Sidney Carr Mize (March 7, 1888 – April 26, 1965) was a

United States district judge The United States district courts are the trial courts of the United States federal judiciary, U.S. federal judiciary. There is one district court for each United States federal judicial district, federal judicial district, which each cover o ...

of the

United States District Court for the Southern District of Mississippi The United States District Court for the Southern District of Mississippi (in case citations, S.D. Miss.) is a federal court in the Fifth Circuit with facilities in Gulfport, Hattiesburg, Natchez, and Jackson. Appeals from cases brought in the ...

Education and career

Born in Scott County,

Mississippi Mississippi () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States, bordered to the north by Tennessee; to the east by Alabama; to the south by the Gulf of Mexico; to the southwest by Louisiana; and to the northwest by Arkansas. Miss ...

, Mize received an

Artium Baccalaureus Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four years ...

degree from

Mississippi College Mississippi College (MC) is a private Baptist university in Clinton, Mississippi. Founded in 1826, MC is the second-oldest Baptist-affiliated college or university in the United States and the oldest college or university in Mississippi. Histor ...

in 1908 and a

Bachelor of Laws Bachelor of Laws ( la, Legum Baccalaureus; LL.B.) is an undergraduate law degree in the United Kingdom and most common law jurisdictions. Bachelor of Laws is also the name of the law degree awarded by universities in the People's Republic of Chi ...

from the

University of Mississippi School of Law The University of Mississippi School of Law, also known as Ole Miss Law, is an ABA-accredited law school located on the campus of the University of Mississippi in Oxford, Mississippi. The School of Law offers the only dedicated aerospace law curr ...

in 1911. He was in private practice in Gulfport, Mississippi from 1911 to 1937. He became a special district attorney of Mississippi in 1914, and special county judge and a special chancery judge in 1930.

Federal judicial service

On January 30, 1937, Mize was nominated by President

Franklin D. Roosevelt Franklin Delano Roosevelt (; ; January 30, 1882April 12, 1945), often referred to by his initials FDR, was an American politician and attorney who served as the 32nd president of the United States from 1933 until his death in 1945. As the ...

to a seat on the

vacated by Judge Edwin R. Holmes. Mize was confirmed by the

United States Senate The United States Senate is the upper chamber of the United States Congress, with the House of Representatives being the lower chamber. Together they compose the national bicameral legislature of the United States. The composition and pow ...

on February 2, 1937, and received his commission on February 3, 1937. He served as Chief Judge from 1961 to 1962, and remained on the court until his death on April 26, 1965.

Cases

In 1962, Mize ruled that there was no evidence that the

University of Mississippi The University of Mississippi (byname Ole Miss) is a public research university that is located adjacent to Oxford, Mississippi, and has a medical center in Jackson. It is Mississippi's oldest public university and its largest by enrollment. ...

's admissions policy was based on the segregation of races, and therefore was legally correct in denying admittance to

James Meredith James Howard Meredith (born June 25, 1933) is an American civil rights activist, writer, political adviser, and Air Force veteran who became, in 1962, the first African-American student admitted to the racially segregated University of Mississ ...

, a Black applicant. The ruling was later overturned by the

Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals The United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit (in case citations, 5th Cir.) is a federal court with appellate jurisdiction over the district courts in the following federal judicial districts: * Eastern District of Louisiana * M ...

, which remanded the case to Mize and instructed him to order Meredith's admission to the University. In his majority opinion, Judge

John Minor Wisdom John Minor Wisdom (May 17, 1905 – May 15, 1999), one of the "Fifth Circuit Four", and a United States Republican Party, Republican from Louisiana, was a United States federal judge, United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appe ...

called the handling of the case "a carefully calculated campaign of delay, harassment and masterly inactivity."

References

Sources

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Mize, Sidney Carr 1888 births 1965 deaths Mississippi College alumni Judges of the United States District Court for the Southern District of Mississippi United States district court judges appointed by Franklin D. Roosevelt 20th-century American judges People from Scott County, Mississippi University of Mississippi School of Law alumni