Early Life and Career
Chotiner was born on October 4, 1909, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, the son of Albert Hyman Chotiner and Sarah Chotiner. The family moved to Columbus, Ohio, soon after Murray's birth, and relocated to California in 1920. Albert Chotiner, a cigar maker by trade, managed a chain of movie theaters in California, and soon abandoned his wife and children.
After attending the University of California, Los Angeles, Chotiner enrolled at the Southwestern School of Law, graduating at age 20, the youngest graduate in the school's history. However, he had to wait until he was 21 to be eligible to take the bar exam. He initially practiced law with his older brother, Jack—they had a general practice in which they defended a number of bookmakers—but eventually the Chotiners dissolved the partnership, and Murray Chotiner opened a law practice on his own in Los Angeles. He later described many of his clients as "unsavory, to say the least". In the early 1940s, he branched out into public relations.
Chotiner initially registered to vote as a Democrat, but soon switched parties, joining the Republicans. He involved himself in Republican politics, working on Herbert Hoover's unsuccessful presidential re-election campaign in 1932. In 1938, the young attorney ran against longtime Republican incumbent Charles W. Lyon for the California State Assembly. Lyon cross-filed and secured his re-election by winning both primaries, defeating Chotiner in the Republican poll, and narrowly beating Robert A. Heinlein (who subsequently turned to writing science fiction) in the Democratic contest.
When Earl Warren successfully ran for Governor of California in 1942, Chotiner served as his field director. However, he alienated Warren when, hoping for a favor in light of his 1942 support, he asked the newly inaugurated governor to decline to approve the extradition of one of his clients to another state. Warren had Chotiner thrown out of his office, and the future chief justice refused to let him have anything to do with his re-election campaign in 1946. According to Nixon biographer Earl Mazo, Chotiner stated that while people remembered him for "making" Richard Nixon, "the real man I created was Earl Warren".
Chotiner served as counsel to state committees investigating violence in motion picture strikes and conditions in children's boarding homes and in homes for the elderly. In 1944, Chotiner was elected president of the conservative California Republican Assembly, a grassroots organization of party activists; he had previously served as president of the Los Angeles Republican Assembly. In addition to his political involvement, he was active in the Los Angeles Jewish Community Relations Committee.
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