Learned Hand papers

The 65,000 items in the collection of papers of Judge Learned Hand span the years 1892-1961, with a few family biographical items dating back to 1846. The collection includes correspondence, opinions, memoranda, reports, statistical tables, legal documents, drafts of speeches and writings, typescripts of oral history interviews, diaries, address books, ledgers, letter-press books, bills, bank statements, newspaper clippings, photos, maps, printed material, microfilm, files of index cards, and memorabilia.

The largest contingent of this collection of papers consists of Judge Hand's correspondence (115 MSS boxes, approximately 50,000 items). This correspondence contains: a) general matters, other than official correspondence, relating to Judge Hand's everyday life, correspondence with casual acquaintances, matters relating to various clubs of which he was a member, general Harvard matters, social engagements, etc., b) correspondence with close friends which extended over long periods of time; and c) correspondence with the various members of his own family and with his wife's relatives.

The second largest contingent comprises the Circuit Court material (69 MSS boxes, approximately 10,000 items), which consists of the day-to-day business of the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, official Court correspondence, reports on the Judicial Conferences, and all of the Memoranda from the time Judge Hand joined the Court of Appeals until his death.

The third most important group of papers consists of the District Court Opinions (9 MSS boxes, approximately 1,000 items), which Judge Hand wrote while sitting on the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. Since only about one out of four of the District Court Opinions is published in the official reporter series, this series is especially valuable.

Among Judge Hand's major correspondence were: Dean Gooderham Acheson, Charles Lowell Barlow, Gordon Knox Bell, Bernard Berenson, Lawrence Berenson, Robert Pendleton Bowler, Louis Dembitz Brandeis, Edward Burnham Burling, Charles Culp Burlingham, Benjamin Nathan Cardozo, Charles Edward Clark, Morris Raphael Cohen, Herbert D. Croly, Louis Henry Dow, Francis Hackett, Hamish Hamilton, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., Felix Frankfurter, Augustus Noble Hand, Charles P. Howland, Charles Evans Hughes, Pierre Jay, Walter Lippmann, Philip Littell, Frederic W. Lord, George Rublee, Harlan Fiske Stone, Thomas Walter Swan, Frederick Townsend, Charles Edward Wyzanski, Jr.

The material was left in the arrangement imposed upon it by Judge Hand. For the sake of convenience of consultation, his 160 odd file boxes of correspondence, each covering about four calendar months, were consolidated into larger groupings.