How Often Have Supreme Court Nominees Been Rejected?

although seven have also turned down the appointment. Some of the nominees have faced a tougher road than others. Of course, roughly twenty three don't make it. Some of those were outright rejected. Some nominees take their names out of consideration. The Senate didn't even bother to vote on ten of the president's recommendations, most notably that of Merrick Garland, who was nominated by President Barack Obama in twenty six toward the end of his second term. Often, though the chosen

ones breathe through the process. Current Associate Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg want a Senate vote of ninety six to three three. In the nineteen eighties, President Ronald Reagan nominated three judges who were voted onto the bench unanimously, Sandra Day O'Connor, the first woman to serve on the court, anton In Scalia, and Anthony Kennedy. We spoke with John Michaels, a professor at the u c l A School of Law. He said,

it's supposed to be a kind of collaboration. There's an understanding that there's deference paid to the president's nominee, so there has to be something problematic about that nominee to not go forward, but welcome to Now these days, in a politically fractured nation, things aren't nearly as easy. Something problematic is always on hand. Collaboration is a dirty word.

A Republican led Senate, at odds with President Obama sixteen sat on Garland's domination, refusing to even hold a hearing when President Donald Trump took office in January seventeen and nominated Neil Gorstch to the bench instead. The Gorsetch passed the Republican led Senate, but just barely, with a fifty four to forty five vote, and only after Republicans changed

Senate rules to prevent a Democratic filibuster. Even getting to the Senate vote is sometimes tricky, as U. S. Circuit Court Judge Brett Covna found out in the late summer of eighteen, Kavanaugh was nominated by Trump to take over the seat of retiring Supreme Court Associate Justice Anthony Kennedy,

and things turned ugly quickly. Democrats, stinging from the Garland snub and the way the Senate pushed through Gorset, and fearing a conservative turn that could impact Supreme Court decisions for decades, hounded Covenaugh's nomination, and when several women days before the Judiciary Committee vote accused Covena of sexual assault, Democrats and a key Republican or too called to reopen the FBI background investigation into the nominees past and angry tiry,

Covena was forced to defend himself in front of a very public hearing of the committee. But Kavanaugh is not the first to be put through the nomination ringer. The very first nominee to the Supreme Court to be rejected was John Rutledge in s Rutledge had been one of the original Associate Justices, but resigned before hearing a case to return to South Carolina. When George Washington tapped him again to serve as Chief Justice during a Senate recess,

he returned. During his brief tenure, Rutledge criticized the administration, and rumors of mental illness and alcohol abuse spurred on by the opposing party press, were rampant. When the Senate convened and had a chance to vote, it rejected him fourteen to ten. He's the only recess appointed judge that didn't later earn a Senate nod. And here are and

skipping ahead, here are the most recent. Harriet Myers, the former Council to President George W. Bush, was nominated to replace retiring Associate Justice Sandra Day O'Connor in October of two thousand five. It was a surprising choice in that Myers had never been a judge. She also had been Bush's personal lawyer for many years, going back to his time in Texas, which raised flags that the appointment might be too political. Meyers struggled with constitutional questions posed to

her by the Senate Judiciary Committee too. In the end, with strong signs that she would not be approved, she withdrew from consideration. Clarence Thomas, meanwhile, was a George H. W. Bush nominee, A staunchly conservative Thomas went through tense hearings in front of the Judiciary Committee in and then Anita Hill, a former employee of Thomas's, showed up with charges that Thomas had sexually assaulted her. Michael's spoke about those hearings.

He said, if you go back and watch some of the ways that senators were questioning Unita Hill, it's not even whether we believe them or not. We weren't really understanding what the problems were. Thomas would end up passing fifty eight. He still serves on the Court. Robert Bourke is the most recent nominee rejected by the full Senate. Reagan put his name in in Bourke was voted down by the Judiciary Committee, but refused to withdraw his name

from consideration, making the Senate vote on him. The conservative Bork scared many with his views on privacy, civil rights, women's rights, and his belief that the Constitution should be interpreted through the eyes of those who framed it. His contentious hearings led to the verb borking from Ariam Webster to attack or defeat a nominee or candidate for public office unfairly through an organized campaign of harsh public criticism.

Or vilification, and there have been others. President Richard Nixon had two Supreme Court nominees rejected, Clement Haynesworth, Jr. In nineteen seventy and g. Herald Carswell in nineteen sixty nine. Cars Well was the first at the time to be voted down since nineteen thirty. Both were shot down for

their past views on civil rights and racial equality. We'd like to think that the Supreme Court, being the last stop on the road to justice, would be able to put aside partisanship in politics to make well reasoned judgments on what is best for the country. But justices have views too, and they are appointed by presidents who have their own views and voted on by representatives who have yet their own. It's not surprising, then, that these nominees

are put through a ringer by opposing parties. As much as we may hate to see a nominee's life turned upside down by the process, it's not just their lives on the line, it's the fate of the country. Michael's explained it this way. It is a little weird to have a system so dependent on a very partisan choice by president when the choice just depends on when people die.

You can just get lucky or unlucky. It would be nice in a perfect world if presidents and senators did not play power politics with the courts, but that would be naive, especially since the court plays a central role in American political, social, and economic life. Today's episode was written by John Donovan and produced by Tyler. Playing. For more illness and lots of other vigorously approved topics, visit our home planet, how stuff works dot com.