[1] At the recommendation of United States Senator James L. Buckley,[1] Van Graafeiland was nominated by President Gerald Ford on December 11, 1974, to a seat on the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit located in New York City and vacated by Judge Henry Friendly.
[3] Van Graafeiland was among the first federal judges to challenge the constitutionality of affirmative action regulations that involved quotas.
"[4] In a 1978 case, Van Graafeiland endorsed stringent narcotics laws adopted under Governor Nelson A. Rockefeller.
That appeal reversed a decision by Judge Constance Baker Motley of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, who had previously ruled that New York State sentences of up to life in prison for the sale of small amounts of narcotics were unconstitutionally severe.
[4] In other opinions, Van Graafeiland criticized mandatory sentencing laws as inhuman, affirmed the rights of musicians to deduct the costs of practice rooms from their taxes in a ruling against the Internal Revenue Service (Drucker v. Commissioner, 1983), and found that the Muppets did not libel Spam (Hormel Foods Corporation v. Jim Henson Productions, 1986).