On January 27, Justice Stephen Breyer announced his retirement from the Supreme Court after over 27 years in the position. The decision opens up a spot for President Joe Biden to place a justice that aligns with his party’s political views that, depending on the justice’s age, could serve for a very long time. Biden announced that he plans on replacing Breyer with the Supreme Court’s first Black woman, a historic first and attempt to diversify the United States’ top court.
Breyer became interested in law early on during his childhood and was exposed to his legal counsel father and public service mother, according to his biography on Oyez.org. He graduated Stanford University in 1959, furthered his education at Oxford University and pursued law at Harvard Law School. He then became a law clerk for Justice Arthur Goldburg, former Supreme Court justice, and held many other prestigious titles until finally being nominated for the Court himself by former President Bill Clinton in 1994.
While on the court, Breyer’s reasoning was described as pragmatic, always taking into account how laws will impact the people they were written for. Social Science teacher Brandon Burmeister also described Breyer’s reasoning as practical and beneficial to the court.
“Breyer was great at reminding people that these decisions are not just philosophical, and they affect the lives of Americans,” Burmeister said.
His position on the court also influenced many pivotal cases in U.S. history. As one of two Jewish justices on the bench, Breyer held a different perspective from the majority Catholic group. He uses a practical interpretation of the law that changes over time and measures the real life impact of decisions. On multiple cases regarding religion, he sided differently depending on the consequences and legal precedents because of this ideology.
“That type of pragmatism or pragmatic voice, I think, is really important on the bench,” Burmeister said.
The process of replacing a justice typically takes about three months, although some recent nominations were rushed due to a high number of justices leaving in the previous president’s term. According to Burmeister, it typically starts with the current president unofficially leaking potential names to the press to gauge the general reaction of the public. Once a single nominee has been determined, the president will announce the nominee’s name in an official speech.
This nominee then goes to the Senate Judiciary Committee, which leads to individual questioning by members of the Senate and then a live round of questioning. Burmeister said that the attitude of the questions varies based on whether or not the nominee is changing the political majority of the court.
“If you have this [Senate hearing] where it’s really not going to change the power dynamics on the court, you might see a little bit more bipartisanship about philosophy and judicial [questions],” Burmeister said.
The questioning during this Senate hearing is important because the only way to remove a justice once they are nominated is by impeachment, which is extremely rare and difficult to do. Burmeister said that because of this, some questions do not relate to the job at all and rather aim to attack a justice’s personal life.
“They go into all of it,” Burmeister said. “Personal issues, they’re looking for red flags, they’re looking for everything. This is a serious [process], and it’s a really arduous process.”
The nominees that have been leaked for this new opening include Black women, all of which are highly qualified according to Burmeister.
Eighth grader Nikhil Daniel is a debate competitor who is well-versed in current events such as this nomination. He said that he is looking forward to the new representation in the court system to show off a more realistic representation of the diversity of the American population.
“By issuing in somebody that is a woman of color, it does help show the diversity of the court system and the diversity of Americans since our court should show the values of the people of the United States,” Daniel said.
Daniel also believes that specifically choosing a justice with race and diversity in mind is important and that all candidates are always selected based fully on merit.
“Merit is always there when you’re selecting a Supreme Court justice, but also showing the melting pot that is America within our court system is necessary,” Daniel said.
The Supreme Court of the United States is supposed to be a representation of the country’s diversity in the population. Yet the current court is 80% white, 66% catholic, and 66% conservative, but the population of the United States is less than 62% white, 20% catholic, and about 50% conservative. Burmeister believes that this disproportionate amount of representation is not how the court should look if its goal is to represent the American people.
“If our job is to create a judicial court that looks like America, then it should have these different groups represented,” Burmeister said.
