Saturday, September 19, 2020

Supreme Court Historical Trivia: Dying in office

With the passing of Justice Ginsburg there has been much discussion about her refusal to resign, presumably in an effort to deny President Trump the opportunity to appoint her successor. And it has been noted that since 1953 Ginsburg is just the fourth Supreme Court justice to die on the bench. The others being Justice Scalia in 2016, Chief Justice Rehnquist in 2005, and Justice Robert Jackson all the way back in 1954.

But a look at the history of the court suggests retirement as the norm for justices is fairly new. Prior to the 1950s and especially in the 19th century, it was extremely common, arguably normative, for justices to remain on the job for life. To date there have been 114 Justices of the Supreme Court. What follows is a list of the 52 who died in office in the order they were appointed to the high court.

William Cushing

James Wilson

James Iredell

William Paterson

John Rutledge

Samuel Chase

Bushrod Washington

John Marshall

William Johnson

Henry Brockholst Livingston

Thomas Todd

Joseph Story

Smith Thompson

Robert Trimble

John McLean

Henry Baldwin

James Moore Wayne

Roger B. Taney

Philip Pendleton Barbour

John Catron

John McKinley

Peter Vivian Daniel

Levi Woodbury

Nathan Clifford

Samuel Freeman Miller

Salmon P. Chase

Joseph P. Bradley

Morrison Waite

John Marshall Harlan

William Burnham Woods

Stanley Matthews

Horace Gray

Samuel Blatchford

Lucius Quintus
Cincinnatus Lamar II

Melville Fuller

David Josiah Brewer

Howell Edmunds Jackson

Rufus W. Peckham

Horace Harmon Lurton

Edward Douglass White

Joseph Rucker Lamar

Pierce Butler

Edward Terry Sanford

Benjamin N. Cardozo

Frank Murphy

Harlan F. Stone

Robert H. Jackson

Wiley Blount Rutledge

Fred M. Vinson

William Rehnquist

Antonin Scalia

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

3 comments:

The Anti-Gnostic said...

A more realistic aspiration would have been to retire and let Obama pick her successor.

The Anti-Gnostic said...

A more realistic aspiration would have been to retire and let Obama pick her successor.

John (Ad Orientem) said...

My guess is that this proved to be the single greatest regret of her life.