I graduated from the University of Missouri School of Law 50 years ago in May 1976, and I have been a law professor for 40-plus years. During my years as a law student, as an attorney and as a law professor, I have come to regard several attorneys among those I consider my heroes.
Two of them served in post-World War II Germany: William Fratcher, a law professor of mine; and U.S. Supreme Court Justice Robert H. Jackson, who died two years after I was born.
I spent three years in the same building with professor Fratcher, who taught us wills and trusts. He was always nattily dressed, well prepared and a fascinating font of legal knowledge. Early in his career, as an officer in the Army (which lasted from 1941 to 1947), he served in the occupation government in Berlin and had a liaison connection to Nuremberg. He was the chief of the war crimes branch of the legal division. Coming to know professor Fratcher and learning of his background sparked in me a keen interest in World War II and its aftermath.
That interest sprung too from my admiration for my father and my uncle (two more “heroes”). My dad, John Baron, served as Army medic under Gen. George Patton at the Battle of the Ruhr Pocket in the European Theater, and my uncle, Warren McGee, served as a Marine corporal as the Allies advanced, under heavy fire, on the islands in the Pacific Theater.
Over the years, I also developed a strong admiration for Jackson, the U.S. chief of counsel for prosecution of axis criminality. Jackson became a lawyer, having completed his law school course work in only one year. He received only a “diploma,” not a law degree, because of his young age of 20 at the time. Nonetheless, he was admitted to the New York bar in 1913.
Under then-President Franklin D. Roosevelt, he served as solicitor general of the United States from 1938 to 1940 and then as attorney general from 1940 to 1941. FDR appointed him to the Supreme Court in 1941. He was a member of the high court until 1954, but he excused himself from participation in court functions in 1945 to 1946 to fulfill the request of then-President Harry Truman to serve at Nuremberg.
I have often wondered if I was ever appointed to the Supreme Court, would I be willing absent myself from the office in order to serve in another role? Jackson’s humility in accepting tasks set before him and his devotion to public service are unmistakable and noble, qualifying him as a hero for me.
But it does not end there. His legal opinions are among the most notable in American jurisprudence. Among other famous writings, he dissented in the case of Korematsu v. United States. In this decision, handed down in 1944, the Supreme Court upheld a criminal conviction of a Japanese American—a citizen of the United States—for violating military orders directing him to report to a Japanese detention camp.
Jackson disagreed with the holding. His view has been vindicated. In Trump v. Hawaii (2018), the Supreme Court said Korematsu was “gravely wrong the day it was decided,” that it has “no place in law under the Constitution,” and that has been “overruled in the court of history.”
Jackson has been recognized as a strong advocate for procedural due process, a principle that protects members of the public from overreaching by government agencies.
As an attorney and a law professor, I have always perked up and taken special note of any decision or document that I find authored by Jackson. He is a “lawyer hero” for me. I would like to also mention that Jackson is portrayed by Michael Shannon, one of my favorite actors, in the 2025 movie Nuremberg.
I would like to acknowledge the assistance of my law school classmate Tim Rice of St. Louis and of law professor John Q. Barrett of St. John’s University for their assistance in preparing this article. Professor Barrett has documented the life of Jackson in his extensive writings, and he maintains a wonderful website and offers a free service, available at the Jackson List essay archive. To subscribe, visit TheJacksonList.com.
Roger Baron is an attorney, an ERISA expert and a professor emeritus at the University of South Dakota School of Law. He can be reached at [email protected].
ABAJournal.com is accepting queries for original, thoughtful, nonpromotional articles and commentary by unpaid contributors to run in the Your Voice section. Details and submission guidelines are posted at “Your Submissions, Your Voice.”
This column reflects the opinions of the author and not necessarily the views of the ABA Journal—or the American Bar Association.
