Harold Hitz Burton Award

In 1964, the Club inaugurated the Harold Hitz Burton Award, given to a Clevelander who has made an outstanding contribution to the nation while working in Washington.

Who was Harold Hitz Burton?

Harold Hitz Burton was born in Boston, went to Bowdoin College, where he was quarterback on the football team, and then Harvard Law School. He accompanied Robert Perry on some of his expeditions to the North Pole ice cap. He was a decorated combat infantry officer during World War I. After the war he moved with his wife to Cleveland to practice law and teach at the Western Reserve Law School while remaining in the National Guard. During the 1920s, Burton entered politics as a Republican. He was elected three times as mayor of Cleveland beginning in 1935. In 1940 he was elected to the U.S. Senate and worked on the committee overseeing the efficiency of the nation’s war effort. 

In 1945, President Harry Truman nominated Burton to the Supreme Court, whereupon the Senate approved him unanimously. He was a champion of judicial restraint and of the Fifth Amendment and was considered a hard worker, a pragmatist, and a unifier on the Court. He worked to undermine Plessy vs. Ferguson. He was instrumental in shaping Brown vs. Board of Education in 1954 and making it a unanimous decision, no mean feat. Owing to Parkinson’s Disease he retired from the Supreme Court in 1958 but served on panels of the U.S. Court of Appeals for Washington, D.C. He died in late October, 1964 and is buried in Highland Park Cemetery in Cleveland. The Cleveland Club of Washington, D.C., named its highest award for Associate Justice Burton and gave the first to him.

Past honorees

2017

Chairman Phil Mendelson, Council of the District of Columbia

2010

Basil (Bud) Littin 

2008

Louis Stokes

2007

Bruce W. Sanford

2005

George V. Voinovich

2004

Nicholas E. Calio

1997

Donna Shalala

1994

Howard M. Metzenbaum

1993

Herbert Block

1991

George M. White

1990

Charles R. Richey

1989

EdwardA. Seitz

1982

H. Chapman Rose

1976

James T. Lynn

1975

Kay Halle

1973

Benjamin O. Davis, Jr.

1972

Clayton Fritchey

1970

Charles A. Vanik

1968

Frank J. Lausche

1967

Frances P. Bolton

1966

Harold G. Mosier

1965

Anthony J. Celebrezze

1964

Harold H. Burton 1964