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WILLIAM O.
DOUGLAS was born in Maine, Minnesota, on October 16,
1898, and raised in Yakima, Washington. He entered Whitman
College in 1916, but his studies were interrupted by
military service in World War I. Douglas was graduated
from Whitman in 1920 and taught school for two years
before attending law school at Columbia University. Upon
graduation in 1925, he joined a New York law firm, but
left two years later to spend one year in Yakima. He
subsequently returned to teach law at Columbia University,
and transferred to the faculty of Yale University in
1929. In 1936, President Franklin D. Roosevelt appointed
Douglas to the Securities and Exchange Commission, and
in 1937 he became Chairman. President Roosevelt nominated
Douglas to the Supreme Court of the United States on
March 20, 1939. The Senate confirmed the appointment
on April 4, 1939. Douglas had the longest tenure of any
Justice, serving on the Supreme Court for thirty-six
years with the spanning the careers of five Chief Justices.
He retired on November 12, 1975, and died on January
19, 1980, at the age of eighty-one. |
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