Supreme Court of the United States

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The U.S. Supreme Court Building in Washington, D.C.

The Supreme Court of the United States of America is the highest federal court in the United States. It consists of nine justices, including a Chief Justice and eight associate justices. Justices are nominated by the President and confirmed by the Senate. Article Three of the U.S. Constitution defines the original and appellate jurisdiction of the Supreme Court, which includes appeals of federal and state cases and trials of cases where a State or foreign ambassador is a party, although the Eleventh Amendment somewhat limits the jurisdiction of federal courts. There is no constitutional specification of how many justices make up the Court, and Congress increased the number as the nation grew.

History

For more information, see: History of the Supreme Court of the United States.


Establishment

The Supreme Court is the only court that is provided for specifically in the Constitution, which, in Article III section 1, vests the United States government's judicial power in "one Supreme Court, and in such inferior courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain and establish."

In the Judiciary Act of 1789, Congress determined that the Supreme Court would consist of a chief justice and five associate justices. The Supreme Court justices would meet in the national capital for two sessions each year and, when not in session, "ride circuit" to serve on intermediate appellate courts in the rest of the country.

From the John Jay Court to the John Marshall Court

The Taney Court

The Chase Court and the Waite Court

Melvin W. Fuller, Edward D. White, and William Howard Taft

The 1930s and FDR’s Court-Packing Plan

Earl Warren and Warren Burger

The Rehnquist Court

The Current Court

(PD) Photo: Steve Petteway
The Current Court

The current Chief Justice is John G. Roberts, Jr., whom George W. Bush appointed in September 2005. Roberts is a Harvard-trained lawyer and former Associate Counsel to the President.

The current associate Justices include:

Supreme Court Justices

Appointing Presidents Chief Justices Associate Justices
George Washington John Jay (1789-1795)

John Rutledge (1795-1795)
Oliver Ellsworth (1796-1801)

John Rutledge (1789)

William Cushing (1789)
James Wilson (1789)
John Blair (1789)
James Iredell (1790)
Thomas Johnson (1791)
William Paterson (1793)
Samuel Chase (1796)

John Adams John Marshall (1801-1836) Bushrod Washington (1798)

Alfred Moore (1799)

Thomas Jefferson William Johnson (1804)

Brockholst Livingston (1806)
Thomas Todd (1807)

James Madison Gabriel Duvall (1811)

Joseph Story (1811)

James Monroe Smith Thompson (1823)
John Quincy Adams Robert Trimble (1826)
Andrew Jackson Roger Brooke Taney (1836-1864) John McLean (1829)

Henry Baldwin (1830)
James M. Wayne (1835)
Philip P. Barbour (1836)

Martin Van Buren John Catron (1837)

John McKinley (1837)
Peter V. Daniel (1841)

John Tyler Samuel Nelson (1845)
James K. Polk Levi Woodbury (1845)

Robert C. Grier (1846)

Millard Fillmore Benjamin R. Curtis (1851)
Franklin Pierce John A. Campbell (1853)
James Buchanan Nathan Clifford (1858)
Abraham Lincoln Salmon P. Chase (1864-1874) Noah H. Swayne (1862)

Samuel F. Miller (1862)
David Davis (1862)
Stephen J. Field (1863)

Ulysses S. Grant Morrison R. Waite (1874-1888) William Strong (1870)

Joseph P. Bradley (1870)
Ward Hunt (1872)

Rutherford B. Hayes John Marshall Harlan (1877)

William B. Woods (1880)

James A. Garfield Stanley Matthews (1881)
Chester A. Arthur Horace Gray (1881)

Samuel Blatchford (1882)

Grover Cleveland (first term) Melville W. Fuller (1888-1910) Lucius Q.C. Lamar
Benjamin Harrison David J. Brewer (1889)

Henry B. Brown
George Shiras, Jr.
Howell Jackson

Grover Cleveland (second term) Edward Douglass White (1894-1910; then Chief Justice)

Rufuss W. Peckham (1895)

William McKinley Joseph McKenna (1898)
Theodore Roosevelt Oliver Wendell Holmes (1902)

William R. Day (1903)
William H. Moody (1906)

William Howard Taft Edward Douglass White (1910-1921) Horace H. Lurton (1909)

Charles Evans Hughes (1910-1930; then Chief Justice)
Willis Van Devanter (1910)
Joseph R. Lamar (1910)
Mahlon Pitney (1912)

Woodrow Wilson James C. McReynolds (1914)

Louis D. Brandeis (1916)
John H. Clarke

Warren G. Harding William Howard Taft (1921-1930) George Sutherland (1922)

Pierce Butler (1922)
Edward T. Sanford (1923)

Calvin Coolidge Harlan Fiske Stone (1925-1941; then Chief Justice)
Herbert Hoover Charles Evan Hughes (1930-1941) Owen J. Roberts (1930)

Benjamin N. Cardozo

Franklin D. Roosevelt Harlan Fiske Stone (1941-1946) Hugo L. Black (1937)

Stanley Forman Reed (1938)
Felix Frankfurter (1939)
William O. Douglas (1939)
Frank Murphey (1940)
James F. Byrnes (1941)
Robert H. Jackson (1941)
Wiley B. Rutledge (1943)

Harry S. Truman Fred M. Vinson (1946-1953) Harold H. Burton (1945)

Thomas C. Clark (1949)
Sherman Minton (1949)

Dwight D. Eisenhower Earl Warren (1953-1969) John Marshall Harlan (1955)

William J. Brennan, Jr. (1956)

John F. Kennedy Byron R. White (1962)

Arthur J. Goldberg (1962)

Lyndon B. Johnson Abe Fortas (1965)

Thurgood Marshall (1967)

Richard M. Nixon Warren E. Burger (1969-1986) Harry A. Blackmun (1970)

Lewis F. Powell, Jr. (1971)
William H. Rehnquist (1971-1986; then Chief Justice)

Gerald R. Ford John Paul Stevens (1975)
Ronald Reagan William H. Rehnquist (1986-2005) Sandra Day O'Connor (1981-2006)

Antonin Scalia (1986-)
Anthony M. Kennedy (1988-)

George H.W. Bush David H. Souter (1990-2009)

Clarence Thomas (1991)

Bill Clinton Ruth Bader Ginsburg (1993-)

Stephen G. Breyer (1994-)

George W. Bush John G. Roberts (2005-) Samuel Alito (2006-)
Barack Obama Sonia Sotomayor (2009-)

Notes