Today, November 13, is Louis Brandeis' birthday [View All]

[hfojvt]

So I was informed when I looked up the Constitution online

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Brandeis

"In his widely cited dissenting opinion in Olmstead v. United States (1928), Brandeis argued, as he had in an influential law-review article prior to being nominated to the Court, that the Constitution protected a "right of privacy," calling it "the most comprehensive of rights and the right most valued by civilized men." Brandeis's position in Olmstead became the law of the land in Katz v. United States, of 1967, which overturned Olmstead."

Wiki says that his religion was Judaism, but I have this quote from his mother

"I do not believe that sins can be expiated by going to divine service and observing this or that formula, I believe that only goodness and truth and conduct that is humane and self-sacrificing towards those who need us can bring God nearer to us, and that our errors can only be atoned for by acting in a more kindly spirit. Love, virtue, and truth are the foundations upon which the education of the child must be based. They endure forever ...And this is my justification for bringing up my children without any definite religious belief: I wanted to give them something that neither could be argued away nor would have to be given up as untenable, namely, a pure spirit and the highest ideals as to morals and love. God has blessed my endeavors."

Also, I happened to discover that one of his children married one of Walter Rauschenbusch's children. Walter was a baptist minister and a Professor at Rochester Theological seminary, and also one of the leading thinkers in the Social Gospel movement, which was sort of a mix of socialism and Christianity.

Anyway, one of their children, who could claim both Louis Brandeis and Walter Rauschenbusch as grandparents went to the same church as one of my grandfather's cousins. All she said about them, though, was "very strange people". Not sure why I bring this up on Mr. Brandeis' birthday, except that it's my six degrees of separation with Louis Brandeis and Walter Rauschenbusch. Both historical Americans that I salute :toast: