Who was the Chief Justice behind the Supreme Court decision where Robert Cooper Grier served as a juror, which denied a "negro" could an American citizenship?
Robert Cooper Grier Robert Cooper Grier (March 5, 1794 – September 25, 1870), was an American jurist who served on the Supreme Court of the United States. A Jacksonian Democrat from Pennsylvania who served from 1846 to 1870, Grier weighed in on some of the most important cases of the 19th century. As a rare Northern member of the majority in the infamous 1857 Dred Scott decision, Grier concurred that African Americans were not—and were never meant to be—citizens of the United States and that the property rights of slaveholders were clearly protected in the Constitution. However, Grier wrote the majority opinion in the 1863 Prize Cases, upholding Abraham Lincoln’s presidential power to institute Union blockades of Confederate ports and giving the Union Army a strategic advantage in the American Civil War.
District of Columbia v. John R. Thompson Co. District of Columbia v. John R. Thompson Co. Inc., 346 U.S. 100 (1953), is a United States Supreme Court case which began on April 30, 1953 over the validity of the local Washington Acts of 1872 and 1873. The Acts prohibited segregation in public places within the District. With the court’s support, the legal ramifications of the 1872 and 1873 Acts could once again be enforced. The case transpired during growing racial tension in the nation’s capital. Throughout Washington, the black community had grown tired of unfair treatment regarding housing, businesses, and education. But, change came soon enough through the courts. On June 8, 1953, the Supreme Court unanimously ruled that the segregating policies practiced by Thompson’s Cafeteria were illegal, marking a huge victory for the national black community.