLion that. we accommodated some
of their requests by making available to them
materials which they would otherwise have been
capable of either subpoenaing or getting through
lawful judicial means. In any event, Ehere was this
plaintiff on the one hand that I was fighting off
and a Watergate Special Prosecutor on the other. I
had no idea what my relationship was supposed to be
to them.
fn any event, the furor over the White House tapes
with respect to Lhe Watergate Prosecutor was
int.ensifying dramatically and everyone in the
country seemed to know about the problem of the
White House tapes. It was a fascinating issue just
in general. When the revelation about the taping
system came out, the plaintiff in my case, knowing
that there had been a meeting at t.he White House,
made a demand, and I forget whether it was by
subpoena or ot.herwise, for a copy of the tape of
this meeting with the dairy farmers, where the
President had met. with them durJ-ng t,his period
just before this change j-n the price support
determination. I relayed that request to the White
House Counsel’s office. I remember going over there
and discussing the issue regarding Lhe production of
the t.ape.
Who was the White House Counsel?
I believe Fred Buzhardt was the White House counsel
at the t.ime. Quit.e obviously, there were lots and
lots of issues that they were concerned about as
they were dealing with the Watergate Special
Prosecutor and goodness knows whatever else they
were dealing with. f was just a lawyer from the
Depart.ment of ,.Tustice. I was Special Lit.igation
Counsel at that time. I was a senior trial
at.torney. Nevertheless, I am not sure that they
focused on all of the issues. But in any evenL, I
recaIl quite vividly that I was able to get that
tape from the White House.
Physically get, a copy of a t.ape?
Physically get, well I got a copy of the tape. But.
I did not get the actual tape, buL they made a copy
of the tape for me. I remember also that they had
delivered the tape to me in December of a9’73, just
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as f was about to embark upon another one of these
depositions with opposing counsel. It was sometime
early in the month of December. I remember, only
because I thought about it at the t.ime right
afterwards. We were going to take a deposition of
Herbert Kalmbach, who was another Watergate figure,
out in Newport. Beach, California. As it turned out,
opposing counsel and I were going to take the same
plane to California. I remember going out to Dulles
Airpor.t and taking the t.ape with me and handing it
to hj-m ‘aboard the airplane or at the gate, in
effect, complying with his discovery request.. We
went, to California and he took the deposition of
Kalmbach, and I came back. It was just before
Christmast.ime of L973. What I had not focused on at
the time, was that this was basically the first
White House tape that had been disgorged by the
White House.
.S: It actually had President Nixon’s voice on the tape?
It actually had PresidenL Nixon’s voice on the tape.
f had l-istened to the tape before I t.urned it over.
It was an interesting tape. It was nothing worth
listening to, in my judgment., based upon my limited
knowledge of all the other circumstances. But,
since f was not in the Watergate Special
Prosecutorts office, I did not know what else they
had. Obviously, I am not suggesting that Lhere was
nothing on it. But from the perspective of my case,
it was an inconseguential tape, buL it. was an it.em
of evidence.
We came back from California and I remember vividly
getting a telephone cal1 from a television anchortype
reporter sometj-me after f reLurned from
Catitornia. In those days I used to get cal1s from
reporters on a regular basis. There were reporters
who covered this part j-cuIar case j-n detall-. They
would fol1ow it. In fact., the reporter would write
the storj-es of the depositions. This was his case
to fo11ow, so j-t was noL a random reporter that. had
the case, there were certain reporters who followed
it. But this was a voice out of the b1ue, although
I cannot remember who it was, but it was somebody I
recognized as a celebrity-type journalist.. He was
frantically asking me about this White House tape
and did I know that, it had been played at a cocktail
party at Georgetown. I said I knew about the tape
but did not know about any cocktail party in
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Georgetown. I had no knowledge about it and frankly
I could not help him at al-I. I could not shed any
light on j-t.
I would typically, over the years, get cal1s from
reporters. They were always seeking inside
information. This was easy becausd I had no
information to give him. f just simply said, sure I
knew about t.he tape but. I do not know about whaLever
happened to it. Later in the day I got. other ca1ls
from other newspaper men. Before the day was out, f
had at 1east. three or four ca1ls from newspaper menr
then from ot.her people in the Department asking me
what I knew about. this thing. ft was sort, of,
again, I have the timing a 1itt1e bit upset. I do
not know whether it was a day after. There was a
l-ot of furor the next day. It was reported
extensj-ve1y on radio and television. There was
indeed a great deal of news coverage about. the
playing of t.his tape at the cocktail party.
Had anyone from any newspaper or television station
actually gotten a copy of the tape itself? Or was
this story sti1l confined to the fact that. it had
been played somewhere else? Or do you recall?
I do not reca1l. I do not believe that. anybody had
a copy of the t.ape. I do not think the copy had
been disseminat.ed. I do not believe that it had
been heard by any of these particular reporlers.
When they asked me about it t.hey were more
interested in just the mere fact of the existence of
tape. The subject matter did not seem to be the
most int.eresting. Again, f could not shed any light
on what had happened. But the next thing I knew, I
got a call from the court saying that. there was
going to be a hearing the next day. The judge
wanted to know what had transpired with this tape.
Of course, f went down to court and opposing counsel
was there. .ludge Jones was in a fierce mood. My recollection may not be accurate, but I do not.
believe that we, that is the government or I, had
moved or done anything to seek any kind of relief
concerning the tape or to seek any sanction. The judge had done this sua sponte.
Of course, Lhe courtroom was mobbed with reporters
and journalists of every kind. In those days, the
television cameramen were stationed in front of the
courthouse and they would chase you up and down the
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street every time you came j-n and out of the
courthouse trying t.o get you to say something about
t,he case. They had fingered everyone who they
thought was involved in anything associated with
Watergate. I do not know whether it happened that
day-
I remember, though, that the hearing was very
difficult for opposing counsel. He was sternly and
harshly reprimanded by the judge. In faj-rness to
him, f Lhink it. is fair to say as I stood t.here in
court and the judge did question me about t.he tape,
you know that I had produced it. I had a terribly
hard tj-me keeping a straight face. While counsel
had done somethj-ng that he probably should not have
done in the sense of treating this evidence lightly
by playing it at a cocktail party, the fact. is that.
there was basically nothing on the t.ape that was
embarrassing or revealing of any inside informat.ion
about price support or dairy farmers or the
Pres j-dent or anybody else as far as I could telI.
Others niay have listened to that tape and found or
heard other things on it. Tn fact, I’rTr sure they
did, because the Watergate Special Prosecutor
focused on that tape quite extensively.
But, from my perspective, and I admit it was quite
limited, i-t was sort of half humorous. I had, as I
said, up until that point regularly appeared before
t,he judge and was excoriated for resisting turning
over information or trying to hold the line
somewhere or another. The judge had been beati-ng on
me because of what he was reading in t.he newspapers.
Now all of sudden now, he was beating on my
opponent. Taking the heat off me somewhat just.
seemed to be a welcome relief. But more basically,
the whole thing seemed to be a tempest j-n a teapot.
The opposing counsel had actually takbn the tape and
played it in his home?
Apparently. He had gone to some kind of, I do not
know the facts or the details, but apparently it
either had been at his home or somewhere else, where
he said I have this White House tape. The furor
that occurred, because of the press reports and what
the judge was expressj-ng, I only vaguely saw at the
time. I came to realize much Iater, the count:iy was
in this great chaotic situation in which the
President was resj-sting t.he disclosure of Whit.e
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House tapes. The Watergat.e Special Prosecutor,
Archie Cox, was hammering away at the President and
the White House to get access to the tapes. It was
the most, one of the most crit,ical issues, which was
t.hen being unfolded in the developing WatergaLe
imbroglio. Here, the tape had come out and had been
treated Iight1y. fL had been treated with something
Iess than the kind of reverence or dignity or
respect t.hat. one would have expected in cont.ext..
The lesson, of course, is that. you never take
anyt.hing that is evidence and treat it in a cavalier
fashion.
Well as a result of that, did ,Judge .Jones either
impose sanctions or did you from that point forward
have materials exchanged under seal or in camera?
No, I do not. recall that he did I do not think
there was any particular sanction. I mean certainly
it was an oral dressing down. I do not recall
that. there was any particular sanction. f do not
think we’sought any sanction.
Eventually, the milk price support, issue was
littered throughout the Watergate period. It was
t.aken up by the House ,Judiciary Committee and was
considered as a possible plank in the impeachment
process proceedings. I think it was ultimately
voted it was not. voted there was not an
affirmative vote, but it was considered as a potential plank or charge in t.he impeachment
proceedings.
The case I believe ult.imately went off favorably to
the government. We ultimately moved for summary
judgment on the basis of all the depositions that
had been taken and all of the discovery. I believe
,Judge .Jones ruled on the basis of evj-dence t,hat.
there was no direct showing that the decisj-on thaL
had been made was inappropriate. Again, I may be
wrong it’s been a long time since I looked at t,he
case.
There was another side issue though assocj-ated with
it. That is the original af f idavit t.hat. we had
submitted on behalf of former Secret.ary Hardin. It
was viewed by some as noL being accurate. This was
his affidavit. We had sat there with him and
prepared it., but we knew none of the facts.
Eventually there was a group within t.he WaLergate
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Special Prosecutorrs Office which was assigned to
process that part of the investigation. f was
called before t.he grand jury, the Watergate Grand
,rury. I testified about the circumstances in which
that affidavit was prepared. I believe the
Watergate Prosecut.or eventually decided not to
prosecute. I do not know what his ground was
but my feeling was that he could not make a case
that t.his was a falsehood. rt was written in such a
way that you would have to argue you could have
argued ‘both sides of the issue. My involvement j-n
that case was over. The Watergate Special
Prosecutor, however, did go after ‘fohn Connal1y, in
connection with some aspect, not necessarily the
same aspect, of Connally’s involvement. with the
dairy people. That was a public trial in which we
know that Connally was acquitted.
Was t,his the one where he was represented by Edward
Bennett Williams? The argument basically was
something along the Iines that when one had as much
money as- Connally did, he would not stoop to take
such a modest amount. It was something like
$l-0, 000, something like that?
f do not. know the details. I did not follow the
case myself. My recollection is that that was a
distant cousin of the events, because some of the
people involved were associated with the milk
industry. It was a long drawn out case.
There is only one other thing worth mentioning. I
found it to be a fascinating comment. I cannot
think of t.he name of the chap who said it. He later
became Secretary of Agriculture, perhaps in the
Nj-xon administ,ration, but he was then an Assistant
Secretary of Agriculture. I remember he was not
involved in the case. He may not even have been
involved in the actual events that had transpired,
whether he was or not, I do not recaIl. f remember
meeting with him because he was sort of the clienL,
the principal person, the client long after
SecreLary Hardin had 1eft. This is before t.he case
rea11y heated up, but wh11e lt was begj-nning to heat
up. His comments, which f found interesting, were
that there are a lot of deep psychological
sensibilities about milk that relate to our infancy.
Wheneve:: you have something that is associated with
mi1k, it dredges up primordial instincts that are
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difficult t.o control. The hullabaloo about this
case the int.erest t,hat it. seemed to generaLe,
derived more from that than from issues of public
responsibility or corruption or things of t.hat sort.
I mean corrupt.ing milk corruption in milk in a
sense t.hese are Lwo t.hings, which when you marry
Lhem, will get people upset.. That. certainly tur:ned
out to be true.
S: WhaL an interest.ing observatj-on.
r: Freudian.
S: Definitely Freudian.
But it j-s not something you would expect to hear
over at the Department of Agriculture. I certainly
did not expect to hear it, but I thought it was
interesti-ng.
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s Good morning Mr. Goldbloom. It is October 31 as you
have noted, Halloween, and we are here to continue
the oral history t,hat you have graciously agreed to
provide to the project. sponsored by the District of
Columbia Federal Court OraI History Project. Good
morning.
Good morning. Good to be here again.
Glad Lo have you here. This morning we are going to
begin d new phase in your 1ife. We are going to
talk about, your final days at the Department of
,Justice and your transition Lo privat.e practice. We
al-so plan to discuss the argumenLs and appearances
that you have had before the United States District
Court for the Dist,rict of Columbia and the United
States Court, of Appeal-s during that time. Having
said that, why don’t we begin with the Freedom of
Information Act case that you were just telling me
about before we started.
A11 right. I t.hink this is a good case to put a
point. on the way the Court of Appeals administered
the Freedom of Informat.ion Act during the 1960s and
l-970s. It is sort of interesting because Lhis one
particular case which I worked on over a number of
years had several phases to it and the final outcome
was sort of unusua]. This involves the case of
Grumman v. The Renegotiation Board which f handled
first. I think starting as a staff attorney and,
probably by the time the case was finally argued I
was Special Litigation Counsel or perhaps even a
Deputy Assistant Attorney General. The case l-asted
for a number of years.
It, was a relatively simple case involving internal
documents of t,he Renegotiation Board, an agency that
monitored the profits of government contractors,
defense contractors/ and was a holdover from World
War II and t,he Korean War designed to recover
excessive profits that these contractors realized.
This agency was a very Ione1y little agency in
Washingt.on. Lonely, because most of the other
agencies of the government, the Pentagon
partj-cu1arIy, felt that this agency was looking over
their shoulders and by taking excessive profits from
t.hese government contractors, in a sense were
criticizing the work of t.he milit.ary depart.ments and
the Defense Department.
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In any event, thi-s was a case to get at int.ernal
documents of the Renegotiation Board. I forget
exactly when the case initially arose, but it was
more or less routinel-y litigated before the District.
Court., Judge Corcoran handled the case in t’he
initial phise and sustained t,he government’s defense
that exemption 5 precluded the production of the
particular internal documents that were involvedffrat
subsequent.ly was appealed by Grumman to the
Court of Appeals and in an opinion by Chief Judge
Bazelon, then Chief ‘Judge Bazelon, the decision of
the Dist.rict Court was reversed and the case
remanded for further proceedings on the ground that
Lhe government had to be held to a rather heavy
burden in demonstrating that internal documents were
indeed privileged from disclosure. It was one of
the earIy, very l-iberal decisions rendered by the
Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia
Circuit on Lhe Freedom of Information Act.
It was interesLing to me because a lot of my work
involved both the Freedom of Informat.ion Act
separately and the RenegotiaLion Board. So this was
sort of an intersecting of two clients or two tlpes
of cases that I worked on.
In any evenL, we wenL back, conducted a number of
proceedings before the District Court, some of which
were discovery of Renegotiat.j-on Board materials,
depositions. I know there was at. least one and
perhaps more depositions of Renegotiation Board
officials. f know for example the Chairman of. the
Board was deposed by Grumman’s attorneys and f
defended him. After the discovery had taken place
the case went back t.o the District Court. .Tudge
Corcoran ruled against the government on t.he grounds
that it had not sustained its burden to prevent the
disclosure of these documents.
At that point the government appealed to the Court
of Appeals. For reasons t.hat I cannot quite recaL1
there were rather substantial delays here both by
Grumman and the government. Delays in the sense
that. t.here were several extensions of time in the
filing of briefs and t,hen once the brj-efs were filed
and pending before the Court of Appeals there was a
substantial time lag before the case was set for
argumenL. It coul-d have been almost, a year af ter
the briefs had been fiIed.
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By t.he time the case was set for argument the second
time in the Court of Appeals, however, a number of
things had occurred at t.he Renegot,iation Board.
There had been a number of personnel changes on t.he
Board. Their position on various documents t.hat
were at issue had changed and, while they had been
resisting their production in the past, they were
now making them available to government contracLors
in proceedings before the Board and hence would be
availaQle under the Freedom of Information Act.
So it was fair t.o say that a month before the
argument when the case was calendared and I met with
the client and discussed the case with them, it
appeared that perhaps something like 75 percent of
the case was moot and the remaining 25 percent, and
by that I mean the documents that were at stake, Lhe
Board certainly wanted to vigorously oppose their
production. But, I had to advise them that there
was faint chance that they would win the case
because of the prevailing mood in the Court of
Appeals ‘on Freedom of Information cases generally.
The government. had been losing them with some
regularity.
Nevertheless, they wanted the case argued and
pursued. My missj-on durlng the course of the
argument as I had discussed t.his with the client was
to present, the facts concerning the change in
position on the documents that were now being,made
available and Lo urge that they should sustain the
remainder of the case in terms of overturning the
District Court and allow the Board to maintain the
privileged nature of these documents. Another way
of looking at. it. was t,hat if the case was going to
be 1ost., it would be lost gracefully.
When the argument took pIace, .Tudge Ske11y Wright
was the presiding judge on the panel a-nd I forget
who else was there. The argument went very well as
f recalI. The court listened to all of the details
about the change in position and was very interested
in the regulations that had been issued, identifying
the shifting of posi-tions on availability of these
documents during- the proceedings
Did ,Judge Wright actually ask you questi-ons during
the argument? Was he an active participant?
He was, ds I recalI, a very active participant. in
the argument. I felt that the position that I was
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ng about the current status of this Freedom
of Information Act problem was very well understood
by the court based upon the colloquy during the oral
argument.
In fact, when I left the argument I was quite
pleased with myself that I had been able to get
through to the panel on the case and that I felt
they had this case well in hand. I must say that
after 4 day or Lwo on reflection f decided
that my sense of euphoria about t.he argument really
was not merited. I had this foreboding feeling t.hat
something terrible was going to befa1l us. This was
because I knew that the Court of Appeals was hostile
toward the government’s position generally in the
Freedom of fnformation Act area.
In any event, a few months 1ater, and I cannot
remember the precise time 1rg, the Court of Appeals
came out with an opinion written by .fudge Wright.
In this opinion, which was very lengthy and complex,
,Judge Wright used this case as a vehicle to render a
broad ruling on pre-decisional documents versus
decisional documents versus a whole host of
consi-deraLions concerning the administrative
process. I must say that very little about, the
courLrs opinion resembled either the case that f
argued or the case that I understood to be presented
by the record.
But the decisj-on was very, very antagonistic t,o the
governmentrs interests generally. It had
far-reaching and broad implicatj-ons for t.he
government in the Freedom of fnformation Act area.
It so happened at or about the same time that
another decision had emanated from a court of
appeals and I do not remember whether it was the
D. C. Circuit or some other circuit involvj-ng the
Nat.ionaL Labor Relations Board and I believe Sears
Roebuck & Co. That was a similar Freedom of
fnformat,ion Act case about. decisional- t14>e
documents. In any event the Solicitor General saw fit t.o take bot.h t.he cases to the Supreme Court and
Grumman was reversed by the Supreme Court. I forget
the vote. It was either 7 t.o 1 or 8 to 1 somet.hing Iike that. Anyway, it was an overwhelming reversal
of the Court of Appeals decision. Of course I
always look back on that as being an int.eresting
phenomenon for a case which I fu11y expected would
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be gracefully lost in the Court of Appeals with a
non-meaningful decision and buried for a1l time.
Barely a ripple on the 1ega1 horizon.
Exactly. Instead, it now stands as a Supreme Court
principle.
Another case that I think is worthwhile describing
that I handled in the Court of Appeals was a rather
sharp ionstitutional confrontation that took place
in the mid-’70s. An j-nteresLing aspect of it was
the fact that it spanned two Administrations. I
think the description of how it. was handled and the
way it was treated by the court is an interestj-ng
refl-ection of t.he way the court dealt with issues in
that time frame.
As an ouLgrowth of the Watergate and post.-Watergate
investigations, various congressional committees
were regularly concerned about conduct by the
Executive Branch in t.he post-Watergate era
concerning whether the rights of citizens on an
individual basis were being impinged upon by
government agencies or government act.ions.
Certainly the investigations thal were conducted by
t.he Church Commi-t,tee and the Pike Commit.tee and t,he
Rockefeller Commission in Lhe post-Watergate era
were reflective of that.. More or less as a
simultaneous effort there was an investigation that
was being conducted by a House commit.tee and I
cannot remember which particular committee but I
know that. either the committee or the subcommittee
was chaired by Congressman ,John Moss from
California. It may have been the House Commerce
Commj-Etee. It may have been another committee but
Irm not certain
In any event, that committee was concerned that, the
FBI was conducting electronj-c surveillances
regarding U.S. cj-tj-zens concerning their telephone
conversations and other forms of communi-cation. rn
an effort to conduct this investigation the Moss
Committee hit upon a way of gaining’ access to
information which might Iead, as far as they were
concerned, to discovery of abuses by government
investigative and intelligence agencies. They
issued a subpoena directed to American Telephone &
Telegraph to get fact.s and information concernj-ng
wiretaps that the FBI had requested AT&T to impose
on certai-n communications activities whether or not
T.
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they were foreign. This was well known to the
Executive Branch because there had been some
discussions with the Executive Branch and the
Attorney General’s office.
In any event, the Attorney General and t.he President
fel-t very strongly that this was an interference
with foreign intelligence activities being conducted
by the United States and that despit.e all the
assurances by the Executive Branch to Congressman
Moss t.Iiat there were no domestic surveillances
involved in these part.icular wire taps, the
Committee went forward and subpoenaed AT&T. AT&T of
course was simply a stakeholder in this controversy
since from their point of view t,hey were carrying
out activities at the behest of the FBf and the
Attorney General doing what they considered to be
their proper corporate citizen’s responsibilities.
Simply being faced with a Congressional subpoena
they saw no recourse but to comply.
During this time period would the Bureau have been
required to get search warrants or any kind of
authorizatj-on for putting these wiretaps on?
This was before the days of the special court.
The FISA?
Yes this is before those days. These wiretaps were
authorized I believe by an internal system within
the Department of Justice in which they just did not
do it on t,heir own. It, was not soIe1y an FBI
operation. It was an operation which was aut.horized
by the Attorney General- and I believe the Att,orney
General or his direct designate had a role in
approving every specifi-c one of these wiretaps.
The government’s positi-on, of course,- in this
particular controversy was that every one of these
wiretaps, and there was no quesLion that there were
wiretaps, had to do wit,h foreign intelligence
activitles and that there were no domestic spying or
surveillance or things of that, sort.. That it was strictly foreigners and for whatever purposes they
were legit.imate areas of government concern and
clearly authorized by prevailing 1aw.
You know those statements certainly did not satisfy
Congressman Moss who insisted upon seeing for
himself and fel-t that the prerogatives of his
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Commit,tee were such that he could get his subpoena
enforced. The Executive Branch seeing that it had
come to impasse Lhis was during the Ford
Administration had no choice but to take some
action and the action that it decided to take was to
file a lawsuit against AT&T. It sought an
injunct.ion Lo prohibit AT&T from complying with the
subpoena.
In connection with that the President of the United
Stat.es invoked executive privilege as the basis, the
foundation for this lawsuit. We sought, an
injunction against AT&T t.o prohibit their
compliance. Obviously, this was all done in the
open because the Committee immediately intervened in
the lawsuit and became the principal, Lhe real party
in interest and defended the case from the
perspective of the congressional interests.
The case came before District ,fudge Gasch. I
believe he granted the injunction after hearing
argument’from Lhe parties. Then it was appealed by
the Committee to the Court of Appeals. At that
point, Rex l-,ee was the Assistant Attorney General.
He and f had worked on the case fairly extensively.
I was one of his deputies during that. time frame.
There were others in the Civil Division that worked
on the case but the two of us I think primarj-Iy had
handl-ed the case. It was handled at a f airly high
level in t.he Attorney Generalrs Of f ice and the Whit.e
House was quite interested.
Who would have been the Attorney General?
Ed Levi was the Attorney General at the time. The
White House, ds I say, was quite j-nt,erested in the
case. We met regularly with the Counsel to the
President, Mr. Buchen. The case came on for
argument in the Court of Appeals. I do not remember the panel but f do remember that ,fudge Leventhal was
on the panel at that time. Rex Lee argued Lhe case the first. time in the Court of Appeals. The Court quite properly recognizing that this was a major constitutional clash between two branches of the
government struggled to find a way not to have t.o
decide it. They did so by determinj-ng that there
were many, many facts and circumsLances and issues
that they needed to know more about. So without
deciding the case, they remanded it for negotiat.ions
and further development of t.he facts by the parties.
They did so with the admonition t.hat if the parties
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coul-d not resolve it one way or another, that t,hey
would continue, they would hear the case again.
It was obvj-ous that the Court of Appeals hoped that
the case would go away by that kind of a resolution.
Nevertheless, the case went back to the District
Court and the parties then embarked upon a long
series of negot.iations. I think iL last.ed. about 5,
6 to 8 — maybe as long as 9 monLhs.
The reason the negotiat.j-ons t.ook so long was that it
ot7cc6u. rred right around t.he time of the election in With Carter winning the presidency while the
case had been on remand, all of the Republj-cans and
Ford Administ.ration left office . l, as the Deputy
in the Civil Division, was the reposit.ory of thg
case while j-t was on remand. In came the new people
from the Carter Administration to take over and,
indeed, to be responsible. One of the first persons
t.hat I reported to about this case was the new
Assistant Attorney General who was the head of the
Office crf Legislative Affairs, Pat Wa1d, who came in
when the Carter Administration started in 177.
I explained the case to Pat Wa1d, who 1at,er became
the Chief Judge on the Court of Appeals. She well
understood the issues.
They were aired before the then Attorney General
Griffin BeII. ft was discussed, f suspect al-so with
people in the White House. It. was decided to carry
on the negotiations as they had before and
recollection of all those evenLs today remi
my
nds me
that I coul-d not perceive a whit of difference in
the position being asserted by the Cart,er
Administration and the Ford Administration. The principles that were at stake from the Executj-ve
Branch’s point of view were readily adopt,ed by the
Carter people. Mrs. WaId and I went up and met with
people on the Hill and negotiated just as we had
done with the Republicans.
The case eventually went back to the District Court.
I must say that our efforts t.o negotiate this to a satisfactory resolution short of litigation were
unsuccessful. Every ef fort that t.he Executive
Branch made to find a middle ground was unsuccessful. This may be unfair t,o the Commj-ttee,
t.hey may have a different perspective of it, but our
view was that they adhered to a very rigid position
concerning the prerogatives of the Committee.
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Indeed, I believe, if memory serves me, t.here was
even a meeting between the At.torney General and
Congressman Moss on this very issue in the Att.orney
General’s Office in which some of these principles
were aired. In any event, the case went back to the
Court of Appeals at. which point I argued the case
Rex Lee having gone and Pat Wald not wanting to
argue the case. It ended up that I argued it.. The
interesting thing about. the argument was that t.he
court was very much int,erested j-n all of the details
of the hegotiat.ions that had taken place over the
last several months.
Had the composition of the Court changed between Rex
Leers first argument and your second?
I do not recal1 precisely. I believe that at least
I know that ,Judge Leventhal remaj-ned on the paneI.
f am not certain f know ,Judge Robinson t Spottswood Robinson, was on the original pane1. f
suspecL he was on the panel the second time around
and who the third judge was f cannot. recall but it
is easily ascertainable.
In any event, the Court, of Appeals after the second
go around, recognizing that they had not been
successful in burying the case by remanding it,
faced up to t.his constitutional crisis one more time
and decided it. probably should not be decided.
My recollection is t,hat t.hey essentially left the
case in status quo. They did not require AT&T to
produce t.he documents but, they did not come down with a hard and definitive decision on it. My recollection is that I left the government some t,ime shortly thereafter and that nothing really of any
substance occurred after that. Basically the fire
in the controversy seemed to go away and that was the end of it. But it was a fascinating foray with
the Court of Appeals and how they dealt with what we all considered at the time to be a fairly
substantial constitutional problem.
Mr. Goldbloom, we are now going to take a turn in
your professional life and talk about your decj-sion
to leave the Department. of .Tust.ice and go into
private practice. Would you be willing to share your thoughts about t.hat move?
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I Sure. I think on the last. tape I sort. of finished
up with a descript.ion of t.he AT&T case and that case
bridged the Ford and the Cart.er Administrations. As
I moved into the Carter Administ.ration I got along
fine with the new Assistant Attorney General. I
thought she was great Barbara Babcock t.ook over
from Rex Lee. f had all the same responsibility and
authority and prerogatives of a Deputy Assistant
Attorney Generaf that I had under the previous
Administration.
I had been in that. job for about 5 years. In the
very beginning days of l97B I was approached by
Carla Hi1ls for whom I had been a Deputy when she
was t.he Assistant Attorney General in either 1-974 or
L975. She asked me whether I would consj-der joining
her i-n opening up a Washington office of a
California 1aw firm, with which she was then j-n the
process of negotiat.ing.
That proposal came to me out of the blue I had
not sought it although I had known Carla fairly
weII. I had been her Deputy and worked very closely
with her when she was the Assistant Attorney
General. f also had a number of cases that she drew
to my attention when she became the Secretary of HUD after leaving the Department of ,fustice during the
Ford Administ.ration. I had worked on a few of those
cases which were controversial and not,orious and in
some respects poIit.icalIy inspired. I had known her
both professionally and somewhat. socially as well
because she was that kind of a person. So when she
approached me this came as a rather j-nteresting and
substantial proposi-tion that I had to consider. I
must say at that point I had put in something better
than J-9 years in the Department and while I had originally considered going into the government for
a 2-year period
f remember that at the beginning of your interview.
It. seemed to stret.ch on for all t.hose years and the
reason t.hat it. did so was that f was blessed by
having good assignmenLs, good work and a feeling of great satisfaction and gratification from t,he work I
did. By the time this proposal came to me my family
had grown. I had five children at this point, ffiy o1dest daughter was J-n co11ege, but I had the
prospect of four more children t,o go to coIlege, to
have to pay for that. The economics of t.hat l-oomed very heavily on my horizon. Whi1e I certainly did
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not decide to leave the government and go int,o
privat.e practice for the benefits of more money
which was clearly the case, it was a major factor,
it would be untrue to say that it was not a major
factor. But it was not. the cont.rolling factor by
any means.
The opportunity to go into the private sector was
one that had come across my desk from time t.o time
over the years. I had been approached various times
and indeed I even made a few relatively few modest
forays int.o the area on my own to test the waters.
But t.hey had never been all that serious. While
some of the proposals made to me were seri-ous,
looking at them and comparing t,hem with the work I
was doing and the opportunities that they presented
I always opted to stay.
But this time it was a Iit,tIe different. This was
the opening of a new office. Carla Hil1s was a
major person and st.iI1 is, of course. This was a
very good firm and I decided to give it a whirl, Lo
take a chance to go out. and interview with them and
T did.
I would say anot.her aspect of the reason for leaving
was that I enjoyed my work immensely. f was very
gratj-fied by the opportunj-ties that were presented
to me. Yet there was always the notion sort of
in the back of my head that there was another
world out there that I really had not sampled.
There was another feast that I could at Ieast,
partake of to see what the world was like from
the private sector, to practice 1aw privately with
private clients. This presented an opportunity and
a challenge.
As it turned out, it was even a greater challenge in
some respects than f thought it would ‘be. A11 of a
sudden, while f had been able to function as a
government litigator for a number of years, and I
thought quite successfully, the range of topics and
issues and Iega1 problems that I was faced with sort
of fe1l into certain set categories. It was not
very difficult to come up with answers because you
kind of sense what the problem was almost when you
were presented wit.h it.
When I went into t.he private sector, f sort of
looked for the challenge of new work, perhaps not
knowing how well f would be challenged. I t.hink I
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survived that challenge successfully but. it turned
out to be a Iot more difficult. It was a more
daunting task over the long period of time to be
able to develop instincts and undersLandings of
various different areas of law where I had not
practiced before. While I am a litigator and while
my litigation skilIs serve me well in every sense of
the term, you are const.antly being faced with an
entirely new set of problems in differing areas that
you may never have been faced with before. That is
rea11y the notion I am t.rying to get across here.
In any evenL, I decided to leave . I j oined l-.,atham &
Watkins at the first. of March L978 much to the
chagrin and unhappiness of my colleagues who thought
I was going to stay forever at the Department of
,.Tustice. At the same time I am sure a 1ot of them
were happy that I was leaving, in one way or
another, happy for me.
I joined an office in which there were seven lawyers
four partners and three associates. Of the four
partners, three of them had included myself, Car1a
Hil1s and Bill Ke11y who had been here in Washington
and worked with Carla Hi11s when she was at HUD. He
was a very young person at Steptoe & ‘-Tohnson when he
then moved over and joined L,atham & Watkins. One partner moved out from California who had been a partner at, the law firm and three associates came
from California. They were fourth or fift.h year
associates who had been with the firm. We opened an
office on K Street which was a very temporary affair
with just seven of us. Wit.hin the year we moved to
more permanent space at 1333 New Hampshire Avenue
right near DuPont Circle where we stayed for about
seven or eight years. Now we are located on
Pennsylvania Avenue at l-001. I have seen our office
g’row in almost 15 years, iL will be 15 years in
March, from seven to our population ih Washington is
around 7A-72 lawyers
That is guite a growt.h.
The law firm had one other office when I joined it.
It was principally located in Los Angeles and had an offj-ce in Newport Beach which was an off*shoot of
the Los Angeles Office. Everybody in that office
had come from Los Angeles. There were 20 lawyers or
so in Newport Beach. The overall size of t.he 1aw firm when I joi-ned it was around 115, that, number sort of sticks in my head. Today the 1aw firm has
S
around 520 overall. Washington was the third
office. We now have seven offices in the United
States, dD office in London and there are Lwo
attorneys, we do not say we have an office, but
there are two attorneys who are working in Moscow
right now and one in Bulgaria. so it has grown over
t,he years and my experience and activities with .the
firm have grown and expanded during t.hat time frame.
Have you continued primarily to do litigation?
Yes. I have always done litigation and I have done
litigation in the 1aw firm. In the Washington
office I am the office chair of the Litigation
Department, which means my responsibilities have to
do with reporting to the national chair of the
Litigation Department which is located in Los
Angeles, coordinating litigation activities in the
firm having to do with assignments and things of
that sort. I t.hink it is fair to say that my work
as a litigator has not changed all that much over
the years. Representing private clients turns out
to be not a lot different from representing the
government cl-ienLs that I had in the Civil Division.
Perhaps t.he greatest opportunity that I had in the
Civil Division was that. the work there, dt least my
work, was to behave pretty much like private lawyers
behave generally. The cases t.hat I worked on we
had clients, the clients had positions or views or
prj-nciples that had t,o be pursued. The civil cases
were litigated pretty much as private parties
liLigat,e civil cases. One of the things that I have
had to tel1 people over the years when they have
heard that f was in government t,hey always think
of government lawyers as prosecutors. There is a
certain concept that i-f you are working for the
government you are prosecuting either a criminal
case or you are prosecuting some civi-I .program. My
work in the government was never never is too
strong rarely did I prosecut.e some offender. I
did not, do fraud work generally nor did I implement
any particular stat,utory program which had a mission
aspect to it. Rather it was client work. Agencies
or i-ndividuals who either needed t.o be defended or
to pursue claims on their behal-f . So that
experience f think has served me in the private
sector fairly well because the problems that. I face
for the clients that I represent now are not a l-ot
different. One of the things when I left the public
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secLor to go into private practice, one of the
surprises that I had in the privat.e sector that I
did not expect, was that I was fu11y familiar with
the bureaucracy that is associated with government.
I was able to deal with the bureaucracy, in fact I
think one of t.he reasons f was successful in the
government was that I managed t.o avoid becoming a
bureaucrat. and l-earned how to manipulate the
bureaucratic process. When r went into the private
secLor f sort of said to myself at the outset I am
puttingf all that behind me and surprise, surprise.
In the private sector the bureaucracies t.hat you
deal with as clients that I represent are not
they are very similar to the government
bureaucracies. They real1y are just the same.
Corporate clients or businessmen or business
ent.ities that I deal with have the same kind of
bureaucratlc tendencies. The people who work for
them, in-house lawyers or executj-ves act the same
way as people act in the government. f deal with it
and I t.trink f deal with it very well but it was a
surprise to me to find that it is as prevalent in
the private sector as it is in the government.
Perhaps the most fascinating aspect of the work in
private practice has been the challenges that come
about from learning new areas of the 1aw. It is not
so much that you have to learn the areas as to get.
involved in substantive matters that you may not
have been exposed to before in an exLensive way.
The first thing shortly after joining the 1aw firm I
became part of the law firm’s trial team in a major
anti-trust litigation. I was by no means in charge
of this. others were already working on it. They
were working out of Los Angeles but. it was a very
large case and they needed as many Ij-tigators as
they could find. There were a number’of portions of
the case that could be divided up and put j-nto
segmenLs. f took over one of the segmenls of the
case, being part of a very large trial- team. At one
point. we hrad 20 lawyers working on this very large
case. It was the Uranium Cartel litigation that
start.ed in the mid-’70s and went lnto t.he ’80s. It
involved Westinghouse and Gulf and all the util-ities
on the East Coast, in Virginia and elsewhere. ft
involved major foreign corporations. Eventually it
was all resolved and settled but there was fairly
ext,ensive litigation. A 1ot of work before it got
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I
settled. It was a challenge and it was very
interesting. It was a very rewarding experience.
Since that time I have gotten involved in a number
of other areas. One of the areas that I work in
largely which is not new to me because I did have
exposure in the government, is government contracts
lit.igation. f do a fair amount of governmenL
contracts work right. now. Perhaps one of the areas
somewhat new is the whj-te coIlar crime aspect that
is assdciated with giovernment contracts litigation
where the government is dealing in the waste, fraud
and abuse sector. The government is pursuing
government contract,ors who are involved with the
issues like mischarging and misall-ocation of costs
and things of t.hat sort. Violations of the various
federal crj-mina1 Iaw, mostly fraud. I have done a
fair amount of work in that area. But by and large
I sti11 get the case that, comes along that is
standard and routine and is as familiar to me as
anything that I did when I was in the federal
government.
I can talk about two or three cases. Perhaps one is
worth talking about more extensively than the
others. I had a case where we represented Sears
Roebuck against. the United States. fL went to the
Court. of Appeals and we got a favorable decision
both out of the District Court and the Court of
Appeals. This was a suit concerning cusLoms dut.ies
that were owed as a reeult. of the television
importation issues. This arose out, of the r70s and
the ’80s.
Who were the do you recall who t,he District CourL
,Judge was?
The Distrlct Court Judge in that case was ,Judge
Hogan I believe. We won the case in ‘the Court of
Appeals before a panel. The decision was written by
,Judge Ruth Ginsburg. I think j-t was a very
favorable decision, our client was quite pleased
with it.
More recently, in the last couple of years I worked
on a fascinating case which was directly associat.ed
with all of the work that I did when I was in the government mainly admlnistrative Iaw.
We represented clj-ents that were involved in an
Endangered Species Act controversy. We brought an
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action here in the District of Columbia and sought
injunctive relief which was denied. We then appealed
to the Court of Appeals and j-t was affirmed by the
Court of Appeals. So we lost both at the District
Court level and t.he Court of Appeals. But it was a
fascinating case in many respects. In fact I have
spoken on this at an ABA Litigation Section Seminar
Program last fa1l i-n Chicago. The case involved the
desert tortoise, which is a loveable little animal
that inhabits the Mojave Desert in California,
Nevada’and parts of Arizona. The tortoj-se was
declared to be an endangered species by Lhe fnterior
Department. in the fall, I guess it must have been
1989. Now, I may have my years wrong. ft was
declared to be an endangered species under the
emerg:ency provisions of the Endangered Species Act.
There were problems about a sickness that was
affecting and afflict.ing the tortoise in California.
Our cLients were homebuilders and developers of real
property in the Las Vegas Va11ey area. Las Vegas
Val1ey is and has been for a number of recenL years
the fastest growing city in the United States. More
people have been moving to the Las Vegas area
because of the climat.e and the economic conditions
there. The concern was that there were many real
estate developments housing projects, golf
courses, but mostly housing and business places that
were in t.he process of being developed.
f do not know whether you are familiar wit.h l-,as
Vegas but Las Vegas is right in the middle of the
desert and it is sort of an oasis but. it rea11y is
not it, is desert everylvhere. The desert. tortoise
is al1 over the area and once an animal or plant is
declared t.o be endangered under the Act, you can not
touch it,, you can not move it, you can not harass
it. ft is a federal crime and you can be prosecuted
for violating the Act. There are criminal penalties
assocj-at.ed with doing anything to an endangered
species. The impact of this declaration of t.he
desert tortoise as an endangered species was such
that it caused all development activj-ty in the Las
Vegas area to come to a screeching ha1t. There are
very large developers out t.here. Major real estate
projects where roads were being built. Bulldozers
were grading and movj-ng dirt or sand about building
these projects. You could not touch them because
the tortoise was everywhere.
The issue in the case had to do with the
t.he disease that had been afflicting the
fact that
tortoise
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was locat.ed in California. The Mojave Desert
st.retches all the way from eastern California
t,hrough Nevada and into parts of Arizona. We
argued, and based on the facts that we were able to
develop, this particular syndrome was actually an
AIDS-like disease that was affecting these t.ortoises
and killing them. It. affected their immune system.
It was prevalent in California, but it had not, been
reported or there was no incidence of it in
Nevada.
To put a blanket determination covering this ent.ire
range of 45,000 square miles was arbitrary and
caprici-ous. We were noL attacking the designation of
the animal-s as an endangered species or anything of
that sort. We were quite interested in doing what we
coul-d to he1p. Nevert.heless, w€ thought that the
emergency listing,was arbitrary and that it should
have been confined to the geographical area where
there were problems in Californj-a. They could have
dealt with them there. In any event, we brought. an
actj-on here in the District of Columbia challenging
the Secretaryrs determination and brought it on
before the District Court. The District Court was quite sympathetic with our plight; neverthel-ess, he felt that the prevailing lega1 doctrines were such
t.hat he had to go along and deny the preliminary
injunction because he thought that t.he Endangered
Species Act was a very powerful instrument, a powerful tool.
Who was the judge?
It was Judge Stanley Harris in the District Court..
The State of Nevada was a participant in this
proceeding. They had joined as a party-plaintiff.
The various public interests groups such as the EDF (the Environmental Defense Fund) and other groups joined in as defendants on the side of. the
government. So all of the interested parties were
i-nvo1ved.
ft came on for a hearing before the Court of Appeals
on our appeal from the denial of the preliminary
injunction. The remarkable thing about this caie
was that. t.he parties, that is our clients, as well
as t.he state of Nevada, which was on our side, w€
were not totally antagonistic to the interest of the federal government t.o do something about the
t.ortoise. Everyone recognized that there was a
serj-ous problem. No one was challenging the Act,
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although t.here were some crazies out t.here if you
wilI, the off-road vehicle operaLors, the motorcycle
riders who wanted to claim that the Endangered
Species Act was unconstitutional, unfair and all the
resL of that. That. was not our position at all. We
were just simply saying that the emergency
provisions of the Act should not have been used to
impose a restriction in Nevada.
We met .early on this was before t.he case was
argued before the Court of Appeals. Early on we met
with the governmenL in an effort Lo see whether
there was an opportunity to work our way out of the
problem because here we were with many, many
developments that had come to a total screeching
ha1t. People were being thrown out of work, their
houses could not be buiIt, schools could not be
buiIt. There were a whole host of very serious
problems. The government and we sat at the meetj-ngs
both at the Department of .Iustice and at the
Interior Department in an effort to see whether
there wds some basis, some basis on which we could
compromise and come up with something. The
government recognized the impact that their
determination was havj-ng on our cl-j-ents and I think
they were concerned that this could have farreaching
implications for t.he administrat.ion of the
Act. But one of the principal problems that we
seemed to be facing was that here the tortoise was
afflicted by t.his rather strange and new disease.
What the environmental- organizations were desperate
to do was to have somebody do some scientific
research on the nature of this disease and whaL was
causing it and figure out ways to treat it or to
deal with it. ot.herwise, this whole specJ-es could
be wiped out. As we talked t,his t.hing through – -a11
these informal discussions were going on whil-e this
case is pending while we were waiting to argue
the case before the Court of Appeals.’ So the
antagonists were sitting around the table, but we
came up with some ideas. I cannot remember who came
up with them, I am certainly not going to take
credj-t for them but. I participat.ed in discussions.
A11 of a sudden it seemed to be that one of the
things that everyone thought would be a great idea
was if we could do some scienti-fic research.
The government had no money, no funds and no budget. to do t.he scientific research. There was no money to do this research on the disease of this species.
As we thought about and talked the t,hing through, it
-85-
came ouL Lhat there was possibly a way of working
our way out of t.his problem. What we were looking
for was a solution, long-term problems under the
Endangered Species Act require you to come up with a
habitat conservation pIan, which is a long-range
study of how to protect the habitat for an
endangered specj-es. You have to set aside land and
all kinds of t.hings that are desj-gned to insure t.he
preservation of t.he species. These are very
complicated, inLeresting and tj-me-consuming issues.
But here we were with real estate projects that were
stymied.
Our cl-ients were fairly well-to-do developers and
this was noL Lhere was somet.hing aL stake here.
We hit upon a not.j-on that the developers would fund
with their own money or subsidize the scientific
research. We brought in another public interest
organizaLion, the Nat.ure Conservancy, which is a
public interest organization Lhat goes out. and
acquires land for environmental j-nterests.
We had all- the parties together and we all sat
around at these meetings. ft turned out that
everyone was agreeable to a program of scientific
research which would take the tortoises you would
need a permit from the Interior Department. The
“taking” is a term of art under stat,ute. You would
use the tortoises as part of the scientific study t.o
determine the causes of this disease slmdrome.
To make a long story short, the Court of Appeals
then decided the case without knowing anyt.hing about
this it knew nothing about the negotiation.
The Court decided the case and I must say we lost it
and we lost it. bad1y. The Court of Appeals even
wenL beyond what we anything that had been said
before ,Judge Silberman wrote the decision for the
Court. You would have thought, at that moment. that.
when the government, won t.he case they would have
said goodbye. fnstead, they kept sitting at. the
tab1e. The environmental organizati-ons were elated
that they won the case, but they kept sitting at the
table with us. Our clients ended up putting up
$2,’700,000 to subsidize scientific research on the
desert tortoise –
Now it required, the whole plan invol-ved
universities, environmental organizations, the
government. They developed this very elaborate
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system for doing the scientific studies. They would
have t.o take some 800 odd tortoises to do t.he
studies. The quid pro quo was that we would put up
the money if they took the tortoises off our land.
Once the tortoises are cleared from our land, then
we can continue with the development. That is the
way it ended up. The tortoises were t.aken off our
land and t.he development continued and we were able
to finish the projects.
A11 of’this took place in the context of a court
case which was basically t.he vehicle for the
settlement. It was done in the context of a
settlement of a case in which the decision, of
course, was just totally favorable to the governmenL
and adverse to the plaintiffs that we represent.ed.
The result was totally favorable to our clients.
The money, I mean the money was a lot of money, but
for the purposes of being able to finish these
developments and was shared by there were a
number of parties involved it was a very, very
salutary effect.
What. a creative way to resolve the problem.
Well it was.
Do you know what ever happened with the study or is
it stilI ongoing?
We1l, the studies are stil1 ongoing and they are
part of the whole process ouL t.here. I wenL t.o at
least 10 meet.iDgs, large meetings with all the
parti-es, all the interested parties on all sides of
the issues were present and we managed to negotiate
this resolution. If all you did was read the
decision of the Court of Appeals you would have no
idea how the case actually came out, but it is
interesting that the case was resolved totally
litigation rather than separate from it. It was a
very useful result for all- part.ies.
For all parties that would suggest too bad
t.here is not a mechanism to advise the court by
t,he way you may be interested in how all of this
turned out.
s
We did not advise the Court of Appeals and I
they were ever officj-a11y notifj-ed of this.
t.o advise the District Court ultimately. We
doubt
We had
did
I:
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I:
because we presented an approval, a settlement
document to the Distrj-ct Court and it was signed off
by the District ‘Judge and the case was over. The
part.ies effectuated this you know outside the
courL system but under its umbrel-l-a, so to speak.
This is a good turningr point. I can perhaps move on
and give you some general reflectj-ons about the
Court of Appeals, or my practice before it.
Yes, I’t,hink that would be very he1pfu1.
Taking the long view over a course of many years,
the Court of Appeals for this Circuit has always
seemed to be much more activist I do not mean
that in a political sense but, activist in the
sense of the kinds of cases and the kinds of i-ssues
that seem to come before it. Because so many
government cases are in this Court. of Appeals sets
the work of this Court apart. from that of the other
Courts of Appeal. I have argued cases, in noL a1lof
Lhem,’ but most of t,he Courts of appeal. I have
probably been in 9 of the 13 or L4. I have been in
the Federal Circuit here in Washington and I have
been in most of the other Circuits around the
country with t.he exception of a few.
This Court. of Appeals, and maybe it is just my
perspecLive from living in this area, the Court has
sometimes, during cert,ainly the r50s and ’70s, been
considered very liberal and very activist and very
politically motivated. Politically with a sma1l
“p”, but nevertheless po1iticaI1y, they were a
player in the context of a 1ot of the issues that
were debated about government, about the
relationship betr^reen the Executive Branch and the
Congress, the relationship bet,ween the Executive
Branch and the public. A11 of the issues of the
Vietnam War and the turmoil of the ‘5Os .and ’70s
so to speak. There were a number of very liberal
activist judges. f know, coming from the point of
view of the government, as a government attorney
during those years, f certainly felt t.he concern
that t.he government generally expressed about it..
But I never fe1t. that there was anything
particularly inappropriat.e about t,he way t,he CourL
of Appeals behaved they were activists and f
expected that. Over the years I have seen judges
behave that way so there was nothing unusual about
this Court of Appeals.
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I must say in my experience and what I have seen
more recently of the Court of Appeals while there is
perhaps a littIe bit less of t,he emotionalism, as
Compared to the ’50s, present in what you see coming
out of the Court of Appeals recently. I think t.his
Court has always been populated by a group of
extremely abIe, bright. judges who take their wo::k
very seriously. They t.ake their role as judges very
seriously in fact sometimes too seriously. By
Lhat I _mean I have seen many, many opinions out of
this Court of Appeal-s where they seem to make an
extraordinary effort to cover every aspect of every
issue that could possibly be involved in some
complicated regulatory program.
There was a case a few years back where t.he CourL of
Appeals issued an opinion which had a Lable of
contenLs in it a several-page table of contents
for something like a 250-page decision. I know for
example that the Court of Appeals here has issued a
number of lengt.hy decisions only to find them
overturrled by the Supreme Court at some later date.
So that is a reflection of how seriously the judges
on this Court take their role in fashioning the
jurisprudence that goes along with the kinds of
cases that they have. I am just not familiar with
some of Lhe newer judges on the Court of Appeals. I
know some of them, I know them by reputation, I know
who they are. f think lt is one of the best Courts
of.Appeal in the country now and I think it always
has been. It i-s always an exciting thing to appear
before them. You rarely feel that there is an
indifference about them and about the cases that
they are handling. None of the judges has ever
l-ooked upon it as just simply a job but rather that
they are reaIly out there making 1aw or helping t.o
form a body of juri-sprudence. I think it is a great
Court. f find it., as I say, exciti-ng and gratifying
every time I appear before it or have anything to do
wirh ir.
I think, having listened to you, it is equally
exciting that there are practitioners in Washington
who have had as many opportunities as you have to
appear before both the Court of Appeals and some of
the excellenL District Court judges here.
ft has been a great and exciting practice that I
have had. I do not know how I have managed to do
it. Some of it ls not as exciting, sometimes it is
boring, but. I believe that you can take cases from
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any sector of the practj-ce and find something about
them that is int.eresting or provocat,ive. There is
nothing du11 about the 1aw generally if you
understand the t.ensj-ons and the rub of most 1ega1
conLroversies. It. can come up any,vhere, any way. I
remember people when I was in the Department of
Justice, when I was a Deputy. New people would come
in and there was a question about where t.hey might
be assigned. At. one period there was an admiralt,y
section in the Civil Division and people said I do
not think I would want to work on admiralty cases.
I will never be an admiralty lawyer. But admiralty
law involved torts and contracts and disputes having
to do with ships and waves and harbors and things of
that sort. It was standard lega1 issues and you
could get as excited and as exciting work there as
you could anlmhere. You would probably get better
trial experience.
f remember that myself when I left ‘Justice to go Lhe
U.S. Attorney’s office in Cincinnati and everyone
said ,oh the cases will not be nearly as interesting
as what you have had at Justice in Washington. You
are going to go out to Cincinnati and you are going
to do some slip and faII at the post office and it
is not going to make the front page of the New York
Times and it is not going to be reported in the
Washington Post. I’ And, sure enough, I went out
there and t.hat was the first case that I took to
trial a woman who had slipped and fa1len at the
post office, but it was fascinating. It was my
case, I got to try it the way that I thought that it
should be tried and it was probably better trial
experience, as you sdy, than many of the other high
profile cases.
And you were able to exercise and employ a1l- of your
1ega1 and tactical inst.incts and they work there
just as well as they work in some casb that appears
on the front page of the New York Times.
The clienL-agency that was involved was just as
concerned about what was going to happen if this
suj-t were lost as were any client.s in the more major
policy-issue cases that. I had worked on.
Well you and I think the same way. Because one of
the things that comes up in private practice and we
do not need to prolong this but we get in the big
fIi’brmet you get lots and lots of cases which I call the company’r cases. Young lawyers always f ee1
– 91,-
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that “boy if f could only work on one of those rtbet
your company’r cases or a major antitrust lawsuit or
a major issue where millions or perhaps bil-Iions of
dollars are at sLake. ” That is fine, it is good to
be involved in those cases but those cases rarely
get litigated with the same kind of verve and
excitement that the “sIip and fa1l in the post
offi-cert cases do. You can never work on a case that
big without, having to consider every possible move
you are going to make 28 different ways and have
it run up several different. bureaucratic flagpoles.
By the time you end up executing the decision that
has been made you feel worn out just by the very
process.
We11, I think it probably speaks well for both of us
that we are this many years into it and stil1
enjoying the pract.ice of 1aw.
End of int.erview.
-92-
Index
Agriculture Department, U.S., 26-27
Milk price support case (Nader v. Butz,398 F.Supp. 390 (D.D.C. 1975)), 35, 55-68
Alaska, 1-2
American Bar Association, Litigation Section Seminar Program, 84
American Telephone & Telegraph Company (AT&T), 73-77
see also Untted States v. American Telephone & Telegraph Co.,567 F.2d l2l
(D.C. Cir. t977)
Anderson, David, 39,57
Archives and Records Administration, National, 40
Arizona, 84-85
Army-McCarthy hearings, I 3-14
Atomic Energy Commissiorr, 44-45, 48, 49
Attorney General, U.S.
see under Justice Department, U.S.
Babcock, Barbara, 78
Bazelon, David L., 70
Bell, GriffiA 76-77
Bowen, Katherine Drinker, 8
Brucker (Secretary of the Army), 24
see also Harmonv. Brucker,355 U.S. 579 (1958)
Buchen, Mr, 75
Bulgaria 8l
Btfiteruzzi,Ronald, 20
Buzlrardt, Fred, 62
Cahill, Gordon, 30-31
California, 78-8 1, 84-85
Carnp Kilmer, New Jersey, 12-1,3
Camp Pickett, Yirginra, 23
Canada, I
Carter Administration” 7 6, 7 8
Central High School, 3-7
Church Commiffee, 73
City of Las Vegas v. Lujan, 891 F .2d 927 (D.C. Cfu. 1 989) (Endangered Species Act cxe), 83-89
Clark, Captain, 53
-41-
Clark, Justice, 25
Committee to Reelect the President (CREEP), 59
Congress, U.S., 52-54
House Judiciary Committee, 66
Connally, John, 60, 67
Copyright laws:
Government documents, copyright of:
Clark, Captain, notebook of, 53 ‘
Morrison, Samuel Elliot, Naval historian, 46-47, 52
statute on, 44,46-47
Revisions of:
congressional testimony on, 52-54
Justice Departrnent interest in, 53
see also Public Affairs Assoctates, Inc. v. Rickover,369 U.S. lll (1962), on remand to
268 F.Supp . 444 (D.D.C. 1967)
Copyrights, Register of, 45
Corcoran, Howard F., 70
Covington and Burling, 34
Cox, Archibald, 45, 6l-62, 66-67
Cravath finn, 30-31
Dairy Producers Association, 60
Davis, Polk, 22
Defense Department, U.S., 45-46, 69
Denver, 38-39
Desert tortoise
see Endangered Species Act case (City of Las Vegas v. Lujan,891 F.2d 927 @.C. Cir.1989))
Dewey, Ballantine, 18
District of Columbia, 19, 23, 36-37, 80-8 1
Washington Monument, 23
Dobb, George Cochran, 29
Douglas, John, 34
Dulles Airport, 63
“Dumaine” interests, 28
Duquesne Power and Light, 48
Eisenhower, President, 33
Ellis Island, I
Endangered Species Act of 1973,P.L.93-205,87 Stat. 884, 83-89
Endangered Species Act case (City of Las Vegas v. Lujan,891 F.2d 927 (D.C. Cir.l989)), 83-89
Appealed to U.S. Court of Appeals, 84-85, 87-88
Background of case, 84-85
Scientific research program set up as settlement of case, 87-89
Settlement negotiations, 86-87
in U.S. District Court, 83-85, 88-89
-42-
Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), 85
Executive Branch, 73-74
Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), 38,41-43
Wiretaps, investigation of, 7 3 -77
Florida, 15
Foley Square, 22
Ford Adminishation, 7 5-7 6, 78
Foreignlntelligence SurveillanceAct of 1978 (FISA), P.L.95-511,92$tat.1783, 74 ‘:
Freedom of Information Act, P.L. 89-487, 80 Stat. 250, 69-73
“Exemption 5”, ’70
Pre-decisional versus decisional documents, 72
Friedman, Daniel, 28
Friendly, Judge, 30
Gasch, Oliver, 75
Gates, Miss, 5
Georgetown, 63-64
G.I. Bill of Rights (Servicemen’s Readjustment Act of 1944, June 22, 1944, c. 268,58 Stat. 284),
15, 17
Ginsburg, Justice, 83
Goldbloom,Irwin:
Career plans, 7-8,21-23
financial security, concern for, 16, 78-79
job satisfaction, 35-37, 78-80
law, decides on, 12, 14-18
Early life:
current affairs, involvement in, 8-9
family history, l-3
father’s immigrant experience, 1-2
mother’s Parkinson’s disease, 2-3
Holmes, Oliver Wendell, influence of biography, 8
marriage, 16,22-23
rcadtng, 6-9
siblings, 2-3,9
Education:
Cental High School:
diversity of, 3-4
extacurricular activities, 4
influential teachers, 5
work during, 4-7
Latinstudies, 5-6
Madison Junior High School, 5-6
Syracuse Law School, 3,18-22
classmates, 18-20
-A3 –
G.I. Bill of Rights (Servicemen’s Readjustment Act of 1944, June22, 1944, c.268,
58 Stat.284), 17
honors in:
class standing, 20,21
Honor Court, Chief Judge, 20
Law Review, 20,21
moot court, participation in, 21
Order of the Coif, 2I
living arrangements during, 20
professors, 21
Syracuse University, 3, 9-11
American Studies major, 8, 11
G.I. Bill of Rights (Servicemen’s Readjustment Act of 1944, Jwte 22, 7944, c.268,
58 Stat.284), 15
influential professors, 6
refurn to after army service, 14-15
work during, 4-7,10
Legal czreer:
at Justice Department, U.S., Civil Division, General Litigation Section:
appellate section considered “elitest of the elite”, 5L
cases:
Grumman Aircraft Engineering Corp. v. Renegotiatton Board,421 U.S. 168
(1975), 69-73
argues appeal, 7l-72
Kingv. Unrted Stotes,29Z F.Supp. 767 (D. Colo. 1968), 37-39
assisted by David Anderson, 39
firstjurytrial,38
writes and argues summary judgment motion, 38-39
Marina Oswald case (Porter v. United States, 473 F.2d 1329 (Sth Cir. 1973)),
39-43
appeal argued before Fifth Circuit, 42-43
briefed for Fifth Circrit, 42
trial strategy, 4I-42
milk price support case (Nader v, Butz,398 F.Supp. 390 (D.D. C. 1975)),
35, 55-68
aff,rdavit, taking from former Secretary of Agriculture, 57,66-67
Anderson, David, assisted by, 57
depositions re political contributions and influence, 59-61
discovery disputes, 61
Kalmbach, Herbert, taking deposition of, 63
principal government lawyer in, 56
psychological effect of comrption involving milk, 67-68
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Watergate Grand Jury, called before, 66-67
Watergate Special Prosecutor, relationship with, 6l-62
Public Affairs Associates, Inc. v. Rickover,369 U.S. lll (1962), on remand to
268 F.Supp. 444 (D.D.C. 1967), 43-53
appeal filed, 51
assigned to case, 46
trial, 43-44,46-5A
(D.C. Ctr.1977), 73-77
argues appeal in U.S. Court of Appeals, 77
executive privilege issues, works with Counsel to the President on, 75
United States v. New York, New Haven, and Hartford Railroad Co.,276 F.2d 525
(2dCir.l960), 27-32
drafts complaint, 29,32
works on brief to challenge Court of Appeals jurisdiction, 31
changes in Department under different administrations, 33-35, 37
copyright law, 43-54
Deparhren[‘s “expert” in, 52-53
testifies before Congress on, 52-54
courhoom experience, 34-35
Deputy Assistant Attorney General, 52-54, 69, 7 5 -7 6, 7 8, 9l
Honors Progtam, 22
ICC and agriculture cases, 27-32,35, 55-68
transferred from Antitrust Division, 26-28
joins, 2l-22,24
office space, 26-27
post-Kennedy assassination cases, 37 -43
Renegotiation Act work, 25-26, 35, 69-7 I
Special Litigation counsel, 62,69
Woodrow Wilson School, offered sabbatical, 46
work, pleasures of, 35-37,78-79
at Latham & Watkins: . .
American Bar Association Litigation Section Seminar Program, speaker at, 84
cases:
Endangered Species Act case (City of Las Vegas v. Lujan,89l F.2d927
(D.C. Cir.1989)), 83-89
injunction sought to challenge designation, 83-84
settlement ideas and discussions, 86-87
Sears, Roebuck & Co. v. [Jnited States,778 F.2d 810 (D.C. Cir. 1985), 83
uranium cartel litigation, 82-83
government contracts litigation, 83
-A5-
invited to join firm, 78
joins, 80
reasons for entering private practice, 78-80
Litigation Department, Office Chair of, 81
Legal philosophies:
“bet the company” cases, 9l-92
bureaucracy in government and private practice, 82
government work and private practice compared, 79-82
govemment work as “client work”, 81-82
Justice Department as training ground for private sector, 36-37
politics and administrative law, relationship between, 56
practice of law, excitement of, 90-92
private practice, challenges in, 82
U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit:
activism in, 89-90
changes in, 90
Legal theories:
“capable of repetition yet evading review”, dochine of, 58
“Dumaine” interests, 28
executiveprivilege, 75
pre-decisional versus decisional documents, 72
U.S. Army service, ll-I4
at Camp Kilmer:
Medical Records Office, assigned to, 12-13
Peress, Major, contactwith, 13-14
rotated to, 12
drafted, 1l
effect of, 12
in Korean War combat zone, I l-13
Grumman Aircrafi Engineering Corp. v. Renegotiation Board,421 U.S. 168 (1975), 69-73
Appeal by government to U.S. Court of Appeals, 70-71
Appeal by Grumman to U.S. Court of Appeals, 70
Appeal to U.S. Supreme Court, 72-73
Board policy changes, 71
“Exemption 5” defense, 70
Freedom of Information Act requests for internal documents of Board, 69-70
Pre-decisional versus decisional documents, opinion based on, 72
Gulf 82
Hardin, Clifford, 55-57, 60, 66-67
Harmon v, Brucker,355 U.S. 579 (1958):
Argued in U.S. Supreme Court by Donald MacGuineas, 24
Army discharges, judicial review of, 24-25
Case not defended on the merits, 25
-A5 –
Harris, Stanley S., 85, 88-89
Harvard University, 46-47
Hills, Carla, 78-80
History of the Untted States Navy in World War II, 46-47
Hogan, Thomas F., 83
Holmes, Oliver Wendell, 8
House Judiciary Committee, 66
Housing and Urban Development, U.S. Department of (HUD), 78, 80
Hudson, New York, 3
Idaho, 1-2
Interior Department, U.S., 84, 86 |
Internal Revenue Service, U.S., 19
Interstate Commerce Act, February 4, 1887, c. 104,24 Stat.379, 29-30
Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC), 26-27, 28-30
Iran-Conta Special Prosecutor, 22
Jones, William B., 58-66
Justice Department, U.S., 19, 22-78, 8l
Antitrust Division, 26-28, 53
Attorney General’s Offrce, 29
Bell, Griffin, 76-77
Kennedy, Robert, 33
Levi, Ed, 74-75
Rogers, William, 22,33
Wiretaps, authonzes, 7 4
Civil Division, 33-34, 53, 9l
directors:
Douglas, John, 34
Orrick, William, 34
Federal Programs Branctq 25
General Litigation Section:
cases:
Grumman Atrcraft Engineering Corp. v. Renegotiation Board, 421U.S. 168
(197s), 69-73
Harmonv. Brucker,355 U.S. 579 (1958),24’25
Kingv. United States,Z9? F.Supp. 767 (D. Colo. 1968), 37-39
Marina Oswald case (Porter v. United States, 473 F.2d 1329 (Sth Cir. 1973)),
39-43
milkprice support case Q{ader v. Butz,398 F.Supp. 390 (D.D.C.1975)),
35, 55-68
Publtc Affairs Associates, Inc. y. Rickover,369 U.S. lll (1962), on remand to
268 F.Supp. 444 (D.D.C. 1967), 43-53
Untted States v. American Telephone & Telegraph Co., 567 F.2d l2l
(D.C. Cir. 1977), 73-77
-A7 –
United States v. New York, New Haven, and Hartford Railroad Co.,276F.2d 525
(2d Cir. 1960), 27-32
Renegotiation Act, primary jurisdiction in, 25-26
section chiefs:
Leathers, Harland, 25
MacGuineas, Donald, 24-27
work of, 25-27
Copyright laws, Department’s testimony on revisions of, 52-54 ‘
Criminal Division, t3-34, 53
Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), 38,41-43
wiretaps, investigation of, 7 3 -7 7
Honors Program at, 22-23
Office of Legislative Affairs, 76
Solicitor General’s Offrce, 25, 28, 30
Cox, Archibald, 45, 61-62, 66-67
Invited to file amtcus brief in Public Affoirs Associates, Inc. v. Rickover, 45
see also under Goldbloom, Irwin, Legal career
Kalmbach, Herbert, 63
Kansas City, Kansas, 2
Kelly, Bill, 80
Kennedy, John F., 33,34
Kennedy, Robert, 33
King, John, 38-39
Kingv. UnitedStates,292 F.Supp. 767 (D. Colo. 1968), 37-39
Government argues Oswald abandoned the rifle, 39
Suit for compensation for Oswald’s rifle, 38-39
Korean War, 1 l-14, 19, 69
Las Vegas, 84
Latham & Watkins, 78-89
Growth in, 80-81
Location of offices, 80-81
Partners in Washington office, 80
Le Moyne College, 20
Leathers, Harland, 25
Lee, Rex, 75,77,78
Leventhal, Harold, 75, 77
Levi, Ed, 74-75
Lewis & Clark expedition, 53
Lithuania 1
Lodge, Henry Cabot, 22
London, 8l
Los Angeles, 19, 80-82
MacGuineas, Donald, 24-27
-A8 –
Marina oswald case (Porter v. United States,473 F.2d 1329 (5th cir. 1973) , 39-43
Milk price support case (Nader v. Butz,398 F.Supp. 390 (D.D.C. 1975)), 35, 55-68
Milkprice support progruun, 55-68
Price support number, challenge to, 55
Watergate hearings, 66-67
see also Nader v. Butz,398 F.Supp. 390 (D.D.C.1975) (milkprice support case)
Mojave Desert, 84-85
Montana, 1-2
Montreal, 1
Montreal World’s Fair, “Expo 67”, 38
Morrison, Samuel Elliot, 46-47,52
Moscow, 81
Moss, John, 73-75,77
Moss Committee, 73-77
Executive privilege issues, 75
Subpoenas AT&T, 73-74
see also United Stotes v. American Telephone & Telegraph Co.,567 F.2d I21
(D.C. Cir. t977)
Nader, Ralph, 56-66
Nader v. Butz,398 F.Supp. 390 (D.D.C. 1975) (milk price support case):
Affidavit, taking from former Secretary of Agriculture, 57,66-67
Background to, 55-56
Discovery disputes, 6l
Doctrine of “capable of repetition yet evading review”, 58
Judge Jones inJluenced by media reports, 6I,65
Media interest in, 60, 63-65
Mootress issues, 57-58
Price support decision, challenge to, 56
Price support number, propriety of, 56
Watergate, involvement with, 55, 59-67
dairy organizations contributing to the Committee to Reelect the President, 59
House Judiciary Committee considers milk price support issues in impeachment
question, 66
Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox, 6l-62
and Secretary Hardin’s deposition, 66-67
White House involvement in, 59-67
White House tape of dairy farmer meeting, 6l-66
played at cocktail party, 63-66
National Labor Relations Board, 72
Nattonal L;abor Relations Boardv. Sears, Roebuck & Co.,421 U.S. 132 (1975), 72
Nature Conservancy, 87
Nebraska, University of, 57
Nevada, 84-86
-A9-
New Brunswick, New Jersey, 12
New Haven Railroad, 27-32
see also United States v. New Yorh New Haven, and Hartfurd Railroad Co.,276F.2d 525
(2dCir.l960)
New Orleans, 42
New York City, 1, 15, 18, 23,48
New York Public Service Commission, 30
Newport Beach, 63, 80
Nixon, Richard, 63, 65-66, 67
Order of the Coif, 2l
Oregon, 1
Orrick, William, 34
Oswald, Lee Harvey, 38-42
Oswald, Marina
see Porter, Marina Oswald, and see also Porter v. United States,473 F.2d L329
(5th Cir. 1973) (Marina Oswald case)
Parkinson’s Disease, 2-3
Peress, Major, 13-14
Pike Committee, 73
Pittsburgh, 48
Porter, Marina Oswald, 38-42
Porter v. United States,473 F.2d 1329 (5th Cir. 1973) (Marina Oswald case), 39-43
Appealed to U.S. Court of Appeals, 42
Claim for compensation for Warren Commission exhibits, 39-43
Condition of exhibits, 41,43
Date of the taking, 41,42
Experts, valuation by, 40-41
Trial in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas, 42
Trial by master in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, 39-42
Princeton University, 46
Public Affairs Associates, Inc. v. Riclaver,369 U.S. lll (1962), on remand to 268 F.Supp. 444
(D.D.C. 1967), 43-53
Admiral Rickover’s speeches as government publications, 44-48
Appealed, 50
Copyright of government publications, 44-48
Govemment agencies added as defendants, 45-46
Justice Departrnent to share cost of defense with Rickover, 47
Note-taking during trial, 49-50,52
Prior breaches ofthe copyright statute:
Morrison, Samuel Elliot and the History of the United States Navy in World War II,
46-47
Rickover abandons copyright claim to most of speeches, 47-48
Statute goveming copyright of government publications, 44, 46-47
-A10 –
Transcript of trial, skirmishes over, 48-49,52
U.S. Supreme Court:
invites amicus brief from SolicitorGeneral, 45
remands case for tnal, 45
Public Affairs Press, 44-51
Puerto Rico, 35
Pulitzer Prize, 47
Ralston Purina Company, 57
Renegotiation Act, April 28, 1942, c. 247, 5 6 Stat. 245, 3 5, 69 -7 I
Conflict between Renegotiation Board and Defense Departrnent, 69
Primary jurisdiction of cases in U.S. Justice Department Civil Division, General Litigation
Section, 25-26
Rickover, Admiral, 43-53
see also Public Affairs Assoctates, Inc. v. Rickover,369 U.S. ltl (1962), on remand to
268 F.Supp . 444 (D.D.C. 1967)
Robinson, Spottswood W.,III, 77
Rockefeller Commission, 7 3
Rogers, William, 22,33
Roosevelt, Franklin Delano, 46
Russia, 1,38
Schiff, Peter, 30
Schnapper, Morris, 44-45
Sears, Roebuck & Co., 72,83
see also National Labor Relations Boardv. Sears, Roebuch & Co.,421 U.S. 132 (1975)
Sears, Roebuck & Co. v. United States,778 F.2d 810 (D.C. Cir. 1985), 83
Seattle, 48
Secret Service, U.S., 38
Silberman, Laurence H., 87
Smith, John Lewis, Ir., 43-53
Appreciationof, 5l-52
Solicitor General’s Office, 25, 28, 30, 45
St. Louis, 57
Steptoe & Johnson, 80
Supreme Court, U.S., 19, 31,32
Grumman Aircraft Engineering Corp. v. Renegotiation Board,421 U.S. 168 (1975), 69-73
Harmonv. Brucker,355 U.S. 579 (1958), 24-25
Justices:
Clark, 25
Ginsburg, 83
National Labor Relations Board v. Sears, Roebuck & Co.,421 U.S. I32 (1975), 72
Public Affatrs Associates, Inc. v. Rickover,369 U.S. llt (1962), on remand to
268 F.Supp. 444 (D.D.C. 1967), 45-53
Syracuse, New York, 1-1 1, 15, 17-23, 36
-A11-
Syracuse Law Review, 20,21
Syracuse Law School, 3,17, 18-22,33
Syracuse University, 3, 6-ll, 14, 18-19
Taft-Hartley Act (Labor-Management Relations Act, June 23, 1947, c. 120,61 Stat. 136), 25
Texas, 38-43
Texas School Book Depository Building, 38-39
Tippit, Officer, 37
Treasury Department, U.S.: ::
Connally, John, 60,67
Secret Service, U.S., 38
United States v. American Telephone & Telegraph Co.,567 F.2d 121 (D.C. Cir. 1977), 73-77
Appealed by Moss Committee to U.S. Court of Appeals, 75
Background of case, 73-75
Change of adminisfoations, effect on case, 76
Injunction to assert executive privilege vis-a-vis the Moss Committee, 75
Panels in U.S. Court of Appeals, 75,77
Remanded for negotiation and settlement urged, 75-76
Returned to U.S. Courl of Appeals, 77
United States v. New York, New Haven, and Hartford Railroad Co.,276F.2d 525 (2d Cir. 1960),
27-32
Appealed, 30
challenge to jurisdiction of Court of Appeals, 30-31
District Court ordered to enter new judgment, 3l-32
Complaint filed in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, 29
“Dumaine interests”, 28
Share exchange deal and ICC issues, 28-29
Shareholder derivative suit with related issues, 29-30
denied certiorari by U.S. Supreme Cotxt, 32
Uranium cqrtel lifigation, 82-83
U.S. Army, ll-14,24-25
U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit, 54
Friendly, Judge, 30
United States v. New Yorh New Haven, and Hartford Railroad Co.,276 F.2d 525
(2d Cir. 1960), 27-32
U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit:
Marina Oswald case (Porter v. United States,473 F.2d 1329 (5th Cir. 1973)), 39-43
U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, 89-90
Cases:
Endangered Species Act case (City of Las Vegas v. Lujan,89l F .2d 927
(D.C. Cir. 1989)), 83-89
Sears, Roebuck & Co. v. United States,778 F.2d 810 (D.C. Cir. 1985), 83
UnitedStatesv.AmericanTelephone &TelegraphCo.,567F.2d 121 (D.C. Cir.1977),
73-77
-Al2-
Judges:
Bazelon, David L, 70
Ginsburg, Ruth Bader, 83
Leventhal, Harold, 7 5, 77
Robinson, Spottswood W’lll, 77
Silberman, Laurence H., 87
Wald, Patricia M., 76-77
Wright, J. Skelly, 7l-72
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, 28
U.S. Court of Claims, 28
U.S. Courthouse, 39
U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado:
King v. Untted States, 292 F.Supp.767 @. Colo. 1968), 37-39
U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, 39-40,55
Cases:
milkprice support case (Irlader v. Butz,398 F.Supp. 390 (D.D.C. 1975)), 35, 55-68
Public Affatrs Associates, Inc. v. Rickover,369 U.S. lll (1962), on remand to
268 F.Supp.44{- (D.D.C. 1967), 43-53
Judges:
Corcoran, Howard F., 70
Gasch, Oliver, 75
Harris, Stanley S., 85, 88-89
Hogan, Thomas F., 83
Jones, William 8., 58-66
Smith, John Lewis, Jr., 43-53
U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Califomia:
Orrick, William, 34
U.S. District Court for the Northem District of Texas, 39
U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, 22,29-30
U.S. Navy, 44-47
U.S. Tax Court, 25
Vancouver, I
Vietnam peace taIks, 22
Virginia 11
Vocational High School, 3
Wald, Patricia M, 76-77
Wall Stueet ftms, 22
Walsh, Lawrence, 22
Warren Commission:
Exhibits, 37-38,40
Report, 40
Washington (state), 1
-A1-3 –
Washington, D.C.
see District of Columbia
Washington Monument, 23
Washington Post, The, 60-61
Watergate case, 55, 59-67
Grand Jwy, 66-67
Post-Watergate investigations :
Church Committee, 73
Moss Committee; 73-77
Pike Committee, 73
Rockefeller Commiss ion, 7 3
Special Prosecutor, 6l-62, 63, 66-67
Watergate eru, 37
Westinghouse, 82
Whipple, Miss, 5
White House, 58-60, 75-77
White House Counsel, 62,75
White House tapes, 6l-66
Williams, Edward Bennett, 67
Winnipeg, I
Wiretaps:
Authorization by Justice Department, 74
Investigated by Moss Committee, 73-77
Woodrow Wilson School, Princeton University, 46
World War II, 3,6,46-47,69
Wright, J. Skelly, 7l-72
-A14 –
B-1
Oral History of Irwin Goldbloom, Esq.
Table of Cases and Statutes
Cases
City of Las Vegas v. Lujan, 891 F.2d 927 (D.C. Cir.1989), 83-89
Grumman Aircraft Engineering Corp. v. Renegotiation Board, 421 U.S. 168 (1975), 69-73
Harmon v. Brucker, 355 U.S. 579, 78 S. Ct. 433 (1958), 24
In re Westinghouse Electric Corp. Uranium Contracts Litigation, 563 F.2d 992 (10th Cir. 1977),
82
King v. United States, 292 F. Supp. 767 (D. Colo. 1968), 37-39
Marina N. Oswald Porter, Individually, Etc. v. United States, 473 F.2d 1329 (5th Cir. 1973), 39-
43
Nader v. Butz, 398 F.Supp. 390 (D.D.C. 1975)), 35, 55-68
Public Affairs Associates, Inc. v. Rickcover, 369 U.S. 111 ( 1962), on remand to 268 F.Supp.
444 (D.D.C. 1967), 43-53
Sears, Roebuck & Co. v. United States, 778 F.2d 810 (D.C. Cir. 1985), 83
United v. New Haven Railroad, 282 F.2d 34 (2d Cir. 1960), 27-32
United States v. American Telephone & Telegraph Co., 567 F.2d 121 (D.C. Cir. 1977), 73-77
Statutes
Endangered Species Act of 1973, P.L. 93-205, 87 Stat. 884, 83-89
Freedom of Information Act, P.L. 89-487, 80 Stat. 250, 69-73
Interstate Commerce Act, February 4, 1886, c. 104, 25 Stat. 379, 29-30
Renegotiation Act, April 28, 1942, c. 247, 56 Stat. 245, 35, 69-71