CLARK, TOM C. (1899–1977)

Tom Campbell Clark, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court and attorney general of the United States, was born September 23, 1899, in Dallas, Texas. He was educated at the University of Texas at Austin, receiving his B.A. in 1921 and his LL.B. in 1922. Admitted to the Texas Bar in 1922, he joined his family's firm in Dallas.

Clark began his twelve-year career with the Department of Justice in 1937 as a special assistant to the attorney general. He held a number of posts in the department, capped by his 1945 appointment as attorney general by President harry s. truman. With this promotion, Clark became the first person to become attorney general by working himself up from the lower ranks of the department.

Four years later, President Truman appointed Clark Associate Justice of the Supreme Court; he took his oath of office on August 24, 1949. His tenure on the bench spanned eighteen years, and he served on both the vinson court and warren court. He retired from the Court on June 12, 1967, to avoid the appearance of a conflict of interests when his son, Ramsey Clark, was appointed attorney general by President lyndon b. johnson. Clark, however, continued to sit as a judge in the various courts of appeal, and to be a vigorous and vocal advocate of judicial reform until his death on June 13, 1977.

On the Supreme Court, Clark built a reputation as a pragmatic jurist. Early on, he voted regularly with Chief Justice fred m. vinson and the other Truman appointees. In time, however, he began to assert his independence. In youngstown sheet and tube company v. sawyer (1952), the steel seizure case, Clark voted against Vinson and Truman, concurring in the Court's decision holding unconstitutional Truman's order for governmental seizure of the nation's steel mills.

While Clark was generally viewed as politically conservative, he was relatively nonideological, and his views changed throughout his tenure, especially during the years of the Warren Court (1953–1969). He was a nationalist, a liberal on racial matters, and, in general, a conservative on issues of criminal procedure and civil liberties.

Clark's most significant opinions in the area of federalism are his landmark opinion on state regulation of commerce in dean milk company v. madison (1951), and his dissent in Williams v. Georgia (1955), which provided the classic definition of "independent and adequate state grounds " that insulate state court decisions from the Supreme Court. In the racial area, speaking for the Court in burton v. wilmington parking authority (1961), he rejected as unlawful state action racial discrimination by private persons who had leased public property. In addition, he wrote for the Court in heart of atlanta motel, inc. , v. united states, (1964) where, in a case involving both national power and racial justice, a unanimous Court upheld the public accommodations provisions of the civil rights act of 1964.

In the areas of criminal procedure and civil liberties Clark was less consistent. Although he may be best known for his controversial opinion in mapp v. ohio (1961), declaring that illegally seized evidence must be excluded from a state criminal prosecution, this opinion was atypical. More often, especially in his later years on the bench, he disagreed with the liberalization of criminal procedure wrought by the Warren Court. For instance, he dissented strongly—indeed almost violently—in miranda v. arizona (1966).

Similarly, Clark's record on civil liberties, though generally conservative, was not completely consistent. Probably Clark was most consistent as to those issues arising out of anticommunist and loyalty-security programs. As attorney general, he had been instrumental in setting up some of these programs, and as a Justice he continued to support government efforts to suppress what he regarded as the communist conspiracy. Thus, he dissented in watkins v. united states (1957) and joined the majority in barenblatt v. united states (1959). In addition, he was the sole dissenter in Greene v. McElroy (1959), a decision which badly damaged the loyalty-security program for employees of private companies.

On the other hand, Clark was generally less sympathetic to efforts by the states to cope with what he regarded as a national problem. Thus, he wrote for a unanimous Court in wieman v. updegraff (1952), which held unconstitutional an Oklahoma loyalty oath statute requiring state employees to swear that they were not members of organizations designated by the attorney general as subversive or a "Communist front." Clark emphasized that under the Oklahoma law an individual could be guilty of perjury even though he did not know the character of the organization that he had innocently joined. And he joined the majority in pennsylvania v. nelson (1956), which invalidated state sedition laws on the ground that Congress had preempted the field.

In other areas of civil liberties, Justice Clark tended more often to vote in favor of asserted constitution rights. Thus, in the area of church-state relations, he wrote the opinion in abington township school district v. schempp (1963), which held unconstitutional a Pennsylvania statute that required that each school day start with the reading of at least ten verses from the Bible. Similarly, he voted with the majority in a series of cases that drastically narrowed court-martial jurisdiction over civilians, the most significant of which was Kinsella v. Singleton (1960).

John Kaplan
(1986)

Bibliography

Kirkendall, Richard 1969 Tom C. Clark. In Leon Friedman and Fred L. Israel, eds., The Justices of the United States Supreme Court, 1789–1969. New York: Chelsea House.