Hughes, Charles Evans

The Beginning of Life

Born in the city of Glen Falls in the state of New York . Hughes' father was a Methodist preacher from Wales, who became a Baptist after moving to the United States. In 1874, the family moved to New York . He graduated from high school at the age of 13. Enrolling in Madison College (now Colgate University ), where he joined the Delta Epsilon fraternity. After two years of study, he transferred to Brown University . He graduated in 1881 at the age of 19, being the youngest student on the course and the third in academic performance. He taught Greek, Latin, and Algebra for a year at in Delhi, NY, to earn money to enter Columbia Law School . He graduated in 1884 and in the same year was admitted to practice law in New York ^[1] .

In 1888, he married Antoinette Carter, the daughter of a senior partner in the law firm in which he worked. They had a son and two daughters, one of whom, Elizabeth Hughes Gossett, subsequently became chairman of the historical society of the Supreme Court.

In 1891, he left legal practice to become a professor at the School of Law at Columbia University , but in 1893 he returned to his company. In 1905, he was appointed lawyer to the New York State Legislative Commission, which investigated gas and electricity tariffs. The elimination of corruption he discovered led to lower gas prices in New York. After that, he was assigned to investigate the insurance industry in New York.

New York State Governor

He was nominated by the Republican Party candidate for governor of New York. He won the election of William Randolph Hurst and served as governor from 1907 to 1910 ^[2] . In 1908, presidential candidate William Taft invited him to run for US Vice President with him, but Hughes refused to remain governor. He managed to enact a law giving more power to the governor and to dismiss many corrupt officials. Hughes was considered a supporter of a strong executive.

Continuing a Political Career

In 1910, Hughes was appointed junior judge of the US Supreme Court. In 1916, he resigned to run for president of the United States ^[3] . He lost the election to Democrat Woodrow Wilson with a slight gap in votes.

A popular story tells that Hughes went to bed the night he counted the votes, thinking that he won the election. When a reporter called in the morning to find out Hughes’s reaction to Wilson’s return, someone (different versions ascribe this to Hughes’s son or one of his servants) replied: “The President is sleeping.” “When he wakes up, tell him that he is no longer the president,” a reporter quickly found.

After the election, he returned to legal practice at his old firm, Hughes, Rounds, Schurman & Dwight (currently en: Hughes Hubbard & Reed LLP ).

Secretary of State

In the years 1921-1925, he served as US Secretary of State during the Warren Harding administration. In this post, he convened the Washington Naval Conference and signed the Washington Maritime Agreement (1922).

US-Soviet Relations

Hughes was an active opponent of the recognition of the Soviet Union . Fundamentally refusing to participate in the work of the Genoese and Hague international conferences, he explained his position by the need to punish the Bolsheviks for their nationalization of foreign property, the refusal to pay the debts of the tsarist government and generally fulfill their international obligations ^[4] . In response to the proposal made in December 1923 by the People’s Commissar of Foreign Affairs G. V. Chicherin to start the Hughes negotiations, he stated that “at present there is no reason for negotiations” ^[5] . Hughes emphasized the subversive propaganda activities of the Soviet government, which aimed at provoking the overthrow of American political institutions. However, the Secretary of State believed that after 1920 there were no restrictions on the development of trade with Soviet Russia. In 1925 , he prepared a 100-page report arguing against the establishment of diplomatic relations with the Soviet regime ^[6] . The resignation of Hughes was met by the Soviet authorities with undisguised satisfaction. Karl Radek called Hughes “the embodiment of the concentrated hatred of capital towards the Soviet Union”, and Chicherin - “the most implacable of all the implacable enemies of the Soviet Union” ^[7] .

In the years 1928-1930, Hughes was a judge in the permanent arbitration court and in the permanent international court of the League of Nations in The Hague . In 1930, under Herbert Hoover , Hughes became President of the United States Supreme Court. He worked at this post until 1941, having considered many significant precedent cases. Opposed attempts by President Franklin Roosevelt to transform the Supreme Court so that he was more loyal to the president.

• Hughes, Charles Evans // Eloquence - Yaya. - M .: Soviet Encyclopedia, 1957. - P. 385. - ( Great Soviet Encyclopedia : [in 51 vols.] / Ch. Ed. B. A. Vvedensky ; 1949-1958, vol. 49).
• Hughes (Hughes) Charles Evans // Ivanyan E.A. Encyclopedia of Russian-American Relations. XVIII-XX centuries. - Moscow: International Relations, 2001. - 696 p. - ISBN 5-7133-1045-0 .

Archives

• Judge Manuscript Information: Charles Evans Hughes . List of archives with documents via Judges of the United States Courts . Retrieved April 15, 2005.
• Archives at the Supreme Court Historical Society

Judicial decisions as a judge of the Supreme Court

• Near v. Minnesota ex rel. Olson, 283 US 697 (1931) .
• Schechter Poultry Corp. v. United States, 295 US 495 (1935) .
• NLRB v. Jones & Laughlin Steel Corp., 301 US 1 (1937) .
• West Coast Hotel v. Parrish, 300 US 379 (1937)

Books

• Addresses of Charles Evans Hughes, 1906-1916; with an introduction

1. ↑ Ivanyan E.A. Encyclopedia of Russian-American Relations. XVIII-XX centuries .. - Moscow: International relations, 2001. - 696 p. - ISBN 5-7133-1045-0 .
2. ↑ Ivanyan E.A. Encyclopedia of Russian-American Relations. XVIII-XX centuries .. - Moscow: International relations, 2001. - 696 p. - ISBN 5-7133-1045-0 .
3. ↑ Ivanyan E.A. Encyclopedia of Russian-American Relations. XVIII-XX centuries .. - Moscow: International relations, 2001. - 696 p. - ISBN 5-7133-1045-0 .
4. ↑ Ivanyan E.A. Encyclopedia of Russian-American Relations. XVIII-XX centuries .. - Moscow: International relations, 2001. - 696 p. - ISBN 5-7133-1045-0 .
5. ↑ Ivanyan E.A. Encyclopedia of Russian-American Relations. XVIII-XX centuries .. - Moscow: International relations, 2001. - 696 p. - ISBN 5-7133-1045-0 .
6. ↑ Ivanyan E.A. Encyclopedia of Russian-American Relations. XVIII-XX centuries .. - Moscow: International relations, 2001. - 696 p. - ISBN 5-7133-1045-0 .
7. ↑ Ivanyan E.A. Encyclopedia of Russian-American Relations. XVIII-XX centuries .. - Moscow: International relations, 2001. - 696 p. - ISBN 5-7133-1045-0 .