{{short description|American lawyer}} {{inline|date=May 2026}} {{Infobox officeholder | name =Irving Howard Saypol | image = Irving Howard Saypol circa 1950.jpg | caption = | birth_date = {{Birth date|1905|9|3}} | birth_place =Lower East Side<br />Manhattan, New York City | death_date = {{Death date and age|1977|6|30|1905|9|3}} |education = St. Lawrence University<br />Brooklyn Law School | death_place =Manhattan, New York City | other_names = | order = | office =New York Supreme Court Justice | term_start =1952 | term_end =1968 | appointer = | predecessor = | successor = | office2 =United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York | term_start2 =1949 | term_end2 =1951 | appointer2 = | predecessor2 = John F. X. McGohey | successor2 = Myles J. Lane |spouse =Adele D. Kaplan }}
'''Irving Howard Saypol''' (September 3, 1905 – June 30, 1977) was a United States attorney for the Southern District of New York and a New York Supreme Court Justice. He directed several high-profile prosecutions of Communists, including the cases of Alger Hiss, William Remington, Abraham Brothman, and Julius and Ethel Rosenberg.<ref name=obit/><ref name=stick>{{cite news|title=A Stickler for Decorum – Irving Howard Saypol|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1965/01/07/archives/a-stickler-for-decorum-irving-howard-saypol.html|access-date=4 March 2018|work=New York Times|date=January 7, 1965|page=23}}</ref>
==Early life and education== He was born on September 3, 1905, one of four sons of Louis and Michakin Saypol, an American Jewish family, on the Lower East Side of Manhattan.<ref name=obit/><ref name=stick/><ref>{{Cite web|first=Ronald |last=Radosh |title=Cold Case: Ethel and Julius Rosenberg |publisher=The Tablet|date=March 29, 2011 |url=https://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-news-and-politics/62998/cold-case |quote=The Rosenberg case was a family affair—almost everyone involved was Jewish: the Rosenbergs and the Greenglasses, those who became government witnesses against the two couples, as well as the prosecutors, Myles Lane, Irving Saypol, and Roy Cohn, and the justice who presided at the trial, Irving Kaufman}}</ref>
He attended night classes at Brooklyn Law School, where he met fellow student Adele B. Kaplan; they married in September 1925. She was a year ahead of him, and he graduated in 1927.<ref name=obit/><ref name=stick/> They both became attorneys;<ref name="Robit"/> he was admitted to the bar in 1928.<ref name=fjc>{{cite web|url=https://www.fjc.gov/sites/default/files/trials/Rosenberg_Trial.pdf |title=The Rosenberg Trial |last=Kobrick |first=Jake |publisher= Federal Judicial Center|date=2013}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|url=https://heinonline.org/HOL/LandingPage?handle=hein.journals/briephid62&div=4&id=&page=|title = Issue 1|journal = Brief|volume = 62|page = 1}}</ref> They had three children together, a daughter and twin sons.<ref name=stick/>
==Career== After working for a period for the City Corporation Counsel after law school, Irving Saypol established his own practice. In 1945 he was appointed as Chief Assistant United States Attorney, and four years later to the top position in the region as the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York.<ref name=stick/><ref name=obit>{{Cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1977/07/01/archives/justice-irving-h-saypol-71-dies-rosenberg-spytrial-prosecutor.html|title = Justice Irving H. Saypol, 71, Dies; Rosenberg Spy-Trial Prosecutor|newspaper = The New York Times|date = July 1977|last1 = Goldstein|first1 = Tom}}</ref> Irving Saypol led the prosecution of several members of the Communist Party of the United States (CPUSA), including Eugene Dennis, William Z. Foster, John Gates, Robert G. Thompson, Gus Hall, William Remington, Abraham Brothman, and Miriam Moskowitz. As a result of these prosecutions, ''Time'' described Saypol as "the nation's number one legal hunter of top communists."<ref>{{cite book |first=David |last=Caute |title=The Great Fear: Anti-Communist Purge under Truman and Eisenhower |location=New York |publisher=Simon & Schuster |year=1978 |isbn=0-671-22682-7 |page=63 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=u46aAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA63 }}</ref>
From 1950 to 1951 Saypol served as Chief Prosecutor for the federal government in the espionage case against Julius and Ethel Rosenberg and Morton Sobell.<ref>{{cite news |agency=Associated Press |title=Saypol Appointed U.S. Attorney Here |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1950/01/07/archives/saypol-appointed-us-attorney-here-us-attorney-here.html |newspaper=New York Times |date=January 7, 1950 }}</ref>
Saypol was elected in 1951 to a 14-year term on the New York Supreme Court, serving from 1952 until 1968. Saypol was one of 14 judges indicted by a special prosecutor. Appointed to investigate police corruption, this prosecutor pursued the judiciary as well.<ref name=Lewis>{{cite news|title= The Zeal of Maurice Nadjari|last= Lewis |first=Anthony |work=New York Times|date= 28 March 1976}}</ref> None of the prosecutions were successful; in Saypol's case the court found that the allegation of $125 bribery, as stated in the indictment, was unsubstantiated. The opinion states: "Taken as a whole, the evidence not only does not establish a legal basis for a charge of bribery, but clearly confirms that there was no bribe."<ref> (Decision of Justice Leonard H. Sandler, ''People v. Sandler'', Indictment No. 1875/76, 87/76, p. 9.</ref>
In 1975 Saypol ruled against the landmark designation for Grand Central Terminal in New York City. This would have removed legal barriers to the construction of a 59-story office tower on top of the terminal.<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1975/01/22/archives/grand-central-landmark-status-voided.html|title=Grand Central Landmark Status Voided|last=Goldberger|first=Paul|date=1975-01-22|work=The New York Times|access-date=2017-07-05|language=en-US|issn=0362-4331}}</ref> Following the demolition of historic Penn Station, this project helped catalyze the historic preservation movement in New York, and more historic buildings were protected from such intrusions. Saypol's decision was roundly and widely criticized by the legal community, and was overturned by three higher courts, including the Supreme Court of the United States in ''Penn Central Transportation Co. v. New York City''.<ref>''Penn Central Transportation Co. v. New York City'', 438 U.S. 104 (1978).</ref>
==Death==
Saypol died from cancer on June 30, 1977, at his home at 152 East 94th Street in Manhattan.<ref name=obit/> At his funeral Judge Charles D. Breitel said, "He had an outstanding career and was happily married for 52 years. What more could a person ask for?"<ref name=obit/>
==Legacy== One of his sons, Ronald Dietz Saypol, became an attorney and businessman. He married Cynthia Otis, a granddaughter of Joshua Lionel Cowen, co-founder of Lionel Corporation.<ref name="Robit">{{cite news |title=Ronald Saypol dies at 85; led model-train maker Lionel into retailing |date=December 8, 2014 |work=Los Angeles Times |url=http://www.latimes.com/local/obituaries/la-me-ronald-saypol-20141209-story.html }}</ref>
Grand Central Terminal has been renovated and expanded several times.
==References== {{Reflist}}
==Sources== *[http://politicalgraveyard.com/bio/sawyers-sayward.html The Political Graveyard: Index to Politicians: Sawyers to Saywell] *[http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/FTrials/Rosenb/ROS_BSAY.HTM Biographies of Participants in the Rosenbergs Trial] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090426090124/http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/rosenb/ROS_BSAY.HTM |date=2009-04-26 }}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Saypol, Irving H.}} Category:1905 births Category:1977 deaths Category:20th-century American Jews Category:Julius and Ethel Rosenberg Category:New York (state) lawyers Category:People from the Lower East Side Category:Brooklyn Law School alumni Category:United States attorneys for the Southern District of New York Category:New York Supreme Court justices Category:20th-century American lawyers