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Charles Evans Hughes (April 11, 1862 – August 27, 1948) was Governor of New York, United States Secretary of State, Associate Justice and Chief Justice of the United States. Hughes was a precocious youngster; at age 6 he found public school boring and confining, and submitted to his parents a plan of study for homeschooling, which his parents accepted. Shortly before his 12th birthday his family moved from Glens Falls, New York to New York City, where his parents enrolled him in public school. He graduated from high school at age 13, second in his class. His father was a Methodist minister from Wales converting to the Baptist persuasion following his arrival in the United States and his son Charles followed the Baptist religion. He went to Madison College (now Colgate University) for two years (where he became a member of Delta Upsilon fraternity), then transferred to Brown University, where he continued as a member of Delta Upsilon and graduated in 1881 at age 19, youngest in his class, receiving third-highest honors. For the next year he worked at Delaware Academy in Delhi, New York where he taught Greek, Latin, and algebra in order to earn money for law school. He entered Columbia University law school in 1882, and graduated in 1884 with highest honors. In 1885 he met Antoinette Carter, daughter of a senior partner of the law firm where he worked, and married her in 1888. They had one son and two daughters, one of whom was Elizabeth Hughes Gossett, who later served as president of the Supreme Court Historical Society. In 1891 he left the practice of law to become a professor at Cornell University Law School, but in 1893 he returned to his old law firm. In 1905 he was appointed counsel to a New York state legislative committee investigating utility rates. His uncovering of corruption led to lower gas rates in New York City. As a result he was appointed to investigate the insurance industry in New York. He served as Governor of New York from 1907–1910, defeating William Randolph Hearst in the 1906 election to gain the position, and being the only Republican statewide candidate to win office. In 1908 he was offered the vice-presidential nomination by William Howard Taft, but declined it to run again for Governor. In 1909 he led an effort to incorporate Delta Upsilon fraternity. It was the first fraternity to incorporate and he served as its first international president. Today several other fraternities have followed Hughes' lead by incorporating. Subsequently he was appointed an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court. He began his service in October 1910. He wrote for the Court in Bailey v. Alabama , which held that involuntary servitude encompassed more that just slavery, and Interstate Commerce Comm. v. Atchison T & SF R Co. , holding that the ICC could regulate intrastate rates if they were significantly intertwined with interstate commerce. On June 16,1916, he resigned to be Republican candidate for election as President of the United States. Defeated by Woodrow Wilson in a close election (23 electoral votes and 594,188 popular votes), he returned to private law practice. In 1920 Hughes favored ratification of the treaty creating the League of Nations. His next position in the United States government was as Secretary of State under Warren G. Harding and Calvin Coolidge from 1921–1925. As Secretary of State he convened the Washington Conference in 1921, regulating naval armament among the Great Powers. From 1926 to 1930, he served as a member of the Permanent Court of Arbitration and as a judge of the Permanent Court of International Justice in The Hague, The Netherlands from 1928 to 1930. He was additionally a delegate to the Pan American Conference on Arbitration and Conciliation from 1928 to 1930. Herbert Hoover, who had appointed Hughes' son as Solicitor General in 1929, appointed Hughes Chief Justice of the United States in 1930, in which capacity he served until 1941. As Chief Justice, he led the fight against Franklin D. Roosevelt's attempt to pack the Supreme Court. Hughes was considered a moderate conservative on the Court. He wrote the opinion for the Court in Near v. Minnesota , which held prior restraints against the press are unconstitutional. He was often aligned with Justices Louis Brandeis, Harlan Fiske Stone, and Benjamin Cardozo in finding President Roosevelt's New Deal measures to be Constitutional. Although he wrote the opinion invalidating the National Recovery Administration in Schechter Poultry Corp. v. United States , he wrote the opinions for the Court in NLRB v. Jones & Laughlin Steel Corp. , NLRB v. Friedman-Harry Marks Clothing Co., , and West Coast Hotel v. Parrish which looked favorably on New Deal Measures. On August 27, 1948, he died in Osterville, Massachusetts. Charles Evans Hughes Middle School (of Long Beach, CA) was named in his honor, as was the Hughes Range in Antarctica.
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