Bickel, Alexander M.

Variant names
Dates:
Birth 1924-12-17
Death 1974-11-08
Americans,
English,

Biographical notes:

Alexander Mordecai Bickel was born in 1924. He emigrated to the United States from Romania in 1938. After serving in the United States Army, he graduated from the City College of New York in 1947, and the Harvard Law School in 1949. He was a law clerk to Associate Justice Felix Frankfurter of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1952 to 1953. Bickel was a professor at the Yale Law School from 1956 until his death in 1974. He published nine books and more than one hundred articles on law, government, political reform, the Supreme Court, and legal history. He was an associate editor of The New Republic; a writer for other popular journals; a military intelligence officer attached to the High Commissioner for Germany and the State Department, and an advisor on desegregation bills and other social legislation from 1958 to 1974. Bickel was active in the Democratic Party, especially between 1967 and 1969. He died in New Haven on November 7, 1974.

From the description of Alexander Mordecai Bickel papers, 1916-1987 (inclusive), 1930-1975 (bulk). (Unknown). WorldCat record id: 702194563

Alexander Mordecai Bickel, professor in Yale Law School and contributing editor of The New Republic, was a pre-eminent scholarly and popular authority on the Constitution, the Supreme Court, and the roles of the several branches of government in shaping public policy. Speaking and writing as teacher, scholar, lawyer, journalist, Democrat, and adviser to government officials, he was in the 1960s and early 1970s an important contributor to national discussion of such legal and political subjects as school desegregation, reapportionment, the Electoral College, the interpretation of the First Amendment, the powers of the President, the significance of the Warren Court, and the meaning of the liberal tradition. These are among the principal events in his personal and professional life:

1924 born in Bucharest, Rumania, to Shlomo and Yetta Bickel. 1939 immigrated with family to New York City, where his father became a journalist in the Yiddish-language press. 1943 1945 served in the U.S Army. 1947 received the B.S. in Social Science from the City College of New York. 1949 received the LL.B. from Harvard Law School, 1949 1950 served as law clerk to Chief Judge Calvert Magruder, U.S. Court of Appeals, First Circuit. 1950 1951 employed in the Office of the U.S. High Commissioner in Germany. 1951 1952 belonged to the U.S. Observer Delegation to the European Defense Community Conference in Paris. 1952 1953 served as law clerk to Associate Justice Felix Frankfurter, U.S. Supreme Court. 1953 1954 employed as special assistant to Director Robert R. Bowie, Policy Planning Staff, U.S. State Department. 1954 1956 employed as research associate, Harvard Law School. 1956 appointed associate professor, Yale Law School. 1957 chosen by the Permanent Committee for the Oliver Wendell Holmes Devise to write "Responsible Government and the Judiciary, 1910-1930," a segment of its projected Supreme Court history. 1957 published The Unpublished Opinions of Mr. Justice Brandeis. 1959 1960 lived in Washington, D.C., during most of sabbatical year. 1959 married Josephine Ann (Joanne) Napolino. 1960 appointed professor, Yale Law School. 1960 first child born, Francesca Ann. 1962 second child born, Claudia Rose. 1963 published The Least Dangerous Branch: The Supreme Court at the Bar of Politics. 1965 published Politics and the Warren Court. 1966 appointed Chancellor Kent Professor of Law and Legal History in Yale Law School and Yale University. 1966 taught in summer session, Stanford Law School. 1967 appointed consultant to the Subcommittee on the Separation of Powers, U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary. 1968 served on the Democratic Party's Commission on the Democratic Selection of Presidential Nominees (Hughes Commission). 1968 published The New Age of Political Reform: The Electoral College, the Convention, and the Party System. 1969 appointed consultant to the Democratic Party's Commission on Party Structure and Delegate Selection (McGovern Commission). 1969 delivered Holmes Lectures at Harvard Law School. 1970 1974 collaborated with U.S. Representative Richardson Preyer on legislation related to school desegregation. 1970 published The Supreme Court and the Idea of Progress 1970 appointed William C. DeVane Professor, Yale University, for a three-year term (1971-1974). 1970 1971 held a fellowship in the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavorial Sciences, Palo Alto, California, 1971 published Reform and Continuity: The Electoral College, the Convention, and the Party System, a revision of The New Age of Political Reform. 1971 argued for the defense in U.S. v. New York Times (the Pentagon papers case). 1971 1973 participated in the Study Group of the Federal Judicial Center on the Caseload of the Supreme Court. 1973 published The Caseload of the Supreme Court: And What, If Anything, to Do About It. 1973 Dec underwent surgery. 1974 Feb returned to professional activity. 1974 Jul appointed Sterling Professor of Law, Yale Law School. 1974 Jul suffered relapse. 1974 Oct completed manuscript of The Morality of Consent. 1974 Nov died.

From the guide to the Alexander Mordecai Bickel papers, 1916-1987, 1930-1975, (Manuscripts and Archives)

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Subjects:

  • Law
  • Law
  • Law and politics
  • Political conventions
  • Segregation in education
  • Segregation in education

Occupations:

  • Educators
  • Lawyers

Places:

  • United States (as recorded)
  • United States (as recorded)

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