Sometime in the next few weeks, nine elderly gentlemen wearing judicial robes will walk into a courtroom in Washington. With a rustling of silken robes, the judges of the United States Supreme Court will settle in their places; lawyers and spectators will take their seats, and the fate of the nine Scottsboro boys, hapless figures in the cause celebre which has had repercussions in practically every part of the world will hang in the balance once again.
Osmond K. Fraenkel, mild-mannered and scholarly, who says that his clients range all the way from “ultra-conservative Wall Street bankers to Communists,” will be one of the two attorneys who will argue the constitutional status of the case for the International Labor Defense before the learned judges of the Supreme Court.
ROUTINE MATTER FOR HIM
It is nothing unusual for the stocky little man with the bushy eyebrows and the frank, open face to find himself championing an unpopular cause and to place himself quietly but none the less firmly in the path of those bent on exacting vengeance on representatives of disliked minorities.
A record of his legal activities since graduation from Columbia Law School reads like a history of liberal movements of this generation. Mr. Fraenkel has represented the American Civil Liberties Union; argued the status of the Soviet government before the Court of Appeals, long before the Soviet was recognized; championed numerous labor unions in their conflicts with the employers; represented rent strikers against landlords; fought for academic freedom in the courts, and represented teachers’ unions.
SURE OF INNOCENCE
“I am convinced of the utter innocence of nine Negro boys,” Mr. Fraenkel declared. “It must be obvious to everyone that the State of Alabama has literally stopped at nothing to send these nine innocents to the electric chair.”
Although not an alarmist, the liberal attorney was frankly pessimistic as to the immediate future of civil liberties in the United States.
“The stress of the last few years,” he declared, “has made it increasingly difficult for people with radical ideas to express themselves. This is particularly true because they are seldom accused on the basis of holding those ideas, but of advocating force and violence instead. This is merely wish fulfilment. It is also true that that violence is usually used against the radicals rather than by them. California and Pennsylvania, which are already reactionary strongholds, furnish ample evidence of this nature.”
BORN TO LIBERAL TRADITION
Nurtured in the democratic tradition, the liberal lawyer comes by his fondness for unpopular causes naturally. Mr. Fraenkel is of German Jewish ancestry and his people came to the United States with the first wave of German emigrants who fled to the United States when the revolution of 1848 proved abortive.
He was born and raised in New York City, “of sound bourgeois stock,” as he puts it. He attended Horace Mann High School, City College and was graduated from Columbia Law School in 1911. Since then he has practiced law in the city with various partners and the practice, he said, “included everything under the sun.”
BELIEVED IN DEMOCRACY
A deep interest in sociology in his college days and a deeply rooted belief in democracy gave an impetus to his desire to fight for the oppressed and underprivileged which he has followed ever since.
His activities have, however, been confined entirely to his own profession. Mr. Fraenkel has never taken active part in politics, but has always remained in the legal arena.
He is the author of a widely known volume, “The Sacco-Vanzetti Case,” a scholarly review and condensation of the entire affair. He has edited a book of legal opinions of Supreme Court Justice Louis D. Brandeis, entitled “The Curse of Bigness.” Mr. Fraenkel is a frequent contributor to law magazines and reviews, chiefly on constitutional questions.
Mr. Fraenkel is a member of the visiting committee of the Columbia Law School and a member of the Municipal Court Commission of the Bar Association.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
