The Warren Court refers to the Supreme Court of the United States between 1953 and 1969, when Earl Warren served as Chief Justice. Warren led a liberal majority that used judicial power in dramatic fashion, to the consternation of conservative opponents. The Warren Court expanded civil rights, civil liberties, judicial power, and the federal power in dramatic ways.
The court was both applauded and criticized for bringing an end to racial segregation in the United States, incorporating the Bill of Rights (i.e. applying it to states), and ending officially sanctioned voluntary prayer in public schools. The period is recognized as a high point in judicial power that has receded ever since, but with a substantial continuing impact.
Prominent members of the Court during the Warren era besides the Chief Justice included Justices William J. Brennan, Jr., William O. Douglas, Hugo Black, Felix Frankfurter, and John Marshall Harlan II.
Read more about Warren Court: Warren's Leadership, Vision, Historically Significant Decisions, Warren's Role, Associate Justices of The Warren Court
Famous quotes containing the words warren and/or court:
“The doctor will take you now. He is burly and clean;
Listening, like lover or worshiper, bends at your heart.”
—Robert Penn Warren (1905–1989)
“Follow a shaddow, it still flies you;
Seeme to flye it, it will pursue:
So court a mistris, shee denyes you;
Let her alone, shee will court you.
Say, are not women truely, then,
Stil’d but the shaddowes of us men?
At morne, and even, shades are longest;
At noone, they are or short, or none:
So men at weakest, they are strongest,
But grant us perfect, they’re not knowne.
Say, are not women truely, then,
Stil’d but the shaddowes of us men?”
—Ben Jonson (1572–1637)