Robert Morss Lovett (December 25, 1870 – February 8, 1956) was an American academic, writer, editor, political activist, and government official.

Background

Lovett was born in Boston, Massachusetts, and graduated from

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

in 1892. While a student at Harvard, he joined

Delta Upsilon Delta Upsilon (), commonly known as DU, is a collegiate men's fraternity founded on November 4, 1834 at Williams College in Williamstown, Massachusetts. It is the sixth-oldest, all-male, college Greek Letter Organizations#Greek letters, Greek-let ...

fraternity.

Career

After a period teaching at Harvard, Lovett came to

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

in 1893 to teach writing and

English literature English literature is literature written in the English language from United Kingdom, its crown dependencies, the Republic of Ireland, the United States, and the countries of the former British Empire. ''The Encyclopaedia Britannica'' defines E ...

at the

University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, U of C, or UChi) is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois. Its main campus is located in Chicago's Hyde Park neighborhood. The University of Chicago is consistently ranked among the b ...

. He was assistant professor of English (1894–1904); associate professor from 1904 to 1909; and full professor from 1909 onward. From 1903 to 1920 he was

dean Dean may refer to: People * Dean (given name) * Dean (surname), a surname of Anglo-Saxon English origin * Dean (South Korean singer), a stage name for singer Kwon Hyuk * Dean Delannoit, a Belgian singer most known by the mononym Dean Titles * ...

in the junior college. He was a member of the

National Institute of Arts and Letters The American Academy of Arts and Letters is a 300-member honor society whose goal is to "foster, assist, and sustain excellence" in American literature, music, and art. Its fixed number membership is elected for lifetime appointments. Its headqua ...

. Professor Lovett was the author of ''The History of English Literature'', with W. V. Moody (1902); ''Richard Gresham'', a novel (1904); ''The First View of English Literature'', with W. V. Moody (1905); ''A Winged Victory'', a novel (1907); and ''Cowards'', a play (1914). He served as editor of the '' Dial'' in 1917 and joined the editorial staff of ''

The New Republic ''The New Republic'' is an American magazine of commentary on politics, contemporary culture, and the arts. Founded in 1914 by several leaders of the progressive movement, it attempted to find a balance between "a liberalism centered in hum ...

'' in 1921. He assisted

Tarak Nath Das Taraknath Das (or Tarak Nath Das; 15 June 1884 – 22 December 1958) was an Indian revolutionary and internationalist scholar. He was a pioneering immigrant in the west coast of North America and discussed his plans with Tolstoy, while organi ...

. Lovett was associate editor of ''The New Republic'' magazine in 1921-40, and a signer, in 1933, of the first manifesto of what has since become the ''

Humanist Manifesto ''Humanist Manifesto'' is the title of three manifestos laying out a humanist worldview. They are the original ''Humanist Manifesto'' (1933, often referred to as Humanist Manifesto I), the ''Humanist Manifesto II'' (1973), and ''Humanism and It ...

'' series, since superseded in 2003 by the third, ''Humanism and Its Aspirations''. As Government Secretary of the

Virgin Islands The Virgin Islands ( es, Islas Vírgenes) are an archipelago in the Caribbean Sea. They are geologically and biogeographically the easternmost part of the Greater Antilles, the northern islands belonging to the Puerto Rico Trench and St. Croix ...

in 1939-43, Lovett served as acting

Governor A governor is an administrative leader and head of a polity or political region, ranking under the head of state and in some cases, such as governors-general, as the head of state's official representative. Depending on the type of political ...

from December 14, 1940 until February 3, 1941. In 1943, the

Dies Committee The House Committee on Un-American Activities (HCUA), popularly dubbed the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), was an investigative committee of the United States House of Representatives, created in 1938 to investigate alleged disloy ...

charged him as a

communist Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, a s ...

subversive, over his association with

left-wing Left-wing politics describes the range of political ideologies that support and seek to achieve social equality and egalitarianism, often in opposition to social hierarchy. Left-wing politics typically involve a concern for those in soci ...

individuals and groups; through an enactment passed by both houses of

Congress A congress is a formal meeting of the representatives of different countries, constituent states, organizations, trade unions, political parties, or other groups. The term originated in Late Middle English to denote an encounter (meeting of a ...

, he was forced out of the Secretary position and barred from federal employment. Lovett, who denied he was a Communist, challenged this action through the courts as an unconstitutional

bill of attainder A bill of attainder (also known as an act of attainder or writ of attainder or bill of penalties) is an act of a legislature declaring a person, or a group of people, guilty of some crime, and punishing them, often without a trial. As with attai ...

, and though he did not get the job back, he won a 1946 decision from the

Supreme Court A supreme court is the highest court within the hierarchy of courts in most legal jurisdictions. Other descriptions for such courts include court of last resort, apex court, and high (or final) court of appeal. Broadly speaking, the decisions of ...

(''

United States v. Lovett ''United States v. Lovett'', 328 U.S. 303 (1946), was a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court held that Congress may not forbid the payment of a salary to a specific individual, as it would constitute an unconstitutional bill of atta ...

''), and received back pay.

Personal life and death

Lovett spent many years living at

Hull House Hull House was a settlement house in Chicago, Illinois, United States that was co-founded in 1889 by Jane Addams and Ellen Gates Starr. Located on the Near West Side of the city, Hull House (named after the original house's first owner Cha ...

, where his wife was aide to

Jane Addams Laura Jane Addams (September 6, 1860 May 21, 1935) was an American settlement activist, reformer, social worker, sociologist, public administrator, and author. She was an important leader in the history of social work and women's suffrage ...

.Dictionary of Midwestern Literature, Volume 1: The Authors
/ref> He died in St. Joseph's Hospital in Chicago in 1956.

References

by Robert Morss Lovett. ''Time'' (Jun. 21, 1948).
"Robert M. Lovett, Educator, Is Dead"
(

obituary An obituary ( obit for short) is an article about a recently deceased person. Newspapers often publish obituaries as news articles. Although obituaries tend to focus on positive aspects of the subject's life, this is not always the case. Ac ...

). ''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

'' (Feb. 9, 1956)
p. 31.

External links

*
Robert Morss Lovett papers
(University of Chicago Library)

1946 U.S. Supreme Court ruling
Robert Morss Lovett materials in the South Asian American Digital Archive (SAADA)
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Lovett, Robert Morss 1870 births 1956 deaths Harvard University alumni Harvard University faculty University of Chicago faculty Governors of the United States Virgin Islands 20th-century American novelists American male novelists Writers from Boston Writers from Chicago 20th-century American dramatists and playwrights American male dramatists and playwrights 20th-century American male writers Novelists from Illinois Novelists from Massachusetts