Wiley B. Rutledge, 1943-1949

WILEY B. RUTLEDGE was born in Cloverport, Kentucky, on July 20, 1894. During his early years, his family moved successively to Texas, Louisiana, and Asheville, North Carolina. Rutledge attended Maryville College in Tennessee for two years and transferred to the University of Wisconsin, from which he was graduated in 1914. He then taught high school and attended Indiana University Law School part time. Rutledge received his law degree from the University of Colorado in 1922. Rutledge practiced law for two years with a firm in Boulder, Colorado, before deciding on an academic career. For the next fifteen years, he was a professor of law and dean at a succession of law schools. In 1935, he became Dean of the University of Iowa College of Law. In 1939, President Franklin D. Roosevelt appointed Rutledge to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. Four years later, on January 11, 1943, President Roosevelt nominated Rutledge to the Supreme Court of the United States. The Senate confirmed the appointment on February 8, 1943. Rutledge served on the Supreme Court for six years. He died on September 10, 1949, at the age of fifty-five.