HOLMES, OLIVER WENDELL, JR.
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. was a justice of the U.S. Supreme Court and legal philosopher who has become a celebrated legal figure. His writings on JURISPRUDENCE have shaped discussions on the nature of law, and his court opinions have been studied as much for their style as for their intellectual content. Though Holmes has been widely praised, he does have critics who contend that he paid too much deference to the power of the state to control individual freedom.
Holmes was born March 8, 1841, in Boston.
His father, Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr., was a
well-known physician, a lecturer at Harvard
Medical School, an author who was widely read
in England and the United States, and a founder
of the Atlantic Monthly. Holmes attended pri-
vate school and then Harvard College, graduat-
ing in 1861.With the outbreak of the Civil War
in 1861, Holmes enlisted as an officer in the
Twentieth Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry.
His military service was difficult. Holmes
was wounded three times, twice almost fatally,
and suffered from dysentery. In 1863 he
accepted a position as an aide to a Union gen-
eral, and he served in that capacity until 1864.
He resigned his commission before the end of
the war and returned, exhausted, to Boston,
where he began preparations for a legal career.
He attended Harvard Law School and
