Posted on 04/04/2026 4:40:47 PM PDT by TexasKamaAina
How many words did each Justice on the Supreme Court speak during its previous term?
There isn’t a single official Supreme Court release that neatly totals how many words each justice spoke over an entire term, but empirical researchers (especially Empirical SCOTUS) do track this—and for the most recent fully analyzed terms, we have pretty solid estimates and rankings.
Most recent term with detailed counts (approximate totals)
For the 2024–2025 term (most recent analyzed in public datasets), the justices’ oral-argument word counts were approximately:
Ketanji Brown Jackson — ~79,000 words
Sonia Sotomayor — ~55,000–60,000
Elena Kagan — ~50,000–55,000
Neil Gorsuch — ~45,000–50,000
Brett Kavanaugh — ~40,000–45,000
Amy Coney Barrett — ~35,000–40,000
John Roberts — ~30,000–35,000
Samuel Alito — ~25,000–30,000
Clarence Thomas — ~5,000–10,000
(Ranges reflect small differences depending on dataset cutoffs and argument participation.)
Key takeaways
Jackson dominates speaking time — by a wide margin. She consistently leads in total words and often in individual cases.
The Court is much more talkative than it used to be; overall word counts have risen significantly in recent years.
Thomas still speaks the least, though he now participates more than earlier in his tenure when he was often silent. Liberal justices (Jackson, Sotomayor, Kagan) tend to ask more questions and speak more overall in recent terms.
Dear FRiends,
We need your continuing support to keep FR funded. Your donations are our sole source of funding. No sugar daddies, no advertisers, no paid memberships, no commercial sales, no gimmicks, no tax subsidies. No spam, no pop-ups, no ad trackers.
If you enjoy using FR and agree it's a worthwhile endeavor, please consider making a contribution today:
Click here: to donate by Credit Card
Or here: to donate by PayPal
Or by mail to: Free Republic, LLC - PO Box 9771 - Fresno, CA 93794
Thank you very much and God bless you,
Jim
Empty barrels make the most noise
Clear inverse relationship between number of words and intelligence.
“Jackson dominates speaking time — by a wide margin. She consistently leads in total words and often in individual cases.”
Jackson dominates speaking time — by a wide margin. She consistently leads in total words and often makes no sense at all.
There, fixed it
Ketanji Brown Jackson — ~79,000 words
None of which made any sense.
Who says much kows little; who says little knows much.
She’s another Kamala, all right.
KBJ overwhelmingly wins the verbal diarrhea award.
"Should not the multitude of words be answered? and should a man full of talk be justified?" (Job 11:2 AV)Looks like Thomas is by far the wisest of them all."In the multitude of words there wantethlacketh not sin: but he that refraineth his lips is wise" (Proverbs 10:19 AV).
"For a dream cometh through the multitude of business; and a fool's voice is known by multitude of words" (Ecclesiastes 5:3 AV).
More women. More words.
Blah Blah Blah Blah Blah Blah Blah Blah Blah Blah Blah Blah
79,000 words of ‘Jive’ talking = about 150 words of English.
I argued my share of cases over 40 years as a lawyer. Whether trial court or on appeal, I always preferred judges who listen rather than judges who ramble on to hear their own voices.
She has a deep, generational lived-experience need to feel “heard” and “seen.”
It is the same reason she takes longer than most people to complete her transaction at 7-11, or to complain to the manager at McDonalds.
She uses made up words like Ketanji and Onyika.
“ It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”
The best ones talk the least, the idiots talk the most.... who woulda thunk it?
I am surprised that there were three zeros in Justice Thomas’ word count. He usually doesn’t say a damned thing (which is completely fine by me, it means that he has thoroughly researched the case already and knows how he’s going to vote - I look forward much more to his written majority opinions).
“Ketanji Brown Jackson — ~79,000 words
Clarence Thomas — ~5,000–10,000”
Not surprising. Smarter people typically speak less. Not always but that’s my observation. YMMV
Like Tanner Novlan in the Liberty Bibberty commercials, they have secretly been “taking word classes online.”
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DVoqvHpgQQl/
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.