Editing Pierce Butler (judge) (section)

===Court service===
[[Image:Pierce Butler of the United States Supreme Court.jpg|Portrait of Justice Butler|thumb|left]]

As an associate justice, Butler vigorously opposed regulation of business and the implementation of welfare programs by the federal government (as unconstitutional). During the [[Great Depression]], he ruled against the constitutionality of many "[[New Deal]]" laws – the [[Agricultural Adjustment Administration]] and the [[National Recovery Administration]] – which had been supported by his fellow Democrat [[Franklin D. Roosevelt]].<ref name="Britannica"/> This earned him a place among the so-called "[[Four Horsemen (Supreme Court)|Four Horsemen]]," which also included [[James Clark McReynolds]], [[George Sutherland]], and [[Willis Van Devanter]].<ref name="Britannica"/><ref name="Ariens">{{cite web |url=http://www.michaelariens.com/ConLaw/justices/butler.htm |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20021016010949/http://www.michaelariens.com/ConLaw/justices/butler.htm |url-status=dead |archive-date=October 16, 2002 |first1=Michael |last1=Ariens |author-link=Michael Ariens |title=Pierce Butler |publisher=Michael Ariens |access-date=July 24, 2012 }}</ref> During his sixteen years on the bench, Justice Butler authored 327 majority opinions as well as 50 minority opinions.

He wrote the majority opinion (6–3) in ''[[United States v. Schwimmer]],'' in which the [[Hungary|Hungarian]] immigrant's application for citizenship was denied because of her candid refusal to take an oath to "take up arms" for her adopted country.

In ''[[Palko v. Connecticut]]'', Butler was the lone dissenter; the rest of the justices believed that a [[Connecticut|state]] was not restrained from [[double jeopardy|trying a man a second time for the same crime]].  Butler believed this violated the [[Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution]].{{citation needed|date=November 2013}}

He sided with the majority in ''[[Pierce v. Society of Sisters]]'', holding unconstitutional an Oregon state law that prohibited parents from sending their children to private or religious schools.<ref name="Ariens"/>
[[File:Pierce Butler, half-length portrait, standing with his son, Kevin, facing left) - photo by Bain News Service, New York LCCN92505101.tif|left|thumb|Pierce Butler with his son, Kevin in 1927]]
In the 1927 decision for ''[[Buck v. Bell]],'' Butler was the only Justice who dissented from the 8–1 ruling<ref>[[Stephen Jay Gould]], "Does the Stonless Plum Instruct the Thinking Reed," in ''Dinosaur in a Haystack'' (1995) p. 287.</ref> and Justice [[Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.]]'s opinion holding that the forced sterilization of an allegedly "feeble-minded" woman in [[Virginia]] was constitutional.<ref name="Thompson">{{cite journal |url=http://www.stjohns.edu/media/3/3528210f8dba49ee9fd325e9db9e987f.pdf |journal=[[Catholic Lawyer]] |first1=Phillip |last1=Thompson |title=Silent Protest: A Catholic Justice Dissents in Buck v. Bell |pages=125–148 |volume=43 |number=1 |date=February 20, 2005 |access-date=July 24, 2012 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130113015710/http://www.stjohns.edu/media/3/3528210f8dba49ee9fd325e9db9e987f.pdf |archive-date=January 13, 2013 }}</ref>  Holmes believed that Butler's religion influenced his thinking in ''Buck'', remarking that "Butler knows this is good law, I wonder whether he will have the courage to vote with us in spite of his religion."<ref>{{cite book |first1=William E. |last1=Leuchtenburg |author-link=William Leuchtenburg |chapter=Mr. Justice Holmes and Three Generations of Imbeciles |title=The Supreme Court Reborn: The Constitutional Revolution in the Age of Roosevelt |chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/supremecourtrebo0000leuc |chapter-url-access=registration |location=New York |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |year=1995 |page=[https://archive.org/details/supremecourtrebo0000leuc/page/15 15] |isbn=978-0195086133}}</ref> Although Butler dissented in both ''Buck'' and ''Palko'', he did not write a dissenting opinion in either case;<ref name="fernandez">{{cite journal |url=http://www.secure.pdcnet.org/peacejustice/content/peacejustice_2002_0012_0001_0115_0134?file_type=pdf |archive-url=https://archive.today/20130415144144/http://www.secure.pdcnet.org/peacejustice/content/peacejustice_2002_0012_0001_0115_0134?file_type=pdf |url-status=dead |archive-date=2013-04-15 |first1=Ashley K. |last1=Fernandes |title=The Power of Dissent: Pierce Butler and Buck v. Bell |journal=[[Journal for Peace and Justice Studies]] |volume=12 |number=1 |year=2002 |pages=115–134 |doi = 10.5840/peacejustice200212113|url-access=subscription }}</ref> the practice of a Justice's noting a dissent without opinion was much more common then than it would be in the later 20th and early 21st centuries.

Another consequential dissent was from the opinion expressed in ''[[Olmstead v. United States]]'', which upheld federal [[wiretapping]].<ref name="Ariens"/> He took an expansive view of [[Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution|4th Amendment]] protections.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.oyez.org/justices/pierce_butler/ |title=Pierce Butler |publisher=[[Oyez.org]] |access-date=July 24, 2012 |archive-date=August 24, 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120824085013/http://www.oyez.org/justices/pierce_butler |url-status=live }}</ref>