Gabriel Duvall - Significance

Significance

In 1939, Ernest Sutherland Bates, the author of The Story of the Supreme Court called Duvall "probably the most insignificant of all Supreme Court Judges." The characterization was rejected by Irving Dilliard's biographical entry in The Justices of the United States Supreme Court 1789–1969 (1969). Dillard did not propose an alternative candidate.

Prof. David P. Currie of the University of Chicago Law School joined the issue in 1983 in the 50th anniversary issue of the University of Chicago Law Review. He argued that "impartial examination of Duvall's performance reveals to even the uninitiated observer that he achieved an enviable standard of insignificance against which all other Justices must be measured." Currie notes that: "On the quantitative scale of PPY, therefore, modified by common sense and a spirit of fair play, Duvall seems to me far and away the most insignificant of his colleagues during the time of Chief Justice Marshall." Prof. Currie proposed several "Indicators of Insignificance (IOI)" that he used to compare Duvall to other candidates, such as: Thomas Johnson, Robert Trimble, John Rutledge, Bushrod Washington, Henry Brockholst Livingston, Thomas Todd, John McKinley, Nathan Clifford, Alfred Moore, Lucius Quintus Cincinnatus Lamar II and Joseph Rucker Lamar, William Henry Moody, Horace Harmon Lurton, George Shiras, Jr., William R. Day, John Hessin Clarke, and William Cushing.

Then-Prof., now-Judge Frank H. Easterbrook replied to Currie's article. He wrote: "I also became worried that Currie had slighted—even overlooked!—the legitimate claims of others to the honors he bestowed on Gabriel Duval. Could it be that Currie's efforts were simply pseudo-science employed in the pursuit of some predetermined plan to award Duval the coveted prize without serious consideration of candidates so shrouded in obscurity that they escaped proper attention even in a contest of insignificance?" Easterbrook concludes: " Of the finalists, Todd and Duval, one disqualified himself by writing some significant opinions. True, Duval tried to atone for this by remaining mute (he was deaf by then as well) after his opinion in LeGrand, but it was too late. His Significant Acts had disqualified him. The winner by default—in what other way can one win this kind of contest?—is Thomas Todd. Long may he reign."