Walter Parker Stacy was chief justice of the North Carolina Supreme Court

North Carolina Supreme Court

The Supreme Court of North Carolina is the state's highest appellate court. Until the creation of the North Carolina Court of Appeals in the 1960s, it was the state's only appellate court. The Supreme Court consists of six associate justices and one chief justice, although the number of justices...

 from 1925 until his death in 1951.

Stacy was a 1908 graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill is a public research university located in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, United States...

, where a scholarship for law students was later established in his memory. He was president of the UNC General Alumni Association in 1925.

Governor Angus Wilton McLean

Angus Wilton McLean

Angus Wilton McLean was a lawyer and banker who was the 56th Governor of the U.S. state of North Carolina from 1925 to 1929...

 appointed Stacy chief justice after the resignation of William A. Hoke. In 1926, Stacy was elected to continue in the post over Republican James J. Britt.

While Stacy was serving as chief justice, President Franklin D. Roosevelt

Franklin D. Roosevelt

Franklin Delano Roosevelt , also known by his initials, FDR, was the 32nd President of the United States and a central figure in world events during the mid-20th century, leading the United States during a time of worldwide economic crisis and world war...

 appointed him to serve on key boards, including the National Steel Labor Relations Board and the Textile Labor Relations Board. In 1937, Roosevelt closely considered Stacy for an opening on the U.S. Supreme Court but in the end the appointment went to Hugo L. Black. Later, President Harry S. Truman

Harry S. Truman

Harry S. Truman was the 33rd President of the United States . As President Franklin D. Roosevelt's third vice president and the 34th Vice President of the United States , he succeeded to the presidency on April 12, 1945, when President Roosevelt died less than three months after beginning his...

 appointed Stacy to a fact-finding board to consider a labor dispute between General Motors

General Motors

General Motors Company , commonly known as GM, formerly incorporated as General Motors Corporation, is an American multinational automotive corporation headquartered in Detroit, Michigan and the world's second-largest automaker in 2010...

 and the United Auto Workers

United Auto Workers

The International Union, United Automobile, Aerospace and Agricultural Implement Workers of America, better known as the United Auto Workers , is a labor union which represents workers in the United States and Puerto Rico, and formerly in Canada. Founded as part of the Congress of Industrial...

  and to a board on labor problems in government-possessed mines.

Quotations

• "...men have gone to war and cut each other’s throats because they couldn’t agree as to what was to become of them after their throats were cut.”