The Judge as POW

Yesterday I attended a tribute to Harold R. Tyler, Jr. at the New York City Bar. Tyler was a legendary figure in his own lifetime, a man of sardonic wit but also an overpowering kindness and humanity. I have never met a man who had a more powerful sense of justice or moral right and wrong. He was the veritable Jungian archetype of a judge. But his greatest service to the nation consisted, under President Ford, of restoring the reputation of a badly tarnished Justice Department in the period just after Watergate when America was undergoing one of its periodic crises of confidence. Tyler was also proud of another US institution: the Army. He served in the artillery in the Second World War, and his father had been a distinguished officer in the Great War.

When I began speaking publicly about questions relating to the Geneva Convention about two years ago, I got a visit from Judge Tyler, not an uncommon occurrence since he was my office next-door neighbor. “I don’t much like to talk about this,” Tyler said, “but in the waning days of World War II, I was taken prisoner by the Germans. I kept thinking to myself: if it weren’t for the fact that we treat the soldiers we take prisoner well, they probably would have shot me. So in a sense I have to thank the Geneva Conventions and our Army traditions for the fact that I’m alive today and didn’t die on that day in Germany. In the end it’s not really a question of some fancy international convention, it’s a question of what’s right and keeping faith with those who wear our service uniform. We have some powerful traditions, and this is one of them. It’s worth fighting for.” But as I subsequently learned, Tyler, with his typical modesty, told only half of the story. In fact, he persuaded the Germans who captured him to surrender and to be his prisoners of war, a feat which brought him to the immediate attention of his commanders. That demonstrates not only extraordinary advocacy but also another important aspect of the American tradition of humane treatment of detainees: it can push a beleaguered foe to surrender.

I am told that he recorded a full account of these incidents as part of an oral history project, which should be published shortly. It will surely make for fascinating reading.