Wattson, Marshman S., 1912-1962.

Wattson, a Minneapolis attorney, was born in Hibbing, Minnesota and moved with his parents to Minneapolis in 1913. He graduated from the University of Minnesota (1933) and from its law school (1935), and was on the faculty of its business school (1937-1942). Wattson served with the U.S. Office of Price Administration and the U.S. Navy during World War II (1942-1945). Afterwards he taught at Indiana University (1945-1953) and, following that, at the University of Minnesota Law School and the William Mitchell College of Law (St. Paul, Minn.).

Wattson's main interests lay in the area of civil liberties, and he was executive secretary of the Minnesota Civil Liberties Union from 1954 until his death. Other interests included the United World Federalists and mental health organizations. He died in Minneapolis on March 6, 1962.

More biographical information is located in the first folder of the collection.

Pierce Butler (1866-1939) began his career as a St. Paul (Minn.) attorney, most of it spent in the general practice of law (1888-1922). In amongst that career he served as Ramsey County Attorney (1893-1896) and as a railroad and corporation counsel. He was nominated to the U.S. Supreme Court by President Warren Harding--at the urging of his friend Chief Justice William H. Taft--and took his seat in January 1923. For the next sixteen years he was closely identified with the court's conservative phalanx, and voted to uphold government restrictions on civil liberties (particularly in cases involving radicals and pacifists) and to oppose government regulation of business in furtherance of social welfare.

From the guide to the Records relating to Pierce Butler's appointment to the U.S. Supreme Court., 1917-1922., (Minnesota Historical Society)