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William Howard Taft

2007 Schools Wikipedia Selection. Related subjects: Political People

   ROBO-Taft
   William Howard Taft
     __________________________________________________________________

   27th President of the United States
   In office
   March 4, 1909 –  March 4, 1913
   Vice President(s)   James S. Sherman, (1909-1912)
   None (1912-1913)
   Preceded by Theodore Roosevelt
   Succeeded by Woodrow Wilson
     __________________________________________________________________

   10th Chief Justice of the United States
   In office
   July 11, 1921 –  February 3, 1930
   Preceded by Edward Douglass White
   Succeeded by Charles Evans Hughes
     __________________________________________________________________

   Born September 15, 1857
   Cincinnati, Ohio
   Died March 8, 1930
   Washington, D.C.
   Political party Republican
   Spouse Helen Herron Taft
   Religion Unitarian
   Signature

   William Howard Taft ( September 15, 1857 – March 8, 1930) was an
   American politician, the 27th President of the United States, the 10th
   Chief Justice of the United States, a leader of the progressive
   conservative wing of the Republican Party in the early twentieth
   century, a chaired professor at Yale Law School, a pioneer in
   international arbitration, and a staunch advocate of world peace that
   verged on pacifism (although the pacifists of his time did not call him
   one of their own).

   Taft served as Solicitor General of the United States, a federal judge,
   Governor-General of the Philippines, and Secretary of War before being
   nominated for President in the 1908 Republican National Convention with
   the backing of his predecessor and close friend Theodore Roosevelt.

   His presidency was characterized by trust-busting, strengthening the
   Interstate Commerce Commission, expanding the civil service,
   establishing a better postal system, and promoting world peace.
   Roosevelt broke with Taft in 1911, charging Taft was too reactionary.
   Taft and the conservatives were alarmed at Roosevelt's attacks on the
   judiciary, and took control of the party machinery. Taft defeated
   Roosevelt for the Republican nomination in a bruising battle in 1912
   that forced Roosevelt out of the GOP and left Taft people in charge for
   decades. In 1921, he became Chief Justice. He is the only President to
   have been the Solicitor General or to have served on the Supreme Court
   of the United States.

Early life

   Taft was born on September 15, 1857, in Cincinnati, Ohio, the second of
   five children. His mother, Louisa Torrey, was a graduate of Mount
   Holyoke College. His father, Alphonso Taft, came to Cincinnati in 1839
   to open a law practice. Alphonso Taft was a prominent Republican and
   had served as Secretary of War under President Ulysses S. Grant.

   Taft was brought up in the Unitarian church and remained a faithful
   Unitarian his entire life. At age 18, he met his future wife, Helen
   Herron, in Cincinnati; she and Taft courted while he was away at
   college.

   The William Howard Taft National Historic Site is the Taft boyhood
   home. The house in which he was born has been restored to its original
   appearance. It includes four period rooms which reflect the family life
   during Taft's boyhood. The home also includes second floor exhibits
   highlighting Taft's life and career, as well as an educational centre.

Education

   In 1874, Taft graduated from Cincinnati's Woodward High School. Like
   most of his family, he attended Yale College in New Haven, Connecticut.
   At Yale, he was a member of Skull and Bones, the secret society
   co-founded by his father in 1832, as well as the Beta chapter of the
   Psi Upsilon fraternity. His college friends knew him by the nickname
   "Old Bill". Yale's football captain, Walter Camp, wanted Taft to join
   the college squad, but Taft's father refused to give him permission,
   citing both concern for his son's safety and his personal opinion that
   football was "not a gentleman's sport." Taft rowed on the Yale crew and
   was an accomplished wrestler. In 1878, Taft graduated from Yale,
   ranking second in his class out of 191. After college, he attended
   Cincinnati Law School, graduating with a Bachelor of Laws in 1880.
   While in law school, he worked on the area newspaper The Cincinnati
   Commercial.

Career

   After admission to the Ohio bar, Taft was appointed Assistant
   Prosecutor of Hamilton County, Ohio, based in Cincinnati. In 1882, he
   was appointed local Collector of Internal Revenue. Taft married his
   longtime sweetheart, Helen Herron, in Cincinnati in 1886. In 1887, he
   was appointed as a judge of the Ohio Superior Court. In 1890, President
   Benjamin Harrison appointed him Solicitor General of the United States.
   In 1892 Harrison appointed him to the newly created United States Court
   of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, a post which he held until 1900. It
   was then that he met Theodore Roosevelt for the first time.

   In addition to his judgeship, between 1896 and 1900 Taft also served as
   the first Dean and a Professor of Constitutional Law at the University
   of Cincinnati. One of Taft's most famous opinions was in Addyston Pipe
   and Steel Company v. United States (1898). Eventually, he became the
   chief judge of the Sixth Circuit.

   In 1900, President William McKinley appointed Taft as the chairman of a
   commission to organize a civilian government in the Philippines, which
   had been ceded to the United States by Spain following the
   Spanish-American War and the 1898 Treaty of Paris. Although Taft
   initially had been opposed to the annexation of the islands and told
   McKinley that his real ambition was to become a justice of the Supreme
   Court of the United States, he reluctantly accepted the appointment
   when McKinley suggested that he would be "the better judge for this
   experience."

   From 1901 to 1903, Taft served as the first civilian Governor-General
   of the Philippines, a position in which he was very popular among both
   Americans and Filipinos. For example, in 1902 Taft visited Rome to
   negotiate with Pope Leo XIII for the purchase of lands in the
   Philippines owned by the Roman Catholic Church. Taft then induced
   Congress to appropriate $7,239,000 to purchase the lands, which he sold
   to Filipinos on easy terms. In 1903, President Roosevelt offered Taft
   the seat on the Supreme Court to which he had for so long aspired, but
   he reluctantly declined when native Filipino groups begged him to
   remain in Manila as Governor-General.

Secretary of War, 1904-1908

   In 1904, Roosevelt appointed Taft as Secretary of War. Roosevelt made
   the basic policy decisions regarding military affairs, using Taft as a
   well-traveled spokesman who campaigned for Roosevelt's re-election in
   1904. Taft met with the Emperor of Japan, who alerted him of the
   probability of war with Russia. In 1906, Roosevelt sent troops to
   restore order in Cuba during the revolt led by General Enrique Loynaz
   del Castillo, and Taft temporarily became the Civil Governor of Cuba,
   personally negotiating with General Castillo for a peaceful end to the
   revolt. In 1907, Secretary Taft helped supervise the beginning of
   construction on the Panama Canal. Taft repeatedly had told Roosevelt he
   wanted to be Chief Justice, not President (and not an associate
   justice), but there was no vacancy and Roosevelt had other plans. He
   gave Taft more responsibilities in addition to the Philippines and the
   Panama Canal. For a while, Taft was Acting Secretary of State. When
   Roosevelt was away, Taft in effect was the Acting President.

Presidency 1909-1913

   Handing off responsibility in 1909
   Enlarge
   Handing off responsibility in 1909

Policies

   After serving nearly two full terms, the popular Theodore Roosevelt
   refused to run in the election of 1908. Roosevelt certified Taft as a
   genuine "progressive", in 1908, pushing through the nomination of his
   Secretary of War for the presidency. Taft easily defeated three-time
   candidate William Jennings Bryan. Taft considered himself a
   "progressive" because of his deep belief in "The Law" as the scientific
   device that should be used by judges to solve society's problems. Taft
   proved a less adroit politician than Roosevelt and seemed to lack the
   energy and personal magnetism of his mentor, not to mention the
   publicity devices, the dedicated supporters, and the broad base of
   public support that made Roosevelt so formidable. When Roosevelt
   realized that lowering the tariff would risk severe tensions inside the
   Republican Party, pitting producers (manufacturers and farmers) against
   department stores and consumers, he stopped talking about the issue.
   Taft ignored the risks and tackled the tariff boldly, on the one hand
   encouraging reformers to fight for lower rates, then cutting deals with
   conservative leaders that kept overall rates high. The resulting
   Payne-Aldrich tariff of 1909 was too high for most reformers, but
   instead of blaming this on Senator Nelson Aldrich and big business,
   Taft took credit, calling it the best bill to come from the Republican
   Party. Again, he had managed to alienate all sides.

   Unlike Roosevelt, Taft never attacked business or businessmen in his
   rhetoric. However, he was attentive to the law, so he launched 90
   antitrust suits, including one against the largest corporation U.S.
   Steel for an acquisition which Roosevelt personally had approved. As a
   result, Taft lost the support of antitrust reformers (who disliked his
   conservative rhetoric), of big business (which disliked his actions),
   and of Roosevelt, who felt humiliated by his protégé. Progressives
   within the Republican party began agitating against Taft. Senator
   Robert LaFollette of Wisconsin created the National Progressive
   Republican League to replace Taft at the national level; his campaign
   crashed after a disastrous speech. Most of LaFollette's supporters went
   over to Roosevelt, leaving LaFollette embittered and alone. More
   trouble came when Taft fired Gifford Pinchot, a leading conservationist
   and close ally of Roosevelt. Pinchot alleged that Taft's Secretary of
   Interior Richard Ballinger was in league with big timber interests.
   Conservationists sided with Pinchot, and Taft alienated yet another
   vocal constituency.

   Taft fought for the prosecution of trusts (eventually issuing 75
   lawsuits), further strengthened the Interstate Commerce Commission,
   established a postal savings bank and a parcel post system, and
   expanded the civil service. He supported the 16th Amendment, which
   allowed for a federal income tax, and the 17th Amendment, mandating the
   direct election of senators by the people, replacing the previous
   system whereby they were selected by state legislatures.
   Taft and Roosevelt were bitter enemies in the 1912 election
   Enlarge
   Taft and Roosevelt were bitter enemies in the 1912 election

Foreign policy

   Taft actively pursued what he termed " dollar diplomacy" to further the
   economic development of less-developed nations of Latin America and
   Asia through American investment in their infrastructures. Throughout
   the early part of his presidency, Taft had difficulties with Nicaragua.
   When the United States shifted its interests to Panama for the purpose
   of building a canal, Nicaraguan President José Santos Zelaya negotiated
   with Germany and Japan in an unsuccessful effort to have a canal
   constructed in his state. The Zelaya administration had growing
   friction with the United States government, which started giving aid to
   his Conservative opponents in Nicaragua. In 1907, U.S. warships seized
   several of Nicaragua's seaports. In early December, United States
   Marines landed on Nicaragua's Caribbean Sea coast. On December 17,
   1909, Zelaya resigned and left for exile in Mexico. The U.S.-sponsored
   conservative regime of Adolfo Díaz was installed in his place. Military
   invasions increased with Marine landings in 1910 and 1912. The Marines
   stayed in Nicaragua through 1925.

   One of Taft's main goals while President was to further the idea of
   world peace. Given his judicial sensibilities, he believed that
   international arbitration was the best means to effectuate the end of
   war on Earth. As such, he championed several reciprocity and
   arbitration treaties. In 1910, he convinced congressional Democrats to
   support a reciprocity treaty with Canada, but the Liberal Canadian
   government that negotiated the treaty was turned out of office in 1911
   and the treaty collapsed. In 1910 and 1911, however, he secured the
   ratification of arbitration treaties that he had successfully
   negotiated with the United Kingdom and France and thereafter was known
   as one of the foremost advocates of world peace and arbitration.

16th Amendment

   To solve one impasse during the 1909 tariff debate, Taft proposed
   income taxes for corporations and business. The new tax on corporate
   net income was 1% on net profits over $5,000. Legally, it was
   designated an excise on the privilege of doing business and not a tax
   on incomes as such. In 1911, the Supreme Court, in Flint v. Stone Tracy
   Company, approved it. Receipts grew from $21 million in the fiscal year
   1910 to $34.8 million in 1912.

   An income tax on individuals, however, required a constitutional
   amendment, which was passed with little controversy in July, 1909,
   unanimously in the Senate and by a vote of 318 to 14 in the House. It
   quickly was ratified by the states, and in February, 1913, it became a
   part of the U.S. Constitution as the Sixteenth Amendment.

Party schism

   Despite his obvious achievements, progressives decried Taft's
   acceptance of the Payne-Aldrich Tariff Act, which lowered the tariff on
   the farm products of the western states, whose citizens desired lower
   rates on Eastern factory products. Taft opposed to the entry of the
   state of Arizona into the Union because of its judicial features.
   Progressives grumbled that he worked too closely with conservative
   Senator Nelson W. Aldrich and Speaker of the House Joseph G. Cannon. By
   1910, Taft's party was deeply divided between progressives and
   conservatives.

   On his return from Europe, Roosevelt broke with Taft in one of the most
   dramatic political feuds of the 20th century. To the surprise of
   observers who thought Roosevelt had unstoppable momentum, Taft
   outmaneuvered Roosevelt and LaFollette, seized control of the GOP, and
   forced both out of the party. The main issue in 1911-12 was
   independence of the judiciary, which Roosevelt denounced. Most lawyers
   in the GOP supported Taft, including many of Roosevelt's key supporters
   like Elihu Root, Henry Stimson, and Roosevelt's own son-in-law,
   Nicholas Longworth. In lining up delegates for the 1912 nomination,
   Taft outmaneuvered Roosevelt, who had started much too late, and kept
   control of the Republican party. Instead, Roosevelt was forced to
   create the Progressive Party (or "Bull Moose") ticket, splitting the
   Republican vote in the 1912 election. Woodrow Wilson, the Democrat, was
   elected, although many historians argue that Wilson would have won
   anyway, because the Republican factions would not support each other.
   Taft won a mere eight electoral votes, making it the single worst
   defeat for a President seeking re-election. He achieved his main goal,
   however, keeping permanent control of the party and making the courts
   sacrosanct.

Administration and Cabinet

                            OFFICE NAME                 TERM
   President                       William Howard Taft  1909–1913
   Vice President                  James S. Sherman     1909–1912
   Secretary of State              Philander C. Knox    1909–1913
   Secretary of the Treasury       Franklin MacVeagh    1909–1913
   Secretary of War                Jacob M. Dickinson   1909–1911
                                   Henry L. Stimson     1911–1913
   Attorney General                George W. Wickersham 1909–1913
   Postmaster General              Frank H. Hitchcock   1909–1913
   Secretary of the Navy           George von L. Meyer  1909–1913
   Secretary of the Interior       Richard A. Ballinger 1909–1911
                                   Walter L. Fisher     1911–1913
   Secretary of Agriculture        James Wilson         1909–1913
   Secretary of Commerce and Labor Charles Nagel        1909–1913

Supreme Court appointments

   During his presidency, Taft appointed the following Justices to the
   Supreme Court of the United States:
     * Horace Harmon Lurton - 1910

          Lurton had served on the United States Court of Appeals for the
          Sixth Circuit with Taft, and Taft's attorney general said that
          at 66 he was too old to become a Supreme Court justice, but Taft
          had always admired Lurton. According to the Complete Book of
          U.S. Presidents (2001 edition), Taft later said that "the chief
          pleasure of my administration" was the appointment of Lurton.

     * Charles Evans Hughes - 1910

          Even though Hughes resigned in 1916 to run in the presidential
          election that year, he became Taft's successor as Chief Justice.

     * Edward Douglass White - Chief Justice - 1910

          Already on the Court as an associate justice since 1894, White
          was the first Chief Justice to be elevated from an associate
          justiceship. Taft succeeded White as Chief Justice in 1921.

     * Willis Van Devanter - 1911
     * Joseph Rucker Lamar - 1911
     * Mahlon Pitney - 1912

   Notably, Taft's six appointments to the Court rank (in number) third
   only to those of George Washington and Franklin D. Roosevelt; as well,
   his appointment of five new justices ties the number appointed by
   Andrew Jackson and Abraham Lincoln. Four of Taft's appointees were
   relatively young at ages 48, 51, 53 and 54.

   The appointments of Edward Douglass White and Charles Evans Hughes also
   are notable because Taft essentially appointed both his predecessor and
   successor Chief Justices, respectively. Hughes initially was appointed
   an Associate Justice, but later resigned to run for the Republican
   Party's presidential candidate in the 1916 election, which he would
   lose. President Herbert Hoover renominated Hughes to the Supreme Court
   as Chief Justice following Taft's retirement.

States admitted to the Union

     * New Mexico: January 6, 1912
     * Arizona: February 14, 1912

Post-presidency

   Taft says goodbye to his son, Charles Phelps Taft II as he leaves for
   World War I
   Enlarge
   Taft says goodbye to his son, Charles Phelps Taft II as he leaves for
   World War I

   Upon leaving the White House in 1913, Taft was appointed Kent Professor
   of Constitutional Law at Yale Law School. The same year, he was elected
   president of the American Bar Association. He spent much of his time
   writing newspaper articles and books, most notably his series on
   American legal philosophy. He also continued to advocate world peace
   through international arbitration, urging nations to enter into
   arbitration treaties with each other and promoting the idea of a League
   of Nations even before the First World War began.

   When World War I did break out in Europe in 1914, however, Taft founded
   the League to Enforce Peace. He was co-chair of the powerful National
   War Labor Board between 1917 and 1918. Although he continually
   advocated peace, he strongly favored conscription once the United
   States entered the conflict, pleading publicly that the United States
   not fight a "finicky" war. He feared the war would be long, but was for
   fighting it out to a finish, given what he viewed as "Germany's
   brutality."

Chief Justice

   In 1921, when Chief Justice Edward Douglass White died, President
   Warren G. Harding nominated Taft to take his place, thereby fulfilling
   Taft's lifelong ambition to become Chief Justice of the United States.
   Virtually no opposition existed to the nomination, and the Senate
   unanimously confirmed Taft by voice vote. He readily took up the
   position, serving until 1930. As such, he became the only President to
   serve as Chief Justice, and thus is also the only former President to
   swear in subsequent Presidents, giving the oath of office to both
   Calvin Coolidge (in 1923 and 1925) and Herbert Hoover (in 1929). He
   remains the only person in the history of the United States to have led
   both the Executive and Judicial branches of the United States
   government, and thus far, is also the last President to hold a public
   office after his Presidential term ended.
   The U.S. Supreme Court in 1925. Taft is seated in the bottom row,
   middle.
   Enlarge
   The U.S. Supreme Court in 1925. Taft is seated in the bottom row,
   middle.

   In 1922, Taft traveled to England to study the procedural structure of
   the English courts and learn how they disposed of such a large number
   of cases in such an expeditious manner. During the trip, King George V
   and Queen Mary received Taft and his wife as state visitors. With what
   he had learned in England, Taft advocated passage of the 1925 Judges
   Act, which empowered the Supreme Court to give precedence to cases of
   national importance, thereby allowing the Court to work more
   efficiently. Taft was also the first Justice to employ two full time
   law clerks.

   In 1929, Taft successfully argued for the construction of the Supreme
   Court Building, reasoning that the Court needed to distance itself from
   Congress as a separate branch of government. Until then, the Court had
   heard cases in a designated room in the basement of the Capitol. Taft,
   however, did not live to see the building's completion in 1935.

   While Chief Justice, Taft wrote the opinion for the Court in 256 cases
   out of the Court's ever-growing caseload. His philosophy of
   constitutional interpretation was essentially a historical,
   contextualist sort of strict constructionism. Some of his more notable
   opinions include:
     * Bailey v. Drexel Furniture Co., 259 U.S. 20 (1922) (opinion for the
       Court)
          + Holding the 1919 Child Labor Tax Law unconstitutional.
     * Balzac v. Porto Rico, 258 U.S. 298 (1922) (opinion for the Court)
          + Ruling that the Fourteenth Amendment did not apply the
            criminal provisions of the Bill of Rights to overseas
            territories. This was one of the more famous of the " Insular
            Cases."
     * Adkins v. Children's Hospital, 261 U.S. 525 (1923) (dissenting
       opinion)
          + Disapproving of the Court upholding Lochner v. New York.
     * Myers v. United States, 272 U.S. 52 (1926) (opinion for the Court)
          + Ruling that the President of the United States had the power
            unilaterally to dismiss executive appointees who had been
            confirmed by the Senate.
     * Gong Lum v. Rice, 275 U.S. 78 (1927) (opinion for the Court)
          + Reluctantly ruling that the Fourteenth Amendment did not
            prohibit Mississippi's prevention of Asian children attending
            white schools in the midst of racial segregation.
     * Olmstead v. United States, 277 U.S. 438 (1928) (opinion for the
       Court)
          + Ruling that the Fourth Amendment's proscription on
            unreasonable search and seizure did not apply to wiretaps.
     * Wisconsin v. Illinois, 278 U.S. 367 (1929) (opinion for the Court)
          + Holding that the equitable power of the United States can be
            used to impose positive action on the states in a situation in
            which nonaction would result in damage to the interests of
            other states.
     * Old Colony Trust Co. v. Commissioner, 279 U.S. 716 (1929) (opinion
       for the Court)
          + Holding that where a third party pays the income tax due to an
            individual, the amount of tax paid constitutes additional
            income to the taxpayer.

Medical condition

   Evidence from eyewitnesses and from Taft himself strongly suggests that
   he had severe obstructive sleep apnea during his presidency, a
   consequence of his 300 to 340 pound (136 to 159 kg) weight. His
   legendary tendency to fall asleep in almost any circumstance, an open
   secret and source of embarrassment for his intimates, is now understood
   to have been the most obvious manifestation of the disease. Within a
   year of leaving the Presidency, Taft lost approximately 80 pounds (32
   kg). His somnolence resolved and, less obviously, his systolic blood
   pressure dropped 40-50 mmHg (from 210 mmHg). Undoubtedly, this weight
   loss extended his life.

Death and legacy

   President Taft's headstone at Arlington National Cemetery
   Enlarge
   President Taft's headstone at Arlington National Cemetery

   Taft retired as Chief Justice on February 3, 1930, because of ill
   health. He was succeeded by Charles Evans Hughes, whom he had appointed
   to the Court while President. Taft died on Saturday, March 8, 1930, due
   to heart complications. Three days later, on March 11, he became the
   first American president to be buried at Arlington National Cemetery. A
   third generation of the Taft family entered the national political
   stage in 1938. The former President's oldest son, Robert A. Taft I, was
   elected to the United States Senate from Ohio. His other son, Charles
   Phelps Taft II, served as mayor of Cincinnati, Ohio, from 1955 to 1957.
   Two more generations of the Taft family later entered politics. The
   President's grandson, Robert Taft Jr., served a term as a Senator from
   Ohio from 1971-1977; the President's great-grandson, Robert A. Taft II,
   is the current governor of Ohio. William Howard Taft III was U.S.
   ambassador to Ireland from 1953 to 1957. William Howard Taft IV was a
   high official in the United States Department of State from 2000 to
   2006, but now is in private law practice.

Trivia

     * In religious beliefs, Taft was a Unitarian. He once remarked, "I do
       not believe in the divinity of Christ, and there are many other of
       the postulates of the orthodox creed to which I cannot subscribe."
     * He became an honorary member of the Yale Chapter of the Acacia
       Fraternity in 1913 (while he was a professor of law at Yale).
     * Taft was severely overweight to the point that he became stuck in
       the bathtub in the White House several times, prompting the
       installation of a new bathtub capable of holding all of the men who
       installed it, something the White House denied until the bathtub
       was torn out years later. At 6 feet, and weighing over 350 pounds
       (159 kg), Taft is the heaviest person to be President, although
       Jefferson, Lincoln, Lyndon Johnson, and Clinton were taller.
     * When asked about his time on the Supreme Court and as President,
       Chief Justice Taft allegedly remarked, "I don't remember that I
       ever was President."
     * In Manila, Philippines, Taft Avenue was named after him. The
       Supreme Court of the Philippines is located in that road.
     * Taft was the last American president to have had facial hair (in
       this case, a moustache), as of 2006.
     * Taft was an avid baseball fan, but contrary to myth he did not
       create the seventh-inning stretch, which was custom decades
       earlier. He was, however, the first American president to throw the
       ceremonial first pitch at a baseball game, at Griffith Stadium,
       Washington, D.C., on April 14, 1910.
     * Taft was the first American president to golf as a hobby.
     * Taft was the first president to occupy the Oval Office when it was
       opened in October 1909.
     * Taft was the first American president to own a presidential
       automobile. He converted the White House stables into a four-car
       garage in 1909.

   President Taft's cow, Pauline, poses in front of the Old Executive
   Office Building.
   Enlarge
   President Taft's cow, Pauline, poses in front of the Old Executive
   Office Building.
     * Taft owned a Holstein cow, Pauline Wayne, which he let graze freely
       on the White House lawn. Pauline was the last cow to live at the
       White House. She provided milk for the president and his family.
     * Even though the strife during the election of 1912 devastated the
       once very close friendship between Taft and Theodore Roosevelt, the
       two reconciled not long before Roosevelt's death.
     * The First District Court of Appeals in Cincinnati, Ohio, is named
       after him.
     * He is one of two presidents buried at Arlington (the other being
       John F. Kennedy) and one of four chief justices buried at Arlington
       (the others being Earl Warren, Warren Burger, and William
       Rehnquist).
     * He was the first Chief Justice that did not die in office since
       Oliver Ellsworth and was the only Chief Justice ever to have a
       state funeral.

     * There is a law school named after him in Santa Ana, California:
       William Howard Taft University.
     * In later years, Taft owned a wooden cane that was a gift from
       Professor of Geology W.S. Foster, from 250,000-year-old wood.

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