When Republicans Experimented with to Impeach a Supreme Court Justice

On April 15, 1970, Ford took the Property floor and started a speech earning the general public circumstance from Douglas. Sounding like he was looking through from a binder of oppo research, the congressman highlighted some of Douglas’ most provocative writings exterior the court docket, these kinds of as his e-book, “Points of Rebel.”

“Recently, there has appeared on the stands a small black guide with the autograph, ‘William O. Douglas,’ scrawled on the address in purple,” Ford stated. “Its title is ‘Points of Rebellion’ and its thesis is that violence might be justified and potentially only revolutionary overthrow of ‘the establishment’ can preserve the nation.

“The kindest thing I can say about this 97-page tome is that it is quick reading through. Had it been prepared by a militant sophomore, as it easily could, it would of study course have under no circumstances identified a prestige publisher like Random Property. It is a fuzzy harangue evidently intended to give historic legitimacy to the militant hippie-yippie motion and to bear testimony that a 71-calendar year-outdated Justice of the Supreme Courtroom is one in spirit with them.”

In that reserve, Douglas wrote: “We need to know that today’s Institution is the new George III, Irrespective of whether it will go on to adhere to his ways, we do not know. If it does, the redress, honored in tradition, is also revolution.” (George III was the king of England when the American colonies declared their independence.)

Ford also castigated Douglas for creating — when on the Supreme Court —in publications this kind of as Avant Garde, whose publisher, Ralph Ginzburg, experienced been convicted in 1963 of violating federal obscenity legal guidelines.

“When I very first encountered the information of Mr. Justice Douglas’ involvement with pornographic publications and espousal of hippie-yippie model revolution, I was inclined to dismiss his fractious actions as the very first sign of senility,” Ford said. “But I feel I underestimated the justice.”

“In circumstance there are any ‘square’ Us citizens who were far too stupid to get the concept Mr. Justice Douglas was hoping to explain to us, he has now removed all probable misunderstanding,” Ford added, citing Douglas’ writings for a further publication, Evergreen Overview. As Household members thumbed by copies of the risqué magazine, Ford explained, “I am only unable to explain the prurient ads, the perverted recommendations, the downright filthy illustrations and the stunning and execrable four-letter language it employs.”

Ford argued that Douglas ought to have recused himself from Ginzburg’s enchantment of a $75,000 libel judgment received by Sen. Barry Goldwater, dating back to a 1964 write-up in an additional Ginzburg publication that experienced likened the then-GOP presidential prospect to Adolph Hitler. In January 1970, the Supreme Court denied Ginzburg’s request to review the judgment Douglas was 1 of two justices to dissent. Ford famous that Douglas had gained $350 for his posting in Avant Garde.

“Writing signed article content for infamous publications of a convicted pornographer is poor adequate. Having revenue from them is even worse. Declining to disqualify one’s self in this case is inexcusable,” Ford billed.

And Ford elliptically referred to Douglas’ messy personalized existence, together with his four marriages, the previous two of which ended up to females in their early 20s when Douglas was in his 60s: “His private everyday living, to the degree that it does not carry the Supreme Courtroom into disrepute, is his possess organization. 1 does not have to have to be an ardent admirer of any judge or justice, or an advocate of his way of life, to accept his correct to be elevated to or continue to be on the bench.”

In addition, Ford suggested that the justice, who experienced been nominated to the court docket by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1939, may have ties to Mafia and gambling figures. He known as for an investigation into Douglas’ conduct, incorporating, “I would vote to impeach him proper now.”

The future working day, a lot more than 100 Property members endorsed a resolution contacting for the generation of a particular committee to investigate whether to impeach Douglas. Approximately fifty percent of the users who signed on have been Democrats, but they were generally conservatives from the South.

Ford’s attack versus the justice, leveled in notably personal phrases, was out of character for the usually genial Midwestern lawmaker. And there was a rationale for that: Ford was doing the job at the behest of a substantially far more bare-knuckle politician — Nixon, who was continue to seething at Democrats for rejecting his very first two Supreme Courtroom nominees.

The White Property denied any involvement in the anti-Douglas hard work at the time. But William Saxbe, a Republican Ohio senator who went on to turn out to be Nixon’s last legal professional normal, wrote in his memoir that Nixon experienced “sicced” Ford on Douglas “in retaliation and likely in a fit of pique” immediately after shedding these votes.