Edward Douglass White Jr.

In January 1918, the Supreme Court decided the Selective Draft Law cases, upholding the 1917 draft law against each of the objections before it.

Chief Justice Edward Douglass White wrote for the unanimous court.

One of the objections was that compulsory military service is involuntary servitude forbidden by the Thirteenth Amendment.

That objection received, in its entirety, this, "Finally, as we are able to conceive upon what theory the extraction by government from the citizen of the performance of his supreme and noble duty of contributing to the defense of the rights and honor of the nation as the result of a war declared by the great representation body of the people, can be said to be the imposition of involuntary servitude in violation of the prohibitions of the Thirteenth Amendment, we are constrained to the conclusion that the contention to that effect is refuted by its mere statement." Refuted by its mere statement.

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That argument didn't work.

The court that ultimately decided Plessy v. Ferguson consisted of Chief Justice Melville Fuller and Justices Stephen Field, John Marshall Harlan, Horace Gray, David Brewer, Henry Billings Brown.

George Shearer's Edward Douglas White and Rufus Peckham.

Man, what a collection of 19th century names.