Supreme Court Justices: Demographic Characteristics, Professional Experience, and Legal Education, 1789-2010

Susan Navarro Smelcer
Analyst on the Federal Judiciary

On May 1, 2009, Justice David H. Souter announced his retirement as an Associate Justice when the U.S. Supreme Court recessed for the summer. To fill this vacancy, President Barack Obama selected Sonia Sotomayor, a judge from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. In announcing the nomination, President Obama noted her Ivy League education and extensive judicial experience. President Obama also emphasized Sotomayor's life story, discussing in particular her upbringing as a child of Puerto Rican-born parents in a Bronx housing project. 

The Sotomayor nomination prompted renewed discussion among Senators, media commentators, and scholars regarding racial, ethnic, gender, religious, professional, and educational diversity on the Court. With the upcoming retirement of Justice John Paul Stevens, announced on April 9, 2010, this discussion is likely to be renewed. With his departure, the Court will lose its only protestant Christian member. Justice Stevens is also the only active Justice to have served in the military during wartime. Against the backdrop of recent and pending changes to the Court's composition, this report examines the social, professional, and educational backgrounds of the Justices across the entire history of the Supreme Court. 

Over time, the Supreme Court has become more diverse in some ways and more homogeneous in others. When first constituted, and throughout most of its history, no women or minorities served on the Court. This changed with the appointment of the first African-American Justice, Thurgood Marshall, in 1967, and the first female Justice, Sandra Day O'Connor, in 1981. When Justice Marshall retired from the Court in 1991, he was succeeded by another African-American, Justice Clarence Thomas. Although Justice O'Connor, upon her retirement in 2006, was succeeded by a male, Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr., the Court's membership once again, in August 2009, included two female Justices, upon the confirmation of Sonia Sotomayor. 

The religious affiliations of the Court's members also has changed over time. For almost the first 50 years of the Court, all Justices were affiliated with protestant Christian churches. The first Jewish Justice, Louis Brandeis, was appointed in 1916. Currently, two Jewish Justices, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen G. Breyer, serve on the Court. The first Catholic Justice, Chief Justice Roger Brooke Taney, was appointed in 1836. With the confirmation of Justice Sotomayor, six of the nine current Justices identify as Roman Catholic. 

The career experiences of the Court's Justices, while quite diverse in the past, have become more homogeneous in recent times. Historically, Justices had served in a variety of professions, such as in the Cabinet, in a federal or state legislative body, or in a private legal practice. In the last 50 years, however, Justices have more and more frequently been elevated from positions on the federal circuit courts of appeals. Of the nine current Justices, all possess federal circuit court experience, and six have served as government attorneys in some capacity. No sitting Justice has served in a federal or state Cabinet position or legislature. Justice Sonia Sotomayor brings both experience as a private practitioner and a government attorney and is the only current Justice on the Court to have experience as a federal trial judge. 

Over time, Justices' legal educations have become more homogeneous, as well. In the last 20 years, especially, three Ivy League law schools—Harvard, Yale, and Columbia—have been disproportionately represented on the Court. Of the nine sitting Justices, eight have attended one of these three law schools, including recently confirmed Justice Sotomayor, who is a graduate of Yale Law School.


Date of Report: April 9, 2010
Number of Pages: 36
Order Number: R40802
Price: $29.95

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