Scope and Content Note
The papers of Simon Ernest Sobeloff (1894-1973) span the years 1882-2005, but are concentrated in the period 1950-1973. Sobeloff's duties as United States Solicitor General are represented in the collection. Documentation of his tenure as judge and chief judge of the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals is particularly extensive and comprehensive. The papers are divided into nine series: Appointment Books, General Correspondence, United States Solicitor General Files, United States Court of Appeals Files, Speeches and Writing Files, Subject File, Miscellany, Scrapbooks, and 2019 Addition.
Only a few items from Sobeloff's youth and early professional career are contained in the collection. Letters in the General Correspondence series, 1930-1973, contain references to his early childhood in Baltimore, his experiences as a page in the United States House of Representatives, and his early law practice. The correspondence concerns both his professional duties and his social activities. The letters in this series complement correspondence found in the Solicitor General Files, United States Court of Appeals Files, and the Speeches and Writings File. Correspondents in these series include the justices of the United States Supreme Court, judges of the Courts of Appeals and circuit courts, and various political, government, and literary figures, among them being David L. Bazelon, Warren E. Burger, William O. Douglas, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Felix Frankfurter, Clement F. Haynsworth, Jr., J. Edgar Hoover, Jacob K. Javits, Robert F. Kennedy, Harold Leventhal, Theodore R. McKeldin, H. L. Mencken, John Johnston Parker, John Paul, Morris Ames Soper, R. Dorsey Watkins, and J. Skelly Wright.
The Solicitor General Files, 1953-1956, while not extensive, reveal how Sobeloff conducted the office and decided which cases the government should appeal and when it should confess error. Files for cases which Sobeloff either argued personally or was on the brief before the Supreme Court include notes and drafts of briefs detailing his methods of argumentation as well as correspondence relating to the cases. Among the cases were those concerning actions of the Subversive Activities Control Board, the validity of trying a civilian by court-martial, federal preemption of state sedition laws, and segregation in the public schools. When the Supreme Court outlawed racial segregation in the public schools in May 1954, it ordered reargument the following term on the question of an appropriate decree to implement the decision. Opposing counsel were invited to address the court on this point, and Sobeloff appeared for the government. President Eisenhower took a personal interest in this case and called Sobeloff as solicitor general to the White House on a Saturday morning to review the brief. A copy of the brief with Eisenhower's notations is in the papers along with other related material on the segregation issue.
Sobeloff's confirmation as a judge of the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals was held up for a year by several members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, mainly because of his role in the desegregation decision and his views on other controversial issues of the 1950s. This period is documented in the correspondence and the published hearings in the United States Court of Appeals Files series. When he became a judge and subsequently chief judge of the Fourth Circuit, Sobeloff rendered several important decisions in cases from counties in Virginia and North Carolina, striking down certain school districting plans and ordering a more speedy implementation of desegregation.
The Court of Appeals series contains a comprehensive record of Sobeloff's seventeen years on the federal bench and provides the opportunity for a close study of the judicial process in one appellate court. The case files include correspondence among the judges, intracourt memoranda, bench memoranda, notes, draft opinions, and other related material produced and collected by Sobeloff. Also included are records of the judicial conferences, which provide an account of the topics of interest discussed at the annual meetings of the judges of the Fourth Circuit. The United States Judicial Conference files contain correspondence, notes, and working drafts for various advisory committees upon which Sobeloff served. The Court of Appeals series also includes an office file of personnel records, court dockets and other scheduling matters, financial records, and general reference material relevant to the operation of the court.
Throughout his public life, Sobeloff made a great number of speeches both before the legal profession and various philanthropic organizations. Correspondence, notes, and rough drafts are included with these speeches, which make up the greater part of the Speeches and Writings File, 1928-1972. The writings consist of book reviews and scholarly articles which appeared mainly in legal journals. Major subjects include criminal insanity, courts and the press, civil liberties, freedom and security, administration of immigration laws, the criminal code, and the work of the solicitor general's office. At the end of this series is a group of speeches written by Sobeloff for the use of others, including his close friend and advisee, Theodore R. McKeldin, governor of Maryland.
The Subject File, 1936-1973, documents Sobeloff's activities in the American Bar Association, the Federal Bar Association, Maryland Commission on Administrative Organization of the State, National Council on Crime and Delinquency, Institute of Judicial Administration, the Jewish Court of Arbitration and Defamation League, and the Baltimore Urban League. These files reveal Sobeloff's involvement in the Jewish community both locally and nationally. He served as director of the Association of Jewish Charities, director of the Jewish Educational Alliance, and as an officer in the American Jewish Congress. Locally he served on the Baltimore Board of Jewish Education and the Baltimore Jewish Council. He was a trustee of Brandeis University and a member of the Visiting Committee in the Social Sciences at Johns Hopkins University.
Some of Sobeloff's early work in municipal and state functions is noted in the Miscellany series, 1882-1973, including material from the 1930s concerning the Baltimore Employment Stabilization Commission and Sobeloff's appointment as the United States attorney for the district of Maryland in 1931. Also included in this series are fragmentary files of Sobeloff's tenure as chief judge of the Maryland Court of Appeals, 1952-1954, which consist of drafts and printed copies of opinions and a small amount of correspondence and memoranda. Social correspondence, gift lists, travel files, and other personal and financial material are also included as well as biographical material for both Sobeloff and his wife, Irene. Few items in this series concern Sobeloff's early years, with the exception of a phonetic shorthand manual used while he served as a page in the House of Representatives in 1909. Additional biographical information can be found in an oral history transcript at the Maryland Historical Society.
The Scrapbook series consists of microfilm copies of fourteen volumes of scrapbooks relating to Sobeloff's career, 1914-1972.
The 2019 Addition, 1919-2005, supplements the initial portion of the collection and includes material relating to Sobeloff's tenure as United States Solicitor General, his duties as a judge of the United States Court of Appeals, his work concerning Jewish issues and organizations, and his service with various state commissions and public offices in Maryland. The bulk of the addition consists of routine correspondence, a combination of both personal and professional, from Sobeloff's time on the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals and his involvement with local and national Jewish organizations. Documented in the files are the efforts of Sobeloff and the organizations with whom he was affiliated to stop antisemitism in the United States and to protest the government of Germany's mistreatment of Jews prior to and during World War II. Also present are files pertaining to the establishment of Palestine as a national home for Jewish people. The addition also includes family papers, files relating to Sobeloff's private legal practice, and material about his farm in Riderwood, Md.