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Felix Solomon
Cohen was a lawyer with special interest in natural resources, in
statehood and economic development for American territories, in
Indian affairs, and in immigration and minority problems. He was a
professor of jurisprudence, a civil servant, and an author of
numerous articles on law, ethics, and philosophy, on Native Americans
and minorities, and on human and natural resources. From 1933 through
1947 he served in the Solicitor's Office of the Interior Department
as an assistant solicitor, associate solicitor, and acting solicitor.
He also served as chairman of the Office's Board of Appeals. Cohen
drafted the Wheeler-Howard Act (later known as the Indian
Reorganization Act) of 1934, and contributed to the department's
handling of Indian and Eskimo aboriginal rights. In 1939 Cohen was
named Chief of the Indian Law Survey, a joint project of the Lands
Division of the Department of Justice and of the Department of
Interior to compile all federal laws, treaties, etc., involving
Native Americans. Cohen edited a summary of the 46-volume survey,
which was published by the Interior Department asThe Handbook of
Federal Indian Law and remains a milestone in the evolution of Indian
law. He received the Department's highest honor--the Distinguished
Service Award--on retirement from government service in 1948.
Cohen re-entered
private general law practice in January 1948, but continued to be
interested in the legal affairs of Native Americans and immigrants,
in human rights, and in natural resources. He eventually associated
his Washington, D.C. office with the New York law firm of Riegelman,
Strasser, Schwarz & Spiegelberg (which later became known in
Washington as Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Kampelman). Cohen
handled several importantpro bono Indian cases, particularly lawsuits
which established Native Americans' rights to vote (in the last two
states that had denied the franchise to them--New Mexico and
Arizona), and to receive Social Security benefits in states that
denied them such legal rights.
In 1946, Cohen had
begun teaching legislative drafting and legal philosophy at Yale
University's Law School, and jurisprudence at The City College of New
York's Department of Philosophy. Cohen had also taught at the New
School for School Research and the University of Newark Law School
(later Rutgers Law School). In 1951 he publishedReadings in
Jurisprudence and Legal Philosophy, the syllabus which he developed
with his father, Morris R. Cohen, for both their jurisprudence
courses (Morris Cohen at St. John's Law School and Felix Cohen at
Rutgers and the New School for Social Research).
Felix S. Cohen was
born in Manhattan, but grew up in Yonkers, New York. He attended The
City College of New York, received an M.A. in philosophy from Harvard
in 1927 and a Ph.D. from Harvard in 1929. In 1928 Cohen entered
Columbia Law School, graduating in 1931. He married Lucy M. Kramer
that year; they had two daughters. He died at his home in Washington,
D.C., in October 1953. Additional biographical detail can be gleaned
from other material in Series V of this collection. Box 91, folder
1469 contains a brief biography of Felix S. Cohen by his wife.
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