The Supreme Court of the United States is regarded as the highest judicial body in the country. The United States Supreme Court leads the federal judiciary and administers various rulings on violations of legal code.

The Supreme Court consists of the Chief Justice of the United States and eight Associate Justices; the Associate Justices are nominated by the President of the United States and confirmed by majority vote of the Senate. 

The History of the Supreme Court is organized based on era; these particular eras are named after the Chief Justice of that particular time frame. 

The earliest Courts within the Supreme Court were run under Chief Justices, Rutledge, Jay and Ellsworth during 1789-1801. At this time, the Supreme Court heard few cases; furthermore the Court initially lacked a home and any sense of real prestige.

The Supreme Court, and the prestige or reputation attached, dramatically altered during the Marshall Court (1801-1835). During this era, the Supreme Court was declared the supreme arbiter of the United States Constitution. The Marshall Court made several important rulings which gave shape and substance to the constitutional balance of power between the federal government and the states.

 As time passed, the Supreme Court gained administrative and authoritative power and through its numerous court decisions, laid the interpretative framework for which the United States Constitution was built off. Presently, during the Roberts Court, the Supreme Court has dealt with many issues concerning anti-trust legislation, abortion, the death penalty, the Fourth Amendment, free speech of high school students as well as government employees, military detainees, voting rights, school desegregation, and campaign financing. 

The United States Supreme Court is one of the three branches of the federal government. The United States Supreme Court is sometimes also known as the High Court. The ruling of the Supreme Court cannot be appealed. The Supreme Court is able to declare a law unconstitutional, which is a check on the power of the Legislature.

Supreme Court justices assume their position following by a nomination by the President and majority vote from the Senate. U.S. Supreme Court justices do not have term limits. Supreme Court judges serve as long as they desire, and serve as long as they maintain good behavior and health.

Entries on the US Supreme Court docket are usually appellate matters. Few entries on the Supreme Court docket are matters of original jurisdiction. Most often, entries on the Supreme Court docket involve constitutional issues, or evidence that the ruling of the lower court was incorrect.

The Supreme Court building was the final of the three houses built for the three branches of the Federal Government. Before construction of the Supreme Court building was completed in 1935, the US Supreme Court first met in the basement of the Capitol Building, followed by the US Supreme Court relocation to the Old Senate Chamber, and finally entering the Supreme Court Building across the street from the Capitol.

The landmark Supreme Court cases are identified as Supreme Court decisions that have reshaped American lives. These landmark Supreme Court cases and Supreme Court cases encompass almost all areas of American life.

John Roberts is the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. The other Supreme Court justices’ names are Anton Scalia, Anthony Scalia, Clarence Thomas, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer, Samuel Alito, Sonia Sotomayer, and Elena Kagan.

The nine Supreme Court justices are known as either Associate Justices or the sole Chief Justice of the United States. All nine Supreme Court justices serve on the Supreme Court of the United States for life tenure. Serving on the Supreme Court of the United States require a nomination from the President and a confirmation vote in the United States Senate.

The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court is also known as the Chief Justice of the United States. The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court can be an outside nominee to the position, or may be chosen from already seated members of the court. He or she serves as the chief administration officer for the federal courts, appoints the director of the Administrative Office of the United States Courts, presides over oral arguments to the Court, leads the business of the Supreme Court, serves as a spokesman for the judicial branch, sets the Court’s agenda, and decides who writes the opinions of the Court.

Although the current Supreme Court is sometimes identified as Barack Obama’s Supreme Court, this is actually a misnomer since he has only appointed two members of the Court. However, given the age of some of the members of the Court, he may have an opportunity to appoint more justices.

Justice Ginsburg is the oldest member of the current Supreme Court of the United States. She is an Associate Justice. She was appointed by President Bill Clinton. She has served the fourth longest of the current Associate Justices. She is only the second female justice on the Supreme Court.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg was born March 15, 1933 in New York City. Ginsberg attended James Madison High School in New York City, which later dedicated a room in her honor. She earned her undergraduate degree from Cornell University in Ithaca, New York in 1954, after which she enrolled in Harvard Law School. 

She had to transfer to Columbia Law School, but in doing so was able to earn the distinction of being the first woman to be on two major law reviews, the Harvard Law Review and the Columbia Law Review. In 1959, she earned her Bachelor of Laws (LL. B.) from Columbia, tying for first in her class. She was awarded honorary Doctor of Laws degrees from Willamette University and Princeton University in 2009 and 2010, respectively. 

After she graduated, Ruth Bader Ginsburg served as a professor at Rutgers University School of law from 1963-1972, and then became a law professor at her alma mater from 1972-1980, while serving as General Counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union from 1973-1980.

President Jimmy Carter appointed her to become Justice Ginsburg while serving on the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, from 1980-1993. While there, she became friends with Justice Scalia, a friendship that would continue when the two both served on the Supreme Court. After being nominated by President Clinton to the Supreme Court, Justice Ginsburg was approved by a margin of 96-3. 

On the list of Supreme Court Justices, Clarence Thomas experienced one of the most controversial nomination hearings. While Justices Scalia and Kennedy faced unanimous approval, the Senate vote which approved Clarence Thomas was very close, with the final vote coming to fifty two Senators in favor and forty eight Senators opposed. This was the narrowest confirmation vote in more than a century.

Clarence Thomas had first appeared on a list of Supreme Court Justices replacement candidates in 1990 when Justice Brennan stepped down. However, President George H.W. Bush had to postpone his nomination of Thomas due to concerns that he was not yet sufficiently experienced. 

By the time Thomas was finally nominated a year later, however, these fears had not yet been address. President Bush stated that Clarence Thomas was the “best qualified [nominee] at this time” However, there is dubious support for this claim. Critics have claimed that instead, Thomas was the only African American candidate who could provide a reliably conservative vote to replace Thurgood Marshal, the only African American on the Court.

The American Bar Association rated Thomas “qualified” by a 13-2 margin, well below the normal recommendation that most nominees had received since Eisenhower, a unanimous “well qualified” evaluation. Part of the criticism was that Clarence Thomas had never argued before the high courts, had never written a consequential legal book, article of brief.

The most serious reason Clarence Thomas is included on a loss of Supreme Court Justices who have faced a challenging nomination process is because of allegations of sexual harassment leveled again Thomas during the hearing by Anita Hill. 

Justice Anthony M. Kennedy is one of the two members of Barack Obama’s Supreme Court to receive unanimous approval from the United States Senate after his confirmation hearing, the other being Justice Anton Scalia. Following the retirement of Justice Sandra Day O’Conner, Justice Anthony Kennedy often serves as the swing vote in close court decisions.

Anthony M. Kennedy was born and raised in Sacramento, California, to and by a father who was an influential attorney in the California legislature. Anthony Kennedy bears no relation to the Kennedy political dynasty. He is the second oldest member of the United States Supreme Court, as he was born on March 11, 1936. As a child, Anthony Kennedy met the Earl Warren, a man who would later go on to serves as Chief Justice of the United States.

Anthony Kennedy graduated from C.K. McClatchy High School in 1954, and attended Stanford University from 1954 through 1958, where he earned a B. A. in Political Science. He earned a Bachelor of Laws from Harvard Law School in 1961, graduating cum laude.

After graduation, Anthony M. Kennedy was in his own private practice from 1961 through 1963, after which he assumed control of his late father’s practice, which he continued until 1975. 

Between 1965 and 1988, he served as a Professor of Constitutional Law at the McGeorge School of Law, University of the Pacific. President Gerald Ford, acting on a recommendation from Ronald Reagan, nominated Kennedy for a position on the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. In 1988, Anthony M. Kennedy was nominated by President Reagan for a seat on the Supreme Court. 

 Before being appointed Chief Justice, John Roberts had an extensive legal career, despite only being fifty years old when he was appointed to the Supreme Court of the United States in 2005 by President George W. Bush.

John G. Roberts was born January 27, 1955. He was raised in Northern Indiana and educated in a private school, before leaving Indiana to attend Harvard College and subsequently attending Harvard Law School. While attending Harvard Law School, he served as a managing editor of the Harvard Law Review, a prestigious position.

Chief Justice John Roberts was exposed to the function of the Supreme Court shortly after he was admitted to the bar when he served as a law clerk for William Rehnquist, the man who he would eventually replace as the Chief Justice of the United States. 

After serving as a law clerk, John G. Roberts took a position in the Attorney General’s office while Ronald Reagan was President. He then moved on to serve in the Department of Justice and the Office of the White House Counsel under the Reagan Administration and the Administration of George H.W. Bush.

After his time with the Bush Administration, John G. Roberts went into private practice, during which time he argued thirty-nine cases before the Supreme Court.

In 2003, President George E. Bush appointed Roberts to serve as a judge on the D.C. Circuit, only to be nominated to serve as an Associate Justice on the Supreme Court. When Chief Justice Renquist died prior to Robert’s confirmation hearing, Bush resubmitted Roberts to become Chief Justice John Roberts. 

The US Supreme Court building was the final of the three building built for the major branches of the federal government. Before the Supreme Court Building was constructed, the US Supreme Court was forced to meet in the basement of the basement of the United States Capitol Building, followed by the US Supreme Court presiding in the Old Senate Chamber. 

It was not until 1935 that the US Supreme Court moved into its own building. The Supreme Court Building is located in Washington D. C. It is located one block immediately east of the Capitol building.

The Supreme Court Building was designed by architect Cass Gilbert. The cornerstone was laid on October 13, 1392, with construction being completed in 1935. The four story building cost almost ten million dollars. The outside of the Supreme Court building is made from Vermont marble. 

With the exception of the US Supreme Court room itself, the interior surfaces are lined with Alabama marble. The Courtroom is lined with Spanish ivory vein marble. There are twenty four columns in the Courtroom, which are made of ivory buff and golden marble mined from quarries near Siena Italy.

The western facade of the US Supreme Court building, which is often considered the front of the building since it faces the Capitol Building, bears the motto “Equal Justice Under Law,” while the east face of the Supreme Court Building is inscribed with the saying “Justice, the Guardian of Liberty.” 

The majority of the cases on the US Supreme Court Docket are appellate cases. The appellate cases on the Supreme Court docket are attempts to have rulings from lower courts overturned. 

Appellate cases comprise the majority of the Supreme Court Docket since the Supreme Court has original jurisdiction over only a small number of cases. Therefore, much of the Court’s time is spent examining lower court rulings that are presented to the Supreme Court for consideration on the US Supreme Court Docket.

In order to be placed on the US Supreme Court, the Supreme Court must believe that there is an underlying constitutional issue, or have an inclination that one of the lower courts did not act properly. 

However, inclusion on the US Supreme Court docket does not automatically mean that the Supreme Court will overturn the lower court. In fact, in many cases, the Supreme Court supports, or upholds, the finding of a lower court.

The Supreme Court docket is the list of cases that a particular session of the Supreme Court has agreed to hear. The Supreme Court has the authority to set its own docket. However, in a largely forgotten process, a lower court judge may assist in forming the US Supreme Court Docket if he or she “certifies” a case as being in need of national attention or that needs clarification by the Supreme Court. 

US Supreme Court Justices are nominated for the position by the President of the United States. After they are nominated, the Senate of the United States Congress will hold a committee meeting, during which members of the Senate Judiciary Committee will interview any prospective Supreme Court judges. In recent years, the Senate nomination hearings for the Supreme Court justices have become a highly politicized process.

During the Judiciary hearings, prospective Supreme Court judges can expect to have any previous rulings they have issued or any ex parte statements or even membership in organizations outside of the court house examined, as the Senators on the Judiciary Committee attempt to determine the political leanings of each of the US Supreme Court Justices that are appointed to the Court. The Judiciary Committee does so because of the increased partisanship in national politics.

Pinning down the political leanings of the US Supreme Court Justices is less important than nominees for other positions for two major reasons. The first is that the US Supreme Court has traditionally been an apolitical body, focusing more on if the laws which are under review are constitutional than if they adhere to a particular political framework. 

This is not to say that US Supreme Court justices are not political, as seen by the fact that former President Howard Taft was appointed to the Supreme Court after he left the Presidency. Rather, politics is a less important concern for Supreme Court justices. The second reason is that the nine Supreme Court justices hold their positions for long periods of time, since the Court is a life long tenure, making it likely that an individual justice’s political beliefs will change while they are on the Court.