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Wiley Rutledge (1894–1949) served as an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court from 1943 to 1949. The ninth and final justice appointed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, he is known for his impassioned defenses of civil liberties. He practiced law in Colorado before becoming a law school professor and dean. Rutledge supported New Deal policies and other proposals by Roosevelt, who appointed him to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals in 1939 and to the Supreme Court in 1943. Rutledge favored broad interpretations of the First Amendment, and he argued that the Bill of Rights applied in its totality to the states. In other cases, Rutledge fervently supported broad due process rights in criminal cases, and he opposed discrimination against women and racial minorities. However, he joined the majority in two cases – Hirabayashi v. United States (1943) and Korematsu v. United States (1944) – that upheld the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II. (Full article...)

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In the news

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On this day

March 18: Feast day of Saint Cyril of Jerusalem (Christianity)

Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum

1892 – Canadian governor general Lord Stanley of Preston pledged to donate an award to Canada's top-ranked amateur ice hockey club, now known as the Stanley Cup, the oldest professional sports trophy in North America.
1921 – Russian Civil War: Bolshevik forces suppressed a rebellion of sailors and civilians in Kronstadt.
1965 – Cosmonaut Alexei Leonov ventured outside the Soviet spacecraft Voskhod 2, becoming the first person to walk in space.
1985 – The first episode of the soap opera Neighbours was broadcast on the Seven Network, later becoming the longest-running drama in Australian television history.
1990 – Unidentified thieves stole thirteen works of art collectively valued at $500 million from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum (pictured) in Boston, Massachusetts.

Matthew III Csák (d. 1321)
Charlotte Elliott (b. 1789)
F. W. de Klerk (b. 1936)

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Today's featured picture

The saung, also known as the saung-gauk or the Burmese harp, is an arched harp used in traditional Burmese music. It is regarded as the national musical instrument of Myanmar. It was possibly introduced as early as 500 AD from southeastern India, based on archaeological evidence of Burmese temple reliefs that depict a long-necked harp similar to depictions found in Bengal. The earliest evidence of the saung itself is at the Bawbawgyi Pagoda near present-day Prome. At that site, there is a mid-600s sculptured relief depicting the arched harp with about five strings, appearing with musicians and a dancer. It has survived continuously since that time, and has been mentioned in many texts, pictorial representations and Bagan temples. Burmese chronicles describe harps in ceremonial ensembles at medieval Pagan, and female harpists who performed for royals. This 19th-century saung is in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.

Photograph credit: Metropolitan Museum of Art

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