Posted on 10/26/2020 3:24:56 AM PDT by cotton1706
In 1968 Chief Justice Warren decided to retire. He preferred to be replaced by Lyndon Johnson rather than his political enemy Richard Nixon. The plan was that Johnson would elevate his crony Abe Fortas (who Johnson had put on the court by convincing Kennedy appointee Arthur Goldberg to be Ambassador to the UN) to Chief Justice.
Well it was an election year, and Nixon campaigned that the next president should fill the vacancy (sound familiar?). Fortas was filibustered and Warren said he would serve until a successor was confirmed so Richard Nixon got to replace Earl Warren with Warren Burger.
That was just the beginning of the battle.
Justice Fortas was corrupt and quickly resigned. Nixon appointed two conservatives who were rejected (led by Ted Kenedy) to the Senate. Nixon ended up picking Burger pal Harry Blackmun, who wrote the Roe vs Wade opinion (Blackmon said after he retired that he just wanted to make abortion legal).
So the pattern for the Democrats was set. Defeat the conservatives by calling them racists, etc. then you get a nice compliant moderate-liberal nominee.
In 1971 both Hugo Black and John Marshall Harlan retired and died. Nixon appointed Lewis Powell (a swing justice a la his successor Anthony Kennedy) and conservative William Rehnquist. Both were confirmed but Rehnquist was grilled.
Gerald Ford was no conservative and didn't have the stomach for battle so when William O. Douglas retired in 1975 he nominated John Paul Stephens, who turned out to be an outright liberal.
- continued below -
In 1986 Warren Burger retired and conservative Rehnquist was elevated to Chief and Antonin Scalia was appointed to fill the Rehnquist seat.
The Republicans lost control of the Senate in 1986 so when swing justice Powell retired in 1987 it was all hands on deck for the democrats. Led by Ted Kennedy they destroyed Robert Bork's nomination. Then Douglas Ginsburg was nominated, then withdrawn because he once smoked pot. So we got pantywaist Anthony Kennedy.
In 1991 Warren Rudman and John Sununu convinced George Bush to appoint David Router instead of Ken Starr. So we got another liberal.
8 of the 9 justices were now Republican appointees but still no conservative majority.
In 1993 the lone Democrat-appointed justice (and pretty much conservative) Byron White retired and Democrat Bill Clinton got to replace him with Ruth Bader Ginsburg, then replace Harry Blackmun with Stephen Breyer.
No nominees for eleven years. In June 2005 Justice O'Connor retired and George Bush appoints John Roberts. Then in September Chief Justice Rehnquist dies so Bush appoints Roberts to be Chief Justice.
To replace O'Connor Bush appointed Harriet Myers, but conservatives weren't having that so she was withdrawn and the stellar Samuel Alito was confirmed.
Another Democrat presidency replaces Souter and Stephens with SotoMayor and Kagan.
Then in 2016 Antonin Scalia dies. Lame duck Obama appoints Merrick Garland but McConnell's Senate refuses to vote.
Trump is elected and Neil Goresuch is confirmed to the open seat.
Anthony Kennedy retires in 2018 and a protracted battle ends with Brett Kavanaugh's confirmation.
Justice Ginsburg dies last month and here we are. We will witness Judge Any Coney Barrett become a justice later today.
With three Trump justices and two Bush conservative justices (Thomas and Alito), a REAL conservative majority will have arrived.
A long road indeed, over 50 years in the making.
How could I forget Justice Thomas, who was confirmed in 1991 to replace Thurgood Marshall.
The Democrats failed to derail Thomas as they had Bork. The Thomas battle was the lowest of the lows, until Kavanaugh.
Justices usually pick the time of their retirement so that the political party of their choice will select their replacement. It doesn’t always work as they want.
Earl Warren - see the OP
Thurgood Marshall - GWH Bush was so popular after the Gulf war Marshall gave up outwaiting the Republicans and retired in 1991. Yay Clarence Thomas. For years he had said he would stay on the court until he died, if he had Clinton would have replaced him, he died in 1993.
Ginsberg - missed outwaiting the Republicans by just a few months (based on her view that Trump will lose). She could have retired when Obama was president, she already had health issues at the time, but she gambled and lost.
Its really going to be hard to top Kavanaugh in terms of scumbag tactics (and I seem to recall that was setup a long time ago as some on the left were worried Mitt was going to upset Obama and Kavanaugh was a likely choice of his).
No mention of my favorite judge Clarence Thomas?
I messed up the narrative. Souter was in 1990, Thomas in 1991. THEN we got to Clinton.
What the Democrats did to Robert Bork was (and remains) unforgiveable.
In many ways, it has set the tone for future Supreme Court nominations.
What we’ve seen with Clarence Thomas, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Comey Barrett is entirely the fault of the Democrats. And worse yet, one of the Senators who engaged in the character assassination of Bork is now running for President.
“Borking” actually began late in the year 1969 with Clement Haynsworth, Nixon’s first nominee to replace Abe Fortas in. Hayneworth, a Southerner, was an excellent choice but was branded a “racist” by the liberal press.
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