[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 108 (Thursday, June 29, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Pages S9335-S9336]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


            TRIBUTE TO FORMER CHIEF JUSTICE WARREN E. BURGER

  Mr. HEFLIN. Mr. President, America lost one of its great 
constitutional thinkers and jurists with the death of former Chief 
Justice Warren Earl Burger on Sunday, June 25. He served as Chief 
Justice for 17 years, longer than any other in this century. While he 
pointed the Court toward a more centrist course during his tenure, he 
nevertheless presided at a time when the Supreme Court was still seen 
as being at the forefront of social change in this country.
  As my colleagues know, I have an abiding interest in judicial 
administration, and I always looked to Justice Burger as a true leader 
in improving the administration of justice. My term as chief justice of 
the Alabama Supreme Court coincided with his as the U.S. Chief Justice. 
He was a tremendous help with our efforts to pass the judicial article 
and with the court reform movement in our State. He was keenly 
interested in judicial education not only for legal professionals, but 
for people from all walks of life, believing that knowledge of the 
system could help individuals improve their lives.
  Chief Justice Burger advocated the unified court system for States 
and founded the National Center for State Courts. He helped organize 
State and Federal judicial councils to ease the friction that tended to 
result between State and Federal courts at the time.
  He developed the Federal Judicial Center, an educational and research 
arm for the Federal court system. He persuaded Senior Judge Alfred 
Murrah--for whom the Federal building in Oklahoma City was named--to 
serve as head of the Judicial Center. Judge Murrah's leadership 
resulted in enormous strides for the center. Justice Burger was also a 
strong supporter of the National College of the Judiciary.
  We might say that Justice Burger's passion was more the overall 
administration of the law as opposed to the hard substance of the law. 
He believed that the process of the law was important to preserving its 
substance. He strove to make the courts run better. He pushed Congress 
to create more judgeships and to raise judges' salaries. To help 
eliminate congestion and reduce case backlog, he promoted the 
streamlining of court procedures. He has been called the guiding force 
in helping State courts improve their judicial administration.
  Born in St. Paul, MN, Warren Burger spent his early life on a farm. 
He worked his way through the University of Minnesota and the St. Paul 
College of Law, now the Mitchell College of Law. After obtaining a law 
degree in 1931, he practiced law in Minnesota for over 20 years.
  In 1953, President Eisenhower appointed him as an assistant U.S. 
Attorney General for the Justice Department's Civil Division. Three 
years later, he was placed on the Court of Appeals for the
 District of Columbia Circuit. In 1969, President Nixon elevated him to 
the High Court to succeed retiring Chief Justice Earl Warren. The 
Senate overwhelmingly approved Chief Justice Burger on June 9, 1969, 
after a judiciary committee hearing that reportedly lasted but an hour 
and 40 minutes, something that is hard to imagine happening today.

  As Chief Justice, Warren Burger was tough on criminal defendants, but 
he was neither a hard-line conservative nor an activist willing to 
reverse rulings of the Warren Court. After he retired in 1986, he spoke 
regularly at judicial conventions. He wrote a recent book, ``It Is So 
Ordered: A Constitution Unfolds,'' in which he narrated in detail 14 
major Supreme Court cases.
  From 1987 until 1991, the former Chief Justice headed the commission 
on the bicentennial of the U.S. Constitution, a job he pursued with 
great passion, energy, and intensity. While he believed the 
Constitution to be a living document, allowing for the evolution of 
national governmental institutions, he also believed in following the 
letter of 

[[Page S 9336]]
the law in reaching decisions. He once told an interviewer, ``If you 
follow your conscience instead of the Constitution, you've got 1,000 
constitutions, not one. A judge must decide cases quite often in a way 
that he doesn't like to decide them at all.''
  Of course, Chief Justice Burger wasn't ignoring the role of one's 
conscience in interpreting the Constitution, for that is an important 
part of deciding cases. To him, the role of a jurist's conscience was 
to ensure that he followed the law as written, regardless of personal 
or political beliefs.
  Warren Burger will stand in history as one of our great Supreme Court 
Chief Justices. He served during a time of swift social change in our 
Nation, and will long be remembered for the balance, moderation, and 
consistent thoughtfulness he brought to the Court and to the 
administration of justice in general.


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