President William McKinley appointed Jacob Trieber as a Federal judge for the Eastern District of Arkansas in 1900. Trieber thus became the first Jewish Federal judge in the United States. His appointment was a miracle of no small proportions, considering he was an immigrant with a heavy foreign accent, of modest means, with no formal college or law school training, and came from a small town in rural Arkansas. Yet he became known nationwide for his judicial abilities and legal acumen, and was particularly noted for his courageous (and almost solitary) pro-civil rights decisions. He is the subject of the new book, “A?Rift in the Clouds”, about the efforts of three judges to read the Reconstruction Amendments to give blacks legal protection.
Typed Letter Signed on his Supreme Court letterhead, November 24, 1922, to Judge Trieber. “Thank you for sending me your address before the West Tennessee Bar Asociation.”