District attorney in the context of "Roe v. Wade"

Thomas Edmund Dewey (March 24, 1902 – March 16, 1971) was an American lawyer and politician who served as the 47th governor of New York from 1943 to 1954. He was the Republican Party's nominee for president of the United States in 1944 and 1948, losing the former election to Franklin D. Roosevelt and the latter election to Harry S. Truman in a major upset.

As a New York City prosecutor and District Attorney in the 1930s and early 1940s, Dewey was relentless in his effort to curb the power of the American Mafia and of organized crime in general. Most famously, he successfully prosecuted Mafia boss Charles "Lucky" Luciano on charges of forced prostitution in 1936. Luciano was given a 30- to 50-year prison sentence. He also prosecuted and convicted Waxey Gordon, another prominent New York City gangster and bootlegger, on charges of tax evasion. Dewey almost succeeded in apprehending mobster Dutch Schultz as well, but Schultz was murdered in 1935, in a hit ordered by the Commission.

Henry Morgenthau Jr. (/ˈmɔːrɡənθɔː/; May 11, 1891 – February 6, 1967) was the United States Secretary of the Treasury during most of the administration of Franklin D. Roosevelt. He played a major role in designing and financing the New Deal. After 1937, while still in charge of the Treasury, he played the central role in financing the United States participation in World War II. He also played an increasingly major role in shaping foreign policy, especially with respect to Lend-Lease, support for China, helping Jewish refugees, and proposing (in the "Morgenthau Plan") measures to deindustrialize Germany.

Morgenthau was the father of Robert M. Morgenthau, who was district attorney of Manhattan for 35 years; Henry Morgenthau III, an American author and television producer; and noted pediatrician Dr. Joan Morganthau Hirschhorn. He continued as Treasury secretary through the first few months of Harry Truman's presidency, and from June 27, 1945, to July 3, 1945, following the resignation of Secretary of State Edward Stettinius Jr., was next in line to the presidency. Morgenthau was the only Jew to be next in line to the presidency in the presidential line of succession.

Two-Face is a supervillain appearing in American comic books published by DC Comics. The character was created by Bob Kane, and first appeared in Detective Comics #66 (August 1942). He has become one of the superhero Batman's most enduring enemies belonging to the collective of adversaries that make up his rogues gallery.

In his comic book appearances, Two-Face is the alter ego of Harvey Dent, Gotham City's former district attorney who becomes a criminal mastermind obsessed with duality and the number two. Half of his face is hideously scarred after mob boss Sal Maroni throws acid at him. The resulting disfigurement drives him insane and causes him to make decisions based on the flip of a coin. The Modern Age of Comic Books portrays the character as having dissociative identity disorder, with Two-Face being an alternate personality that developed as a result of childhood abuse. The modern version is also established as having once been an ally of Batman and Commissioner James Gordon, and a close friend of Batman's secret identity, Bruce Wayne.

Kamala Devi Harris (/ˈkɑːmələ ˈdeɪvi/ KAH-mə-lə DAY-vee; born October 20, 1964) is an American politician and attorney who served as the 49th vice president of the United States from 2021 to 2025 under President Joe Biden. She is the first female, first African American, and first Asian American U.S. vice president, and the highest-ranking female and Asian American official in U.S. history. Harris represented California in the U.S. Senate from 2017 to 2021 and was the attorney general of California from 2011 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, she was the party's nominee in the 2024 presidential election.

Born in Oakland, California, Harris graduated from Howard University and the University of California, Hastings College of the Law. She began her law career in the office of the district attorney of Alameda County. Harris was recruited to the San Francisco District Attorney's Office and later to the office of the city attorney of San Francisco. She was elected district attorney of San Francisco in 2003 and attorney general of California in 2010, and reelected as attorney general in 2014.

The United States attorney for the District of Columbia (USADC) is responsible for representing the federal government in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia. The U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Columbia has two divisions, the Civil Division and the Criminal Division. The Civil Division is responsible for representing federal agencies in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia and in appeals before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. The Criminal Division prosecutes federal crimes in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, including cases involving national security, public corruption, violent crime, and narcotics trafficking.

Unlike the states, the District of Columbia is under the exclusive jurisdiction of the U.S. Congress. By statute, the U.S. attorney is responsible for prosecuting both federal crimes and all serious crimes committed by adults in the District of Columbia. Therefore, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia serves as both the federal prosecutor (as in the other 92 U.S. attorneys' offices) and as the local district attorney. The attorney general of the District of Columbia, who is elected by the people of the district, handles local civil litigation and minor infractions, comparable with a city attorney.

Hiram Warren Johnson (September 2, 1866 – August 6, 1945) was an American attorney and politician who served as the 23rd governor of California from 1911 to 1917 and represented California in the U.S. Senate for five terms from 1917 to 1945. Johnson achieved national prominence in the early 20th century as a leading progressive and ran for vice president on Theodore Roosevelt's Progressive ticket in the 1912 presidential election. As a U.S. senator, Johnson voted for American entry into World War I and was later a critic of the foreign policy of both Woodrow Wilson and Franklin D. Roosevelt. Johnson was the only governor of his state from 1856 until 1943 to serve more than one term.

Johnson was born in 1866 and worked as a stenographer and reporter before embarking on a legal career in his hometown of Sacramento. After he moved to San Francisco, he worked as an assistant district attorney and gained statewide renown for his prosecutions of public corruption. On the back of this popularity, Johnson won the 1910 California gubernatorial election with the backing of the progressive Lincoln–Roosevelt League. He instituted several progressive reforms, establishing a railroad commission and introducing aspects of direct democracy, such as the power to recall state officials. Having joined with Theodore Roosevelt and other progressives to form the Progressive Party, Johnson won the party's 1912 vice-presidential nomination. In one of the best third-party performances in U.S. history, the ticket finished second nationally in the popular and electoral votes.

Henry Menasco Wade (November 11, 1914 – March 1, 2001) was an American lawyer who served as district attorney of Dallas County from 1951 to 1987. He participated in two notable U.S. court cases of the 20th century: the prosecution of Jack Ruby for killing Lee Harvey Oswald, and the U.S. Supreme Court case that held abortion was a constitutional right, Roe v. Wade. In addition, Wade was district attorney when Randall Dale Adams, the subject of the 1988 documentary film The Thin Blue Line, was wrongfully convicted in the murder of Robert Wood, a Dallas police officer. After his term and death, he was criticised for his corruption, ranging from wrongful convictions, to attitudes and certain comments on race, in addition to some decisions such as execution of innocent men.