Everyone knows that Justice Byron White was a noted professional football player; but now I learn from a reader that when Chief Justice John Marshall was a young lieutenant during the Revolutionary War, he was known for his “athletic prowess in footraces and jumping contests” and was supposedly able to “leap over obstacles six feet high.” (See Joseph Ellis, His Excellency 199 (2004).) The latter assertion strikes me as pretty improbable, but I pass it along for whatever it’s worth . . . .
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