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Becker is remembered as 'a judge's judge'

The fun-loving, brief-aholic, piano-playing, El-riding, Daily News aficionado - whose precedent-setting opinions shaped the law of the land - had only one regret: He never hired a law clerk named Adrian.

The late U.S. appeals Judge Edward R. Becker was remembered yesterday in Philadelphia by Supreme Court justices and other prominent figures.
The late U.S. appeals Judge Edward R. Becker was remembered yesterday in Philadelphia by Supreme Court justices and other prominent figures.Read more

The fun-loving, brief-aholic, piano-playing, El-riding,

Daily News

aficionado - whose precedent-setting opinions shaped the law of the land - had only one regret: He never hired a law clerk named Adrian.

Edward R. Becker, senior judge of the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, who died of prostate cancer last May, always said he wanted to call out: "Yo! Adrian."

Yesterday, no fewer than three U.S. Supreme Court justices, the entire Third Circuit Court of Appeals, U.S. District Court justices, U.S. magistrates, former federal law clerks, and lawyers, family and friends fondly recalled Becker as a brilliant jurist who never forgot his Philadelphia roots.

For nearly 90 minutes in the ceremonial courtroom in the U.S. District Courthouse, moderator U.S. Supreme Court Justice David H. Souter solicited anecdotes about Becker's endearing, sometimes quirky mannerisms from those who loved him.

U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter said he and Becker became lifelong friends after meeting on the El as undergraduates at the University of Pennsylvania, attending Yale Law School and marrying best friends from Olney High School.

The day after Becker's 1970 appointment to the federal bench, at a Specter family gathering, Becker drank an odd-tasting coffee from a silver urn - filled with a toxic preservative to keep the heirloom shining.

Talking to the poison hotline, Becker feared his might be "the shortest tenure in the history of the federal court," recalled Specter.

Not so. Becker wrote more than 2,000 opinions, many precedent-setting, during his 36-year career, including a 502-page opus prefaced with a table of contents.

In 1981, he was elevated to the Third Circuit by President Ronald Reagan, and Becker served as chief judge from 1998 to 2003.

His Third Circuit successor, Chief Judge Anthony J. Scirica, called him the "heart and soul of the court, a proud native son, steeped in [Philadelphia's] neighborhoods, its history and its dreams."

Becker's philosophy was: "Whatever court you sit on, at the end of the day, some human being is going to be affected by what you do," Scirica added.

Becker read every opinion the Third Circuit published, sometimes calling a judge to point out that "on Page 67, in a footnote number on line three, there's a typo," said Supreme Court Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr., who served on the Third Circuit with Becker.

Alito called Becker his mentor - "a judge's judge." He looked forward to Becker's phone calls on legal issues, his latest projects and his multifaceted life.

"He was the hardest-working person I have ever known," added Alito, with tears in his eyes. "His work was a labor of love."

Becker read legal documents wherever he was: on the El, in the Caribbean surf and on a boat en route to snorkel. He also loved to have fun, showing up at the end of a U.S. Supreme Court term to play the piano and sing old standbys during the era of Chief Justice William Rehnquist.

Souter said he was entrusted with the duty to get him back on the train bound for Philadelphia, but there was "always one more song."

His law clerks followed him to his son's soccer games, where he kept one eye on the game while discussing a case's intricacies.

They learned how to answer the phone - to find out if the love of his life was on the other end, recalled law-clerk-turned-lawyer Paul Fishman.

Each year, Becker invited his three newest law clerks to become part of his extended family. He was devoted to his wife, Flora, a lawyer; his son Jonathan, a New York City teacher; a daughter, Susan, an assistant U.S. attorney in the civil division; and his son Charles, or "Chip," now with the Kline & Specter law firm.

His 97 law clerks created the Becker Fellowship at Yale for law students to do public-service law in the summer in Philadelphia, recalled his daughter, who keeps her dad in her heart.

Becker's passion for Philadelphia and the common man knew no bounds. Besides working with Specter on asbestos legislation, he also headed a campaign with Ann Meredith, then head of Lights of Liberty, to reopen Chestnut Street by Independence Mall, after it was closed for security reasons after 9/11.

Reopened just days before his death, the street where America's founding fathers signed the Declaration of Independence is now called Edward R. Becker Way. *