These diaries present fragments from a remarkable life: the immigrant boy who became a counselor to presidents and a shaping force in the evolution of our Constitution into a twentieth-century instrument. As Henry L. Stimson noted, Felix Frankfurter had a talent “for keeping in touch with the center of things.” The life of his times at the level of decision and policy, the human tensions elicited by the possession of power pulse through the pages of his diaries. There are fascinating glimpses, from the inside, of the Taft administration, of Roosevelt’s Washington during World War II, and of the early years of the Truman presidency.
“Joe Lash’s introductory essay is beautifully written. I regard it as the best thing anyone has thus far done on Felix Frankfurter. For the legal profession it should be more interesting than a full biography.” —Herbert Wechsler, Harlan Fiske Stone Professor of Constitutional Law, Columbia Law School
