[1] On February 19, 1958, Matthes was nominated by President Dwight D. Eisenhower to a seat on the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit vacated by Judge Charles Evans Whittaker.
[1] Just five months into his federal judicial service, Judge Matthes authored the opinion of the Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, sitting en banc, in Aaron v. Cooper, 257 F.2d 33 (8th Cir.
[2] In reversing the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas, the Eighth Circuit held that incidents in Little Rock, which stemmed from widespread community opposition to public school integration and that negatively impacted normal educational processes, were not enough to legally justify suspending the integration plan previously ordered by the federal courts.
"We say the time has not yet come in these United States when an order of a Federal Court must be whittled away, watered down, or shamefully withdrawn in the face of violent and unlawful acts of individual citizens in opposition thereto," he wrote.
The Supreme Court unanimously affirmed the Eighth Circuit's judgment in a landmark opinion jointly authored by all nine Justices.