Background
Simon was born on December 3, 1894 in Baltimore, Maryland, United States, the son of Jacob Sobeloff, an upholsterer, and Mary Kaplan, both Jewish immigrants from Russia.
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Simon was born on December 3, 1894 in Baltimore, Maryland, United States, the son of Jacob Sobeloff, an upholsterer, and Mary Kaplan, both Jewish immigrants from Russia.
He earned his law degree from the University of Maryland School of Law.
Sobeloff started working in a law office at age twelve and was admitted to the bar in 1914. Soon, he began to intersperse his practice with periods of public service, first as assistant city solicitor (1919 - 1923), and later as deputy city solicitor (1927 - 1930). In 1931 he was appointed United States Attorney for the District of Maryland by President Herbert Hoover.
Until his resignation in March 1934, he vigorously enforced the Prohibition laws, despite his dislike for them. During his tenure as a federal prosecutor, the Baltimore Trust Company, the largest bank in the South, crashed. A judge designated Sobeloff to conduct an investigation into the failure. While Sobeloff's 1936 report did not recommend prosecutions, it alleged that the bank directors were "personally liable for their negligent acts" and also for the "grossly" negligent conduct of the officers in that they failed to exercise proper supervision.
Sobeloff left his practice again to serve as Baltimore city solicitor from 1943 to 1947. In late 1952 Governor Theodore McKeldin, the latest in a line of progressive Republicans who were his patrons, appointed Sobeloff Chief Judge of the Maryland Court of Appeals. His tenure lasted only until early 1954, when he was named solicitor general of the United States, the government's chief advocate before the United States Supreme Court. At this time school segregation cases were the Court's main focus. In 1933 he had testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee in support of a federal antilynching bill.
Sobeloff presented the government's arguments on implementation of Brown v. Board of Education, urging that segregated school districts "effectuate the Court's decision as speedily as feasible. " This wording came directly from President Eisenhower, who wrote part of the government's brief. Sobeloff refused to sign the government's brief or to argue its case in the Supreme Court. He did this, he said, because a person "on trial, " especially one stigmatized by removal from an official position, must be granted his constitutional right to confront witnesses. Sobeloff took this unprecedented step "because I have to be able to live with myself. " As a result, he lost a promised seat on the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.
In 1955, President Eisenhower nominated Sobeloff to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. Sobeloff ultimately became chief judge in March 1958, serving in that capacity until December 1964, when he reached the retirement age of seventy. He remained an active judge until his death.
Sobeloff died in Baltimore.
Sobeloff had long been an active and outspoken opponent of racial inequality. He spoke out publicly about the need to maintain national security without abandoning the rights of the accused.
Simon used his wit to cut through pretense or sham, but the defenseless, the downtrodden, and minorities were never the butts of his irony.
He constantly championed the underdog, the burdened, and the oppressed. As an advocate he was engaging and candid, mixing firmness and tact. He was trim and vigorous, an immaculately groomed man who carried his learning lightly.
Quotes from others about the person
Thurgood Marshall, who headed the legal battle to desegregate public schools, noted that, Sobeloff was "one of only three white lawyers who were at all interested. He stuck with me from the beginning to the end. "
In 1918 he married Irene Ehrlich; they had two daughters.