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Both his parents, William J. Brennan, Sr., and Agnes McDermott, emigrated from County Roscommon to the United States because, as Justice Brennan recalled, they "saw a chance for a better life in America."
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A high school classmate recalled, "Bill took home so many academic prizes from school, none were left for the rest of us."21 In 1928, Brennan graduated from the University of Pennsylvania's undergraduate Wharton School of Finance and Commerce, with honors in economics.Just before he graduated, he married Marjorie Leonard, whom he had met during his sophomore year at Wharton at the Cotillion of the East Orange Women's Club, and to whom he was deeply devoted for fifty-four years, until her death in 1982.Fore-shadowing the complex man he was to become, Brennan rebelled against parental authority by secretly eloping with Marjorie, but he made certain that they were very properly married in Baltimore Cathedral.
Brennan went off to the Harvard Law School, while Marjorie stayed in Newark working to help pay his tuition.
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At Harvard, Bill Brennan was a workaholic.Quiet, unassuming, unknown to classmates who later rose to great prominence in academe, Brennan's academic performance earned him acceptance by Harvard's Legal Aid Society, where he represented the poor in a variety of civil cases, an experience that he recalled fondly over the years.It was at the Legal Aid Society that he experienced firsthand the power of the law to affect the lives of the weak.
During Brennan's second year of law school, in 1930, his father died suddenly of pneumonia.Brennan contemplated leaving law school, but Harvard awarded him a scholarship to allow him to finish his studies.He waited tables at a fraternity house and performed odd jobs to make ends meet.It was the height of the Great Depression when Brennan graduated from law school in 1931.His father's sudden death had left the family in financial straits.It fell to the Justice to help support his mother, his wife, and six siblings.Brennan contemplated hanging out a shingle as a union lawyer, but his economic responsibilities made that course impossible.Instead, he accepted an offer from Pitney, Hardin & Skinner, the most prestigious law firm in Newark, where he had clerked for a summer.Brennan was the first Catholic lawyer hired by the firm.He was assigned to practice labor law, cast in what must have initially seemed the incongruous role of representing management.As he had in law school, Brennan worked long hours, often into the early hours of the morning.He distinguished himself as a talented labor negotiator, and became the firm's first Catholic partner in 1937.
In July, 1942, at the advanced age of 36, Brennan volunteered for the army.
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During 1943- 1944, Brennan was assigned to Los Angeles, where he over-saw the massive influx of women into civilian defense jobs, organizing a complex support structure of day care, housing, health, and transportation.Despite significant housing shortages in the Los Angeles area, Col. Brennan refused to take the easy route of commandeering the homes of interned Japanese-Americans.In 1945, it was Brennan's responsibility to oversee the furlough of soldiers in Europe after the defeat of Hitler.Despite pressure from industry and from Congress, Brennan refused to favor workers in certain occupations over others.In one congressional hearing, Brennan defended his decision, explaining that "to the extent you make an exception for a single soldier there is somebody eligible for discharge whose discharge is delayed."22 Brennan left the Army in 1945 at the rank of full colonel after being awarded the Legion of Merit.
The Justice returned to his old law firm, continuing to build his labor law practice at a time when labor strife was mounting.To capitalize on Brennan's growing reputation as a consummate labor lawyer, the firm added his name to the firm's masthead, which became, Pitney, Hardin, Ward & Brennan.Throughout his rapid rise to prominence as a leader of the private bar, Brennan developed a reputation as impeccably fair and gracious.He once asked a judge to postpone a hearing upon learning that his opponent's father had died."We'll have the hearing another day," Brennan told his flabbergasted opponent.23 Morton Stavis recalled litigating one of his first cases against Brennan: "I . . . was guilty of a number of procedural oversights."We'll have the hearing another day," Brennan told his flabbergasted opponent.23 Morton Stavis recalled litigating one of his first cases against Brennan: "I . . . was guilty of a number of procedural oversights.
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Brennan carried this fair-mindedness into the public arena.Though his livelihood depended upon his management-side labor work, he spoke out in support of the right to strike and in favor of legislation to prohibit employer intimidation of union members.But he also urged labor to "accep[t] its responsibilities not to invade or trample upon the rights of other groups" and vigorously condemned racial discrimination by unions.25
With his prestige within the bar growing, in 1946, Brennan championed the cause of court reform, a charge led by Arthur T. Vanderbilt, who was at the time a prominent Newark lawyer and the Dean of New York University School of Law.
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Brennan fought hard to develop, and pass into law, a variety of reforms, including adaptation of federal procedural rules to the New Jersey courts, the development of an office to track court statistics, increased accountability of trial judges, and mandatory pretrial discovery and settlement conferences.The procedural reforms brought startling results, including a cleanup of the massive backlog of cases, an increase in settlements, and most importantly to Brennan, a system "assuring that right and justice shall have the most favorable opportunity of prevailing in cases that are tried."26
When Vanderbilt was appointed Chief Justice of the New Jersey Supreme Court, he set his mind to convincing Brennan to accept an appointment as a trial judge.After a year of cajoling, Brennan relented.In January 1949, Republican Governor Alfred E. Driscoll appointed Brennan, then 43, to the trial court.
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Shortly after Brennan took the bench, he was appointed assignment judge for Hudson County.Within a year and a half, he was elevated to the Appellate Division of the Superior Court, the state's intermediate court.Two years later, in March 1952, Governor Driscoll appointed Brennan to the New Jersey Supreme Court.
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In a 1954 St. Patrick's Day speech in Boston, Brennan attacked McCarthy, warning that " we cannot and must not doubt our strength to conserve, without sacrifice of any, all of the guarantees of justice and fair play and simple human dignity which have made our land what it is."
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29 In a later speech, Brennan struck a theme that he would repeat many times.He warned that if we violate individual rights out of fear, we come "perilously close to destroying liberty in liberty's name."30 In later years, Brennan was proud that the only Senate vote against his confirmation was cast by Senator McCarthy.
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In one of the extraordinary strokes of fortune that shape our lives, Brennan attended a 1955 conference on court reform hosted by Attorney General Herbert Brownell.
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