Murphy, Frank (Francis) William

(1890-1949)

   Born in Harbor Beach, Michigan, Frank Murphy was a graduate of the University of Michigan in 1912 and the University of Michigan Law School in1914. He served in the army in France during World War I and after the war was appointed U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Michigan. He returned to private practice in 1920, taught law at the University of Detroit, and became a judge in the recorder’s court in Detroit in 1923. A member of the Democratic Party, in 1930 Murphy was elected mayor of Detroit. He introduced work relief programs to combat the high unemployment rate in the city and was reelected in 1932. In 1933, he was appointed governor-general of the Philippines, where he supported moves toward independence but left the post to become governor of Michigan in 1936.

   A supporter of President Franklin D. Roosevelt and the New Deal, Murphy introduced a “Little New Deal” in Michigan, reforming the civil service, improving workmen’s compensation, and increasing spending on education. He refused to use state troops to intervene in the “sit-down strikes” in the automobile industry in 1937. Murphy was defeated in the 1938 election. In 1939, he was appointed U.S. attorney general, and he led the investigation that destroyed the Pendergast machine in Kansas City. In 1940, Roosevelt appointed Murphy to the Supreme Court, where he became one of the more liberal justices, particularly on civil rights issues. He was critical of the internment of Japanese Americans and dissented in the cases of Hirabayashi v. United States and Korematsu v. United States. Murphy’s career was cut short by heart disease, and he died of a coronary thrombosis.