The Supreme Court of the United States is the highest ranking judicial body in the United States. Its membership, as set by the Judiciary Act of 1869, consists of the Chief Justice of the United States and eight associate justices, any six of whom would constitute a quorum. Justices are nominated by the President of the United States and appointed after confirmation by the United States Senate. Justices of the Supreme Court have life tenure and receive a salary which is set at $255,500 per year for the chief justice and at $244,400 per year for each associate justice as of 2014.
The Supreme Court was created in 1789 by Article III of the United States Constitution, which stipulated that the "judicial Power of the United States, shall be vested in one supreme Court" together with any lower courts Congress may establish. Congress organized the Court that year with the passage of the Judiciary Act of 1789. It specified the Court's original and appellate jurisdiction, created thirteen judicial districts, and fixed the number of justices at six (one chief justice and five associate justices).
Since 1789, Congress has occasionally altered the size of the Supreme Court, historically in response to the country's own expansion in size. Membership was decreased in 1801 to five, then increased to seven members in 1807, to nine in 1837, and to ten in 1863. It was then reduced to seven in 1866. In 1869, Congress set the Court's size to nine members, where it has remained since.
While the justices of the Supreme Court are appointed for life, many have retired or resigned. Beginning in the early 20th century, many justices who left the Court voluntarily did so by retiring from the Court without leaving the federal judiciary altogether. A retired justice, according to the United States Code, is no longer a member of the Supreme Court, but remains eligible to serve by designation as a judge of a U.S. Court of Appeals or District Court, and many retired justices have served in these capacities. Historically, the average length of service on the Court has been less than 15 years. However, since 1970 the average length of service has increased to about 26 years.
Current Justices of the Supreme Court
There are currently nine justices serving on the Supreme Court; listed in order of seniority, they are:
All Justices of the Supreme Court
Since the Supreme Court was established in 1789, 113 persons have served on the Court. Five individuals in this group were confirmed for associate justice, and later confirmed for chief justice separately. While listed twice, each of them has been assigned only one index number. The justices of the Supreme Court are:
Notes
Timelines
All justices
The graphic below is a timeline depicting the progression of the justices in the United States Supreme Court. Information regarding their seat number, predecessors, successors and fellow justices, as well as their tenure on the court can be gleaned from the timeline. Additionally, the progression of presidents (with the number of justices they nominated) is shown at the top of the timeline to give a more detailed historical context. Three presidents (Taft, F. Roosevelt, and Reagan), in addition to successfully nominating several justices to the court, elevated an associate justice to chief justice. These elevations are counted as nominations, and are designated with a caret(^). Several justices began their terms on the bench after the inauguration of a new president.
This graphical representation of the progression of the High Court allows some otherwise obscure information to be easily noted. For example, Joseph Story (in the early 19th century) and Stephen Breyer (in the late 20th and early 21st centuries) are each noteworthy for serving over 11 years as the court's most junior member. Samuel Blatchford (in the 1880s) served the third longest as the court's most junior member at less than 6 years. Thomas Johnson (1790s), Robert Trimble (1820s) and Arthur Goldberg (1960s) are the only justices to leave the court while still being the court's most junior member. William Rehnquist is unique in that he is the only justice to witness all of his more senior justices leave the court, without witnessing any of his more junior justices leave the court. Hugo Black, in addition to witnessing all eight of his predecessors leave the court, saw 22 new members appointed to the court (his predecessors' eight replacements and 14 others), meaning he worked beside a record thirty justices.
Due to various changes in the size of the Court over the years, not all ten of this chart's associate justice timelines extend to the present day. "Seat 5" was last held by James Wayne until his 1867 death, and "Seat 7" was last held by John Catron until Catron died in 1865. On April 7, 2017, Neil Gorsuch was confirmed by the senate as the replacement for Antonin Scalia, whose seat had remained vacant since his death on February 13, 2016.
Current justices
See also
- Supreme Court of the United States
- List of Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States by court composition
- List of law schools attended by United States Supreme Court Justices
- List of Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States by seat
- List of United States Supreme Court Justices by time in office
- List of law clerks of the Supreme Court of the United States
- List of nominations to the Supreme Court of the United States
- Unsuccessful nominations to the Supreme Court of the United States
- Other
- List of national supreme courts
References
External links
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