National Affairs: EARL WARREN, THE 14th CHIEF JUSTICE

Ancestry: His grandfather, Halvar Varran, a Norwegian carpenter, came to the U.S. in 1865 and changed his name to Harry Warren. Halvar’s Norwegian-born son, Methias, and Swedish-born Chrystal Hernlund, who met and married in California in the 1880s, were Earl Warren’s parents. Methias became master car repairman for a division of the Southern Pacific Railroad, turned into a mortgage-foreclosing recluse in his later years, was bludgeoned to death in his lonely Bakersfield, Calif, home in 1938. The motive was believed to be robbery; the crime has never been solved.

Early Years: Earl Warren was born March 19, 1891, in a five-room frame house on Los Angeles’ dingy Turner Street, grew up in the “railroad section” of Bakersfield. He earned his spending money as a newsboy, a railroad callboy, a freight hustler, a farm hand and a cub reporter on the Bakersfield Californian. At Bakersfield’s Kern County High School, he played clarinet in the school band and outfield on the baseball team. At the University of California, he was full of fun but not of diligence. He was a popular member of the Gun Club, which headquartered at Pop Kessler’s saloon, and he flunked second-year Greek. He graduated from the university’s law school in 1914.

Career: After graduation, he spent three years as a junior lawyer in San Francisco and Oakland firms, once admitted that court appearances terrified him. Said he: “I’d get on a streetcar, and I’d be so tense I would hope the car would be wrecked on the way to the courthouse.” He went into the Army as a private in 1917, came out as a first lieutenant in 1919, took a job as clerk of the California state assembly’s judiciary committee and never returned to private practice; he has been a lawyer in government ever since. He was deputy city attorney for Oakland in 1919-20, deputy district attorney for Alameda County (Oakland, Berkeley, Alameda) in 1920-25, district attorney in 1925-39. A relentless prosecutor, he convicted an average of 15 murderers a year, jailed the county sheriff for gambling graft, convicted Alameda’s mayor for bribery and theft of public funds. None of his convictions was ever reversed on appeal, but none of them gave him particular pleasure. Said he: “I never heard a jury bring in a verdict of guilty but that I felt sick at the pit of my stomach.”

Elected attorney general of California in 1938, he won the Republican nomination for governor in 1942 and turned bumbling Democrat Culbert Olson out of office. He was re-elected on both the Republican and Democratic tickets in 1946, defeated Democratic Nominee James Roosevelt by more than a million votes in 1950. The only man ever elected to three terms as governor of California, he was staunchly independent, did not work with the regular Republican organization, won support of every element and class, appointed both Republicans and Democrats to state jobs. In his long political career, he lost only one election—as Republican candidate for Vice President in 1948. As governor, he cut the state sales tax, raised gasoline taxes to finance road building, widened unemployment insurance coverage, reformed the prison system, three times tried unsuccessfully to establish a compulsory state health insurance program. During his ten years and nine months as chief executive, the population of California nearly doubled, and he faced the great problems brought by great growth. No other governor in U.S. history has built so many highways, schools and hospitals. None of the major bills he signed has ever been declared unconstitutional; his judgeship appointments greatly improved the caliber of the California bench.

Family: In 1925, after four years of courtship, District Attorney Warren married Mrs. Nina Palmquist Meyers, a young widow with a six-year-old son, James. In addition to James, who was adopted and given the Warren name, they have two sons, Earl Jr., 23, and Robert, 18, and three photogenic daughters, Virginia, 25, Dorothy, 22, and Nina Elizabeth (“Honey Bear”), 19. Woeful California Democrats used to say: “You can beat Earl Warren, but how can you beat that family?”

Personal Characteristics: A big (6 ft. 1 in., 207 Ibs.), hearty, smiling, blue-eyed Westerner with thinning, blond-white hair, he has an easy, friendly manner, a booming laugh, a bone-crushing handshake. A working Mason (33rd degree, past Grand Master of California), he often reads the Bible before going to bed at night or the first thing in the morning. His staff knows him as a firm and exacting boss, but a fair and considerate one. He is neat, orderly, practical, unimaginative, calm, judicious and stubborn. Said an old friend and associate: “He’ll be careful as hell before he makes up his mind, but once he’s decided…nothing in the world will change him.” Although he has never expounded a philosophy of the law, his political philosophy is clear: middle of the road. While some conservative Republicans consider him too “liberal,” he places himself midway between extremes, has said: “I am convinced the American people will not tolerate Socialist government, but they are definitely committed to social progress.”