Roman Hruska: The Senator Who Said Mediocre Judges Deserve a Seat

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Roman Hruska was born in 1904 in David City, Nebraska, one of 11 children of Czech immigrants, and moved to Omaha in 1917. He studied at the University of Omaha and the University of Chicago Law School, graduated from Creighton law in 1929, and cofounded the Douglas Theatre Company. In 1944 he accepted a Douglas County Board seat as a favor after a friend resigned, chaired the board until 1952 and led state and national county officials' groups. Elected to the House in 1952, he won the 1954 special election for Hugh Butler's Senate seat and served until 1976 on the Appropriations and Judiciary committees, voting for the Civil Rights Acts of 1957, 1960, 1964 and 1968, the Voting Rights Act and Thurgood Marshall's confirmation.

In 1970, as the ranking Republican on Judiciary, he defended Richard Nixon's Supreme Court nominee G. Harrold Carswell, whom critics called a mediocre jurist with a high reversal rate. Hruska answered that mediocre judges, people and lawyers are entitled to a little representation, adding that the court could not have all Brandeises, Frankfurters and Cardozos. The nomination failed 51 to 45. He later defended Nixon through Watergate, calling it a partisan attack even after the resignation. He retired in 1976, returned to Omaha, and died in 1999 at 94, 15 days after breaking his hip, and was buried in Omaha's Bohemian Cemetery.

• The Carswell fight followed the Senate's rejection of Nixon's earlier nominee Clement Haynsworth.
• He also voted to ban poll taxes during the civil rights era.
• He won reelection in 1958, 1964 and 1970, twice defeating Democrat Frank B. Morrison.
• In 1978 Jimmy Carter signed a bill naming the U.S. Meat Animal Research Center in Clay County for him.
• The Roman L. Hruska Federal Courthouse stands in Omaha, and a law center named for him in Lincoln houses the state bar association.