Editing Charles Evans Hughes (section)

==Associate Justice==
{{see also|White Court (judges)}}
[[File:Oliver Wendell Holmes, 1902.jpg|right|thumb|upright=0.8|Hughes struck up a close friendship with Associate Justice [[Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.]]]]
By early 1910, Hughes was anxious to retire from his position as governor.<ref name="Simon 2012 42–43">{{harvnb|ps=.|Simon|2012|pp=42–43}}</ref> A vacancy on the Supreme Court arose following the death of [[Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States|Associate Justice]] [[David J. Brewer]], and Taft offered the position to Hughes, who quickly accepted the offer.<ref name="Simon 2012 42–43"/> His nomination was formally received by the Senate on April 25, 1910. The [[Senate Judiciary Committee]] reported favorably on his nomination on May 2, 1910, and the Senate unanimously confirmed him the same day.<ref name="Simon 2012 42–43"/>  Two months after Hughes's confirmation, but prior to his taking the judicial oath, Chief Justice [[Melville Fuller|Melville W. Fuller]] died. Taft elevated Associate Justice [[Edward Douglass White]] to the position of Chief Justice despite having previously indicated to Hughes that he might select Hughes as Chief Justice. White's candidacy for the position was bolstered by his long experience on the bench and popularity among his fellow justices, as well as Theodore Roosevelt's coolness towards Hughes.<ref>{{harvnb|ps=.|Abraham|2008|pp=132–134}}</ref>

Hughes was sworn in to the Supreme Court on October 10, 1910, and quickly struck up friendships with other members of the Court, including Chief Justice White, Associate Justice [[John Marshall Harlan]], and Associate Justice [[Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.]]<ref>{{harvnb|ps=.|Simon|2012|pp=45–46}}</ref> In the disposition of cases, however, Hughes tended to align with Holmes. He voted to uphold state laws providing for minimum wages, workmen's compensation, and maximum work hours for women and children.<ref>{{harvnb|ps=.|Shesol|2010|p=27}}</ref> He also wrote several opinions upholding the power of Congress to regulate interstate commerce under the [[Commerce Clause]]. His majority opinion in ''Baltimore & Ohio Railroad vs. Interstate Commerce Commission'' upheld the right of the federal government to regulate the hours of railroad workers.<ref name="Shoemaker 2004 63–64">{{harvnb|ps=.|Shoemaker|2004|pp=63–64}}</ref> His majority opinion in the 1914 [[Houston East & West Texas Railway Co. v. United States|Shreveport Rate Case]] upheld the [[Interstate Commerce Commission]]'s decision to void discriminatory railroad rates imposed by the [[Railroad Commission of Texas]]. The decision established that the federal government could regulate intrastate commerce when it affected interstate commerce, though Hughes avoided directly overruling the 1895 case of ''[[United States v. E. C. Knight Co.]]''<ref>{{harvnb|ps=.|Henretta|2006|pp=136–137}}</ref>

He also wrote a series of opinions that upheld civil liberties; in one such case, ''[[McCabe v. Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railway Co.]]'', Hughes's majority opinion required railroad carriers to give African-Americans "equal treatment."<ref>{{harvnb|ps=.|Henretta|2006|p=150}}</ref> Hughes's majority opinion in ''[[Bailey v. Alabama]]'' invalidated a state law that had made it a crime for a laborer to fail to complete obligations agreed to in a labor contract. Hughes held that this law violated the [[Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution|Thirteenth Amendment]] and discriminated against African-American workers.<ref name="Shoemaker 2004 63–64"/> He also joined the majority decision in the 1915 case of ''[[Guinn v. United States]]'', which outlawed the use of [[grandfather clause]]s to determine voter enfranchisement.<ref>{{harvnb|ps=.|Shoemaker|2004|p=224}}</ref> Hughes and Holmes were the only dissenters from the court's ruling that affirmed a lower court's decision to withhold a writ of habeas corpus from [[Leo Frank]], a [[Jewish]] factory manager convicted of murder in the state of Georgia.<ref>{{harvnb|ps=.|Simon|2012|pp=47–48}}</ref>