History of the U.S. Supreme Court Quiz

Answer: Byron White

The Bush v. Gore case dealt with whether to have another recount in Florida. The Court decided for Bush, there was no 'new' recount in Florida, Bush got the state's electoral votes, and that put him over the top to 'win' the election. Both Harry Blackmun (on the court from 1970 to 1994; a Nixon appointee) and Abe Fortas (on the court from 1965 to 1969; a Johnson appointee) were dead by the time the Bush v. Gore case came before the Court. John Paul Stevens (a 1975 appointee of Gerald Ford) was on the Court, heard the case, and sided with Al Gore. Byron White was on the Court from 1962 to 1993, and was an appointee of President Kennedy.

Answer: William Douglas

Franklin Roosevelt appointed William Douglas to the court in 1939, and he retired in 1975 (he was on the court for 36 years and 7 months), and Douglas was one of the most liberal Justices in history. Hugo Black was appointed by FDR in 1937, and retired in 1971. Before being a Supreme Court Justice, Black was a US Senator from Alabama. Black was briefly a member of the KKK, but on the court he was a champion of school desegregation. John Harlan was a justice from 1955 to 1971, and President Eisenhower appointed him. Though they disagreed on many issues, he was a close personal friend of Hugo Black. William Howard Taft was Chief justice from 1921 to 1930, and President Warren Harding appointed him. Taft is the only person to have been both President and Supreme Court Justice.

Answer: Potter Stewart

Potter Stewart was appointed by President Eisenhower in 1958, and he retired from the Court in 1981. His father was the Republican mayor of Cincinnati. He is perhaps most famous as being the Justice who could not formulate a definition of pornography, but said, "I know it when I see it." Warren Burger was from Minnesota, was appointed by President Nixon, and served as Chief Justice from 1969 to 1986. Owen Roberts was a Justice from 1930 to 1945.

He was appointed by President Hoover, was from Pennsylvania, and became dean of the Law School at the University of Pennsylvania after he retired from the court. Felix Frankfurter was an appointee of President Franklin Roosevelt, and served as Justice from 1939 to 1962. Frankfurter was originally from Vienna, Austria.

There is no Consitutional requirement for a Supreme Court Justice to be born in the US, like the requirement for the President.

Answer: He was the second black Supreme Court Justice.

Clarence Thomas was an appointee of the first President George Bush, Anita Hill accused him of sexual harassment during his confirmation process, and he is Roman Catholic. The first black Justice on the Supreme Court was Thurgood Marshall, who was appointed by President Lyndon Johnson in 1967. Marshall retired in 1991, and Thomas filled his seat.

Answer: Marbury v. Madison

Judicial review is a concept that allows the Supreme Court to decide if a law is unconstitutional (on a related note, the idea of judicial review is not found in the Constitution). Marbury v. Madison took place in 1803. The Court, led by Chief Justice John Marshall ruled that the Constitution is the supreme law of the land, and that the Court has the power to decide if a given law conflicts with that supreme law. Mapp v. Ohio was decided in 1961, and it declared the "exclusionary rule" applied in state court.

The exclusionary rule basically said that any evidence obtained in seizures that conflict with the Constitution (for example, evidence obtained in a search without a warrant) was not admissible in court. For some time, illegally obtained evidence was excluded from Federal Courts, and now the Supreme Court said such evidence was excluded from State Courts as well.

In Miranda v. Arizona, which took place in 1966, the Court ruled that arrested subjects had to be notified of the rights (including the right to remain silent), and if they were not notified of their rights, whatever information is obtained in a subsequent interrogation is not admissible in court. That lead to the now ubiquitous, "You have the right to remain silent..." etc. Stenberg v. Carhart was decided in 2000, and declared that a Nebraska law forbidding so-called "partial birth abortions" was unconstitutional.

Answer: John Marshall Harlan

The first Justice John M. Harlan served on the court from 1877 to 1911. President Rutherford B. Hayes named him to the court. That Justice Harlan was known as "The Great Dissenter," and he is best known for his dissent in the case Plessy v. Ferguson, where in 1896 the Supreme Court found a Louisiana law that required racial segregation on trains to be Constitutional.

As mentioned, President Eisenhower appointed the second Justice John M. Harlan to the court, and he served from 1955 to 1971. Harlan was the most conservative member of the liberal Warren Court of the 1950s and 1960's (a particular 'era' of the court is usually titled according to who was Chief Justice during that era, hence the time while Earl Warren was Chief Justice is called "The Warren Court"). President Lincoln appointed Salmon P. Chase Chief Justice in 1864, and he served until 1873. John Jay was the first Chief Justice, and he was appointed by George Washington in 1789.

He resigned his post in 1795 to become Governor of New York.

Answer: Byron White

Roe v. Wade was decided by the Court in 1973. The Court ruled that the Constitution protected a women's right to have an abortion. As a side note, if the Court decides to overturn Roe v. Wade, it does not mean abortion will necessarily become illegal: it means that states will have the right to establish laws which regulate abortions.

Therefore, a given state may decided to outlaw abortion, while another state may decide to keep abortions unregulated. Byron White and William Rehnquist both dissented from the Roe v. Wade decision.

As already mentioned, White was a 1962 appointee of President Kennedy. At the University of Colorado, White played football, and he 'earned' the nickname "Whizzer," which he hated. White played professionally for Pittsburgh and Detroit. Rehnquist was appointed as Associate Justice in 1972 by President Nixon, and he was promoted to Chief Justice in 1986 by President Ronald Reagan. Marshall and Brennan were both in the majority for Roe v. Wade. Marshall was appointed in 1967 to President Johnson, and Brennan was appointed in 1956 by President Eisenhower.

Answer: Engel v. Vitale

Engle v. Vitale was the first in a series of decisions by the Court to eliminate religious activities from government-run institutions using the "no establishment of religion" clause in the First Amendment to the Constitution, and it declared unconstitutional a prayer read before the school day in schools in New York state. Abington Township v. Schempp dealt with a Pennsylvania law that required students to read Bible verses at the beginning of the school day.

The Court found that law unconstitutional. Abington Township is a suburb of Philadelphia, and the case was decided in 1963. Allegheny v. ACLU was decided in 1989.

In that case the court ruled that a display of a nativity scene inside a Pittsburgh, PA courthouse was a government endorsement of religion. "New York Times" v. United States was also known as the "Pentagon Papers" case.

The Nixon Administration wanted to prohibit the "New York Times" and the "Washington Post" from publishing secret documents that related to the Vietnam War, in order to protect National Security.

The Court ruled that the word "security" was vague, and it could not be used to eliminate the freedom of the press that was guaranteed by the First Amendment. The case was decided in 1971.

Answer: He would be allowed to appoint one new Justice for each Justice over the age of seventy.

President Franklin Roosevelt won a landslide reelection in the election of 1936. Much of his New Deal legislation (to help get the US out of the Great Depression), however, was declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. Roosevelt called the Supreme Court Justices "nine old men." As a result, Roosevelt announced what would become nicknamed "the Court Packing Plan." Roosevelt could nominate one new Justice for each Justice over 70.

His plan was met with some opposition, but the death knell(s) for the plan were: (a) a letter to the Senate by Chief Justice Charles Evan Hughes that said the Court was not overworked, and that the reorganization would make the court more inefficient; (b) a decision by Justice Owen J. Roberts to change his vote in a New Deal case to support the legislation.

His decision to change his vote lead to the phrase "A Switch in Time Saves Nine." In the end, Roosevelt got to appoint more than his fair share of justices. He appointed: Hugo Black, Stanley Reed, Felix Frankfurter, William Douglas, Frank Murphy, James Byrnes, Robert Jackson, and Wiley Rutledge to the Court.

He also elevated Harlan Fiske Stone to the position of Chief Justice.

Answer: Robert Bork

Anthony Kennedy ended up being nominated to the Court by Reagan in 1988. Reagan's first appointee to the seat was Robert Bork, who was rejected by the Senate for being too conservative. Now when a Presidential nominee to a post is rejected by Democrats on ideological grounds, it is said that person is "being Borked." Reagan's second nominee for the seat was Douglas Ginsburg, but he withdrew his name after he admitted occasional marijuana use. John Ashcroft was the first Attorney General under the second President George Bush, and before that he was a US Senator from Missouri. Harold Carswell was a Supreme Court nominee by President Nixon that was rejected by the Senate (Clement Haynsworth was his second nominee, which was also rejected by the Senate; Harry Blackmun was the third nominee to the seat, he was confirmed, and he took the seat in 1970). Mahlon Pitney was appointed to the Court in 1912 by President William H. Taft, and he served on the Court until 1922.