Louis Brandeis was born in Louisville, Kentucky in 1856 to a family tolerant of Jewish and Christian rituals. In later life Brandeis might be best described as a secular環umanist. Although he completed his secondary education in Germany, he returned to the United States where he studied law at Harvard. After settling in Boston, Brandeis became a successful lawyer spending a good deal of his time pursuing cases with a political bent. In particular, he enjoyed representing small companies against giant corporations, and aiding the cause of the minimum wage against companies opposed to this principle. In 1912, he supported Woodrow Wilson's nomination for Presidency and in 1916, was appointed a Supreme Court judge, the first Jew ever to be appointed to this position. Brandeis showed little interest in Jewish affairs until the turn of the century when a combination of his professional work and a changing political climate brought about an alteration. He was introduced to Zionism by Jacob de Haas, an English Zionist, and later still by Aaron Aaronsohn, the Palestinian botanist and founder of Nili. Brandeis became active in Zionist affairs during the First World War, when he accepted the role of Chairperson of the Provisional Executive Committee for General Zionist Affairs. Brandeis had a major impact on the American branch of the Zionist movement, drawing to it a number of sympathizers, improving its organization and its finance.