Robert A. Grant

Who was Robert A. Grant?

Robert Allen Grant was a U.S. Representative from Indiana, and later a United States federal judge.

Born near Bourbon, Indiana, Grant moved to Hamlet, Indiana, in 1912 and to South Bend, Indiana, in 1922. He attended the public schools and received an A.B., cum laude, from the University of Notre Dame in 1928, and a J.D., also cum laude, from Notre Dame Law School in 1930. He was admitted to the bar in 1930 and commenced practice in South Bend. He married Margaret A. McLaren on September 17, 1933. He was a deputy prosecuting attorney of St. Joseph County, Indiana, in 1935 and 1936, returning to private practice until 1938.

Grant was elected as a Republican to the Seventy-sixth and to the four succeeding Congresses. He was an unsuccessful candidate for reelection to the Eighty-first Congress in 1948, and resumed the practice of law in South Bend.

On August 21, 1957, Grant was nominated by President Dwight D. Eisenhower to a seat on the United States District Court for the Northern District of Indiana vacated by W. Lynn Parkinson. Grant was confirmed by the United States Senate on August 22, 1957, and received his commission on August 26, 1957. He served as chief judge from 1961 to 1972, assuming senior status on December 1, 1972. In 1976, he was appointed by Chief Justice Warren Burger to the United States Temporary Emergency Court of Appeals. He was also a visiting judge for twelve terms of the United States District Court for the District of Puerto Rico. On September 25, 1992, the divisional courthouse for South Bend was rededicated as the Robert A. Grant Federal Building and United States Courthouse. Grant continued to serve in senior status until his death in 1998, in Sarasota, Florida.