Donald E. Kelly - July 2008 - Six of the Greatest
| Publication year | 2008 |
| Pages | 49 |
| Citation | Vol. 37 No. 7 Pg. 49 |
2008, July, Pg. 49. Donald E. Kelly - July 2008 - Six of the Greatest
July 2008
Vol. 37, No. 7 [Page 49]
Hon. Larry L. Bohning is a Denver County Court Judge and Colorado history buff. He has authored several attorney profiles for The Colorado Lawyer - larry.bohning@denvergov.org.
Thanks to Melissa Hart, Kelley's granddaughter, for providing all of the photographs used in this profile.
Donald E. Kelley began his education in a one-room Nebraska grade school. He would go on to hold some of the highest positions in the legal profession. Kelley was born on January 29, 1908 in McCook, Nebraska. His mother, Elsie Asten Kelley, was of Dutch-English ancestry, and his father, Charles Kelley, had English-Irish ancestry.(fn1)
Kelley walked approximately one and one-half miles each way to attend a one-room grade school in Red Willow County, Nebraska. Frigid winters and outdoor latrines were the norm for Kelley and his fourteen classmates. When he was in the sixth grade, Kelley entered Kearney Military Academy. Kelley rose to the rank of corporal at Kearney and his grade point average of 94 for three years merited him a gold pin.(fn2) He went on to McCook high school to win red-and-white "M" letters in football and basketball before graduating in 1925.(fn3)
Growing up, Kelley worked as a farmhand for his father, and as a law office assistant for his grandfather, John E. Kelley, a lawyer in McCook. John Kelley had a profound influence on Don. In the summer of 1924, his grandfather took him to Cleveland for the GOP convention, which nominated Calvin Coolidge for U.S. President. Don Kelley later would say: "I suppose I was influenced by that time and that experience but I like to think now I became a registered Republican as the result of sound thought and reflection."(fn4)
Kelley studied pre-law at the University of Nebraska and received an LLB from the University of Nebraska College of Law in 1930. On June 21, 1930, he married Georgia E. Pyne from St. Paul, Nebraska. They would have two children, John M. (Mike) Kelley and Donald (Tarz) Pyne Kelley.(fn5)
In 1930, Kelley returned to McCook, and under the guidance of his grandfather, started a general law practice. It was the period of the Great Depression in the United States, and times were tough, especially for young lawyers. Kelley later recalled that his law practice "was not lucrative. . . . Sometimes you got paid with a chicken or eggs."(fn6)
In 1939, Kelley moved to Lincoln, Nebraska. He worked as an assistant attorney general for the state of Nebraska until 1941.
During this time, Kelley argued a case before the U.S. Supreme Court and helped persuade the high court to reverse a decision of the Nebraska Supreme Court and also overrule a previous U.S. Supreme Court decision.(fn7) He also was active in Republican politics in Nebraska and was credited with starting that state's Young Republicans organization.(fn8)
In 1941, he went back to private practice at McCook and finished the term of Red Willow County Attorney Joe Callahan, who had been called into the service. Kelley then was elected to a four-year term as Red Willow County Attorney.
In 1945, Kelley resigned his position as county attorney and moved his family to Denver, where they lived at 20 South Dexter and attended St. John's Episcopal Cathedral. Kelley maintained a general law practice, with offices in the First National Bank building, until 1953. In Denver, Kelley continued to be active in Republican politics.
Republican Dwight D. Eisenhower was elected U.S. President in November 1952 and sworn into office on January 20, 1953. It was, and still is, customary for U.S. Attorneys to submit their resignation when a President of another political party is elected. However, the U.S. Attorney for Colorado, Democrat Charles S. Vigil, who had been appointed to that position by President Harry Truman in 1951, had other ideas. Vigil refused to resign even after getting a call from the office of U.S. Attorney General Herbert Brownell in Washington, asking him to submit his resignation.(fn9) On November 19, 1953, White House press secretary James C. Hagerty issued a statement to the press saying that Eisenhower was removing Vigil and appointing Donald Kelley as U.S. Attorney. Hagerty noted that Vigil, who recently had gained federal convictions against Denver's notorious crime family members Eugene "Checkers" Smaldone and his brother Clyde "Flip Flop" Smaldone, had "declined to resign."(fn10)
Kelley was sworn in as U.S. Attorney for Colorado on November 24, 1953 by U.S. District Judge Lee Knous.(fn11) On November 29, it was announced that Kelley had named Robert Swanson as an assistant U.S. attorney, whose salary was still being negotiated, because U.S Attorney General Herbert Browning recently had ruled that U.S Attorneys and assistants must devote full time to their federal jobs.(fn12)
Kelley hired several distinguished attorneys to work in the U.S. Attorney's Office. Among them were Robert (Bob) Wham, who would go on to become Denver City Attorney; Robert (Bob) Inman, who would later become his law partner; and Richard Matsch, who would become a distinguished federal district court judge.
In an interview of Kelley when he was the U.S. Attorney, a reporter noted that "this quiet University of Nebraska law school graduate with silver gray hair and a wisp of a mustache looks like a state department diplomat."(fn13) His colleagues recall that he was a very handsome man.(fn14)
Some of the most high-profile cases during Kelley's tenure as U.S. Attorney involved alleged communists who were prosecuted by his office in federal court under the Smith Act of 1940.(fn15) The Cold War was at its height during the 1950s. In 1950, General Dwight Eisenhower warned in a kickoff speech for the Crusade for Freedom at the Denver City Auditorium that "the Reds seek to enslave America."(fn16) Plans to build the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) complex near Colorado Springs were formulated in the 1950s.(fn17) NORAD was designed to house U.S. and Canadian military personnel so they could safely monitor a nuclear attack on the United States by Soviet bombers. In 1951, Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were convicted of passing nuclear weapons secrets to the Soviet Union. In 1953, they became the first American civilians executed for espionage.(fn18)
In 1954, a federal grand jury indicted seven alleged communists for conspiracy to violate the Smith Act by teaching and advocating the overthrow of the government and helping to organize the Communist Party for that purpose.(fn19) U.S. Assistant Attorney General William F. Tompkins, boss of the Internal Security Division of the Justice Department, told Denver reporters that the trial of the seven "top regional Communists" was the most serious case the Justice Department had pending in the whole country.(fn20)
Federal Judge Jean Breitenstein,(fn21) who had been assigned to hear the case, called on the "large" Denver law firms (in l954 that meant ten or more lawyers) to provide attorneys to represent the seven...
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