1938—Stephen Gerald Breyer is born in San Francisco. An expert on regulation and a professor at Harvard Law School, Breyer serves from 1979 to 1980 as chief counsel to Teddy Kennedy on the Senate Judiciary Committee. His reward: On November 13, 1980—after Ronald Reagan has defeated Jimmy Carter in his bid for re-election and after Republicans have won control of the new Senate—Carter nominates Breyer to a seat on the First Circuit. His nomination is promptly confirmed. (See “The Intrigue Behind How Stephen Breyer Became A Federal Judge” for a fuller account.)
In 1994 President Clinton will appoint Breyer to replace retiring justice Harry A. Blackmun on the Supreme Court. Breyer will serve in that position until 2022. His jurisprudence will be aptly described by one perceptive critic as “judicial willfulness masquerading as judicial deference.”
2000—The New Jersey supreme court rules by a vote of 4-2 (in Planned Parenthood v. Farmer) that a state statute providing for parental notification for abortion violates the state constitution because it treats minors seeking abortion differently from minors who decide to carry their child to term.
2024—Over the dissent of fourteen judges, including two appointees of Democratic presidents, the Ninth Circuit denies rehearing en banc of a panel ruling that a convicted criminal defendant was entitled to habeas relief on his claim that he was unconstitutionally deprived of his right to represent himself.
Stating that “this case cries for reversal,” the dissenters object that the panel ignored the presumption against waiver of the right to counsel established by Supreme Court precedent, “violated [the federal statute known as] AEDPA at every turn” and “committed fundamental errors that [the Supreme] Court has repeatedly admonished courts to avoid.” They condemn the panel decision as “a get-out-of-jail-free card that flies in the face of AEDPA.”