Warren, Charles (b. Boston, Mass., 9 Mar. 1868; d. Washington, D.C., 16 Aug. 1954), lawyer, authority on American constitutional law and history. Warren graduated from Harvard Law School and served as assistant attorney general in the Department of Justice during World War I. In that office, he helped draft the Espionage Act of 1917 and the Trading With the Enemy Act of 1917 (see
Espionage Acts). He retained an interest in international law throughout his career.
Warren's most lasting contribution was as a historian. His three‐volume book,
The Supreme Court in the History of the United States (1922), won the Pulitzer Prize for History in 1923 and established him as a preeminent authority on the Court. A strong nationalist and conservative, Warren rejected Charles
Beard's economic interpretation of the formation of the Constitution as well as Beard's critical analysis of the Supreme Court. He agreed with Beard, however, that
judicial review was so well known and normal a function of courts in 1787 that the framers took it for granted. In
Congress, the Constitution, and the Supreme Court (1925), Warren urged, however, that Congress free itself from the constitutional straitjacket the justices had imposed on it. Justice Louis
Brandeis, a close friend of Warren's, cited an article Warren published in 1923 on the
Judiciary Act of 1789 as authority for the decision in
Erie Railroad v. Tompkins (1938), which overruled almost a century of decisions based on
Swift v. Tyson (1842).
See also
History, Court Uses of.
Kermit L. Hall
