'John Paul Stevens' (born
April 20,
1920) is currently the most senior
Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. He joined the Court in 1975 and is the oldest and longest serving incumbent member of the Court. Although he was appointed to the court by a
Republican President,
Gerald R. Ford, Stevens is widely regarded as the anchor of the Court's liberal wing. He is the only current Associate Justice to have served under three
Chief Justices.
Biography
Early life, 1920-1947
Stevens was born on
April 20 1920, in
Chicago,
Illinois, to a wealthy family of that city. His paternal grandfather had formed an insurance company and held real estate in Chicago, while his great-uncle owned the
Chas. A. Stevens department store. His father, Ernest James Stevens, was a
lawyer who later became a hotelier, owning two hotels, the La Salle and the Stevens Hotel. He lost ownership of the hotels during the
Great Depression. (The Stevens Hotel was subsequently bought by
Hilton Hotels and is today the Chicago Hilton and Towers.) His mother, Elizabeth Maude Street Stevens, a native of
Michigan City, Indiana, was a high school English teacher. Two of his three older brothers also became lawyers.
The family lived in
Hyde Park, and John Paul Stevens attended the
University of Chicago Laboratory School. He subsequently obtained an
A.B. in
English from the
University of Chicago in 1941; while in college, Stevens also became a member of the Omega chapter of
Psi Upsilon.
He began work on his
master's degree in English at the university in 1941, but soon decided to join the
United States Navy, serving as an intelligence officer in the
Pacific Theater from 1942 to 1945 (for which service he was awarded a
Bronze Star).
Stevens married Elizabeth Jane Sheeren in June 1942. Divorcing her in 1979, he married Maryan Mulholland Simon that December. He has four children: John Joseph (d. 1996 of cancer), Kathryn, Elizabeth and Susan.
With the end of World War II, Stevens returned to Illinois intending to return to his studies in English, but was persuaded by his brother Richard, who was a lawyer, to attend
law school. Stevens enrolled in the
Northwestern University School of Law in 1945 (the
G.I. Bill mostly paying his way). He was a brilliant student (he was reputed to have the highest
GPA in the history of the law school ) and was Editor-in-Chief of the
''Northwestern University Law Review''. He received his
J.D. in 1947.
Legal career, 1947-1970
Given his stellar academic performance in law school, several prominent Northwestern faculty members recommended Stevens for a
Supreme Court clerkship: he served as a
clerk to Justice
Wiley Rutledge during the 1947-48 Term. (This service, Stevens has said, deeply inspired him, as evident from his Rutledgean focus on the careful interpretation of the facts in a case present in his opinions.)
Following his clerkship, Stevens returned to Chicago and joined the
law firm of Poppenhusen, Johnston, Thompson & Raymond (which, in the 1960s, would become
Jenner & Block). Stevens was
admitted to the bar in 1949. He determined that he would not stay long at the Poppenhusen firm after he was docked a day's pay for taking the day off to travel to
Springfield to swear his oath of admission. During his time at the Poppenhusen firm, Stevens began his practice in
antitrust law.
In 1951, he returned to
Washington, D.C. to serve as Associate Counsel to the Subcommittee on the Study of Monopoly Power of the
Judiciary Committee of the U.S.
House of Representatives. During this time, the subcommittee worked on several highly publicized investigation concerns in many industries, most notably
Major League Baseball.
In 1952, at age 32, Stevens returned to Chicago and, together with two other young lawyers he had worked with at the Poppenhusen firm, formed his own law firm, Rothschild, Stevens, Barry & Myers. They soon developed a successful practice, with Stevens continuing to focus on
antitrust cases. His growing expertise in antitrust law led to an invitation to teach the "Competition and Monopoly" course at the
University of Chicago Law School, and from 1953 to 1955, he was a member of the
Attorney General's National Committee to Study Antitrust Law. At the same time, Stevens was making a name for himself as a first-rate antitrust litigator and was involved in a number of trials. He was widely regarded by colleagues as an extraordinarily capable and impressive lawyer with a fantastic memory and analytical ability, and authored a number of influential works on antitrust law.
In 1969, the Greenberg Commission, appointed by the
Illinois Supreme Court to investigate
Sherman Skolnick's corruption allegations levelled at former Chief Justice
Ray Klingbiel and current Chief Justice
Roy J. Solfisburg, Jr., named Stevens as their counsel (meaning he essentially functioned as a
special prosecutor).
As a result of the prominence he gained during the Greenberg Commission, Stevens became Second Vice President of the Chicago Bar Association in 1970.
Judicial career, 1970-present
Stevens' role in the Greenberg Commission catapulted him to local (and to a degree, national) prominence and was largely responsible for
President Richard Nixon's decision to appoint Stevens as a Judge of the
United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit on November 20, 1970.
President Gerald Ford then nominated him as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court in 1975 to replace Justice
William O. Douglas, who had recently retired, and he took his seat
December 19,
1975, after being confirmed 98-0 by the
Senate.
As the senior Associate Justice, Stevens assumes the administrative duties of the court whenever the post of
Chief Justice of the United States is vacant or the Chief Justice is unable to perform his duties. Justice Stevens performed the duties of Chief Justice in September 2005, between the death of Chief Justice
William Rehnquist and the swearing-in of new Chief Justice
John Roberts, and has presided over oral arguments on a number of occasions when the Chief Justice was ill or recused.
Stevens has given lectures on the importance of “learning on the job” and treating the law with flexibility, citing as one example his former disapproval and current support of some
affirmative action policies.
[1]
As his seniority grew in the closing decade of the
Rehnquist court, Stevens was often the senior justice on one side of a split decision and thereby entitled to assign the writing of the opinion. He almost always writes a dissenting opinion when in dissent and writes concurring opinions more often than most other justices historically.
Even though Justice Stevens is 87 years old, he has not shown any hints of opting for retirement. On the contrary, Stevens actively participates in questioning during the oral arguments before the Court and still plays
tennis regularly.
[2] His possible retirement is a highly debated topic in legal and political circles in
Washington. Stevens would be almost 89 years old if he remains on the court until the end of
President Bush's term in January 2009. On the other hand, he has hired law clerks to work for him through the year 2008, which suggests he will not retire before then.
Judicial philosophy
On the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals, John Paul Stevens had a moderately conservative record. Early in his tenure on the Supreme Court Stevens had a moderate voting record. He voted to reinstate
capital punishment in the United States and opposed the
affirmative action program at issue in ''
Regents of the University of California v. Bakke''. But on the more conservative
Rehnquist Court, Stevens tended to side with the more liberal-leaning Justices on issues such as
abortion rights,
gay rights and
federalism. His
Segal-Cover score, a measure of liberalism/conservatism of Court members, places him squarely in the ideological center of the Court. A 2003 statistical analysis of Supreme Court voting patterns, however, found Stevens the most liberal member of the Court.
[3][4]
Stevens' jurisprudence has usually been characterized as idiosyncratic. Stevens, unlike most justices, usually writes the first drafts of his opinions himself and reviews petitions for
certiorari within his chambers instead of having his
law clerks participate as part of the
cert pool. He is not an
originalist (such as fellow Justice
Antonin Scalia) nor a pragmatist (such as Judge
Richard Posner), nor does he pronounce himself a cautious liberal (such as Justice
Ruth Bader Ginsburg). He has been considered part of the liberal bloc of the court since the mid-1980s, though he publicly called himself a judicial conservative in 2007.
[5]
In
1983's ''
Michigan v. Long'', for example, Stevens dissented from the U.S. Supreme Court decision overturning the Michigan Supreme Court's interpretation of federal law, arguing that state court decisions granting people rights under the federal constitution that nullify complained-of state action should not be disturbed by federal courts. In
1985's ''
Cleburne v. Cleburne Living Center'', Stevens argued against the Supreme Court's famous "strict scrutiny" doctrine for laws involving "suspect classifications", putting forth the view that all classifications should be evaluated on the basis of the "rational basis" test as to whether they could have been enacted by an "impartial legislature". In ''
Burnham v. Superior Court'' (1990), Stevens demonstrated his independence in characteristically pithy fashion. As opposing factions led by
Justice Scalia and
Justice Brennan transformed a minor jurisdictional question into a philosophical battle over
Originalism, Stevens concurred separately, explaining that "common sense" persuaded him not to enter the jurisprudential fray.
Stevens was once an impassioned critic of
affirmative action, voting in 1978 to invalidate the
affirmative action program at issue in ''
Regents of the University of California v. Bakke''. He also dissented in
1980's ''
Fullilove v. Klutznick'', which upheld a minority set-aside program. He gradually shifted his position over the years and voted to uphold the somewhat different affirmative action program at the
University of Michigan Law School challenged in
2003's ''
Grutter v. Bollinger''.
Stevens wrote the majority opinion in ''
Hamdan v. Rumsfeld (2006)'', which held that certain military commissions had been improperly constituted.
Freedom of speech
Stevens' views on obscenity under the
First Amendment have changed over the years. Initially quite critical of constitutional protection for obscenity, rejecting a challenge to
Detroit zoning ordinances that barred adult theatres in designated areas in 1976's ''
Young v. American Mini Theatres'' ("[E]ven though we recognize that the First Amendment will not tolerate the total suppression of
erotic materials that have some arguably artistic value, it is manifest that society's interest in protecting this type of expression is of a wholly different, and lesser, magnitude than the interest in untrammeled political debate"), Stevens now adheres firmly to a libertarian free speech approach on obscenity issues, voting to strike down a federal law regulating "virtual" child pornography in 2002's ''
ACLU v. Ashcroft'', where in a concurring opinion Stevens argued that while "[a]s a parent, grandparent, and great-grandparent", he endorsed the legislative goal of protecting children from pornography "without reservation": "As a judge, I must confess to a growing sense of unease when the interest in protecting children from prurient materials is invoked as a justification for using criminal regulation of speech as a substitute for, or a simple backup to, adult oversight of children's viewing."
[6]
Perhaps the most personal and unusual feature of his jurisprudence is his continual referencing of
World War II in his opinions, which Stevens often cites in an attempt to appeal to shared patriotic,
American values. For example, Stevens, a World War II veteran, was visibly angered by liberal attorney
William Kunstler's flippant defense of flag-burning in oral argument in 1989's ''
Texas v. Johnson'' and voted to uphold a prohibition on flag-burning against a
First Amendment argument. Wrote Stevens, "The ideas of liberty and equality have been an irresistible force in motivating leaders like
Patrick Henry,
Susan B. Anthony, and
Abraham Lincoln, schoolteachers like
Nathan Hale and
Booker T. Washington, the
Philippine Scouts who fought at
Bataan, and the soldiers who scaled the bluff at
Omaha Beach. If those ideas are worth fighting for — and our history demonstrates that they are — it cannot be true that the flag that uniquely symbolizes their power is not itself worthy of protection from unnecessary desecration."
Stevens generally supports students' right to free speech in public schools. He wrote sharply worded dissents in ''
Bethel v. Fraser'' and ''
Morse v. Frederick'', two decisions that restricted students' freedom of speech. However, he joined the court's ruling on ''
Hazelwood v. Kuhlmeier'' that upheld a principal's censorship of a
student newspaper.
Commerce clause and states' rights
On the issue of
Interstate commerce clause, Stevens consistently sided with the
federal government. He dissented from ''
United States v. Lopez'' and ''
United States v. Morrison'', two prominent cases in which the
Rehnquist court broke way by holding that Congress had exceeded its constitutional power under the
commerce clause. He then authored ''
Gonzales v. Raich'', which permits the federal government to
arrest,
prosecute, and
imprison patients who use
medical marijuana regardless of if they are using the medicine legally under states' law.
Fourth Amendment
Stevens has a generally liberal voting record on
Fourth Amendment, which deals with
search and
seizure. He dissented in ''
New Jersey v. T.L.O.'' and ''
Vernonia School District 47J v. Acton'', both involving searches in schools. He was a dissenter in ''
Oliver v. United States'', a case relating to the
open fields doctrine. However, Stevens is more conservative on Fourth Amendment than
William Brennan and
Thurgood Marshall. In ''
United States v. Montoya De Hernandez'' he sided with the government, and he was the author of ''
United States v. Ross'', which permits the police to search
automobiles without a
warrant.
On
April 30 2007, he was the lone dissenter in an 8-1 ruling holding that high-speed police chases that result in death or serious injury do not violate the Fourth Amendment. ''
Scott v. Harris''.
[7]
Death penalty
Stevens joined the majority in ''
Gregg v. Georgia'', which overruled ''
Furman v. Georgia'' and again allowed the use of the death penalty in the United States. In later cases such as ''
Thompson v. Oklahoma'' and ''
Atkins v. Virginia'' (which he authored) Stevens held that the Constitution forbids the use of death penalty in certain circumstances. Stevens opposed the use of death penalty on
juvenile offenders, as he was a dissenter in ''
Stanford v. Kentucky'' and joined the Court's opinion in ''
Roper v. Simmons'', which overturned ''Stanford''.
''Chevron''
In 1984, Stevens authored the majority opinion in ''
Chevron U.S.A., Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc.'', the most cited opinion in the history of the United States Supreme Court.
[8] The opinion stands for how courts review Administrative Agencies' interpretations of their organic statutes. If the organic statute is unambiguous, the court goes with that. If the statute is unclear, courts defer to an agency's interpretation of the statute, unless that interpretation is deemed to be "arbitrary and capricious."
Unlike some other members of the court, Stevens has been consistently willing to find organic statutes unambiguous and thus overturn agency interpretations of those statutes. (See his majority opinion in ''
Immigration and Naturalization Service v. Cardoza-Fonseca'', , and his Dissent in ''Young v. Community Nutrition Institute'', 476 U.S. 974 (1986).) Although ''Chevron'' has come to stand for the proposition of deference to agency interpretations, Stevens, the author of the opinion, has been less willing to defer to agencies than the rest of his colleagues on the Court.
Criticism and praise
Stevens has drawn criticism from some on the right, who point to him as one of a number of justices (
Justice Souter being another) who were appointed by a
Republican president yet moved more and more towards the left as the years passed. At the time of Stevens' appointment, Senator
James A. McClure questioned President
Ford about Stevens and was told that Stevens would “vote like a good Republican”. Still no one was sure what that meant — Ford's appointments to other Federal courts ranged from very conservative to moderately liberal.
[9] Unlike some other Republican Presidents, such as
Eisenhower (with Justice
Brennan and Chief Justice
Warren),
Nixon (with Justice
Blackmun and to some extent Justice
Powell), and
George H.W. Bush (with
Souter), who were reportedly displeased with the later rulings of some of their appointments, President Ford in 2005 praised Stevens: “He is serving his nation well, with dignity, intellect and without partisan political concerns.”
[10]
Other facts
★ Stevens is currently the third-oldest Justice in the Supreme Court's history, behind
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. and
Roger B. Taney. In order to pass Justice Holmes as the oldest serving Justice of the Supreme Court, Stevens would have to serve until Wednesday,
February 26 2011, when he would be 90 years and 312 days old.
★ Stevens is currently the tenth longest-serving Justice in the Supreme Court's history. In order to pass his predecessor Justice
William O. Douglas as the longest-serving Justice of the Supreme Court, Stevens would have to serve until Saturday,
June 18 2012. Should he do so, Stevens would be 92 years and 59 days old and, by then, would have served for more than 36 years.
★ For many years, Stevens employed only three law clerks, one fewer than most of his colleagues. However, during the 1994 and 1995 terms, he shared a law clerk hired by retired Justice
Lewis F. Powell, and from the 1996 through the 2000 terms, a fourth law clerk served him through a sharing arrangement with retired Justice
Byron R. White. Since the 2001 term, he has hired the full complement of
four.
★ Justice Stevens does not participate in the
cert. pool, meaning that his clerks personally review every single petition and he reviews every petition considered to have possible merit.
★ Justice Stevens has a high school named after him in
San Antonio, Texas, part of the
Northside Independent School District. Stevens and his wife, Maryan, attended the dedication in September 2005.
★ At the suggestion of Justice Stevens, humorist
Dave Barry once wrote a column on the
antiflatulence product
Beano.
[11]
★ In a ''Nightline'' interview aired
January 2,
2007, Justice Stevens stated that he considers himself a "judicial conservative."
[12]
Notes
1. [1]
2. Charles Lane, "With Longevity on Court, Stevens' Center-Left Influence Has Grown," ''Washington Post'', Feb. 21, 2006.
3. See http://pooleandrosenthal.com/the_unidimensional_supreme_court.htm .
4. Lawrence Sirovich, "A Pattern Analysis of the Second Rehnquist Court," Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 100 (June 24, 2003).
5. [2]
6. [3]
7. Bill Mears, "Court: High-speed chase suspects can't sue police", CNN, April 30, 2007.
8. Breyer, Stewart, Sunstein & Vermeule, ''Administrative Law & Regulatory Policy'', p. 247.
9. [4]
10. [5]
11. Dave Barry, “The Winds of Change”, ''St. Petersburg Times'' (Fla.), September 23, 1991.
12. [6]
References
★ ''Illinois Justice: The Scandal of 1969 and the Rise of John Paul Stevens'' by Kenneth A. Manaster (University of Chicago Press, 2001)
External links
★
Supreme court official bio (PDF)
★
John Paul Stevens encyclopedia article by Prof. Joseph Thai
★
Justice Weighs Desire v. Duty (Duty Prevails) by Linda Greenhouse August 25, 2005 on civilrights.org
★
Stevens High School, named after Justice Stevens
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