Adolf Auguste Berle Jr., assistant Secretary of State, United States of America.

Adolf Auguste Berle Jr., assistant Secretary of State, United States of America. American lawyer and public official, born in Boston. He was a member of the American delegation to the Paris Peace Conference. Resigning in protest against the terms of the Versailles Treaty, Berle returned to practice law in New York City and later, in 1927, became professor of corporate law at Columbia. As a specialist in corporation law and finance, he was a member of Franklin Delano Roosevelts Brain Trust and helped shape much of the banking and securities legislation of the New Deal. As Assistant Secretary of State for Latin American affairs (1938-1944), Berle attended many inter-American conferences and acted as spokesman for Roosevelts Good Neighbor Policy.