R.I.P. David Souter, the Last of His Kind

David Souter has died at 85. Just as Sandra Day O’Connor was the Supreme Court’s last politician and Byron White was the Court’s last moderate Democrat appointee, Souter was most likely the last of his kind: a liberal Republican appointee. Even the most moderate subsequent Republican-appointed justice, Chief Justice John Roberts, is significantly to Souter’s right.

Republicans, boxed entirely out of the Court by Franklin D. Roosevelt (between 1945 and 1952, all nine justices were Democrat appointees), were burned by a series of their own nominees who ranged from socially liberal moderates to across-the-board liberals: Earl Warren, John Marshall Harlan II, William Brennan, Charles Whittaker, Potter Stewart, Warren Burger, Harry Blackmun, Lewis F. Powell Jr., John Paul Stevens, O’Connor, Anthony Kennedy, and Souter. The only really reliable conservative on the Court before Antonin Scalia’s nomination in 1986 was William Rehnquist. Most notoriously, five of the seven members of the Roe v. Wade majority were Republican appointees.

About the Author

Dan McLaughlin

Dan McLaughlin is a senior writer at National Review Online and a fellow at National Review Institute.

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David Souter has died at 85. Just as Sandra Day O’Connor was the Supreme Court’s last politician and Byron White was the Court’s last moderate Democrat appointee, Souter was most likely the last of his kind: a liberal Republican appointee. Even the most moderate subsequent Republican-appointed justice, Chief Justice John Roberts, is significantly to Souter’s right.

Republicans, boxed entirely out of the Court by Franklin D. Roosevelt (between 1945 and 1952, all nine justices were Democrat appointees), were burned by a series of their own nominees who ranged from socially liberal moderates to across-the-board liberals: Earl Warren, John Marshall Harlan II, William Brennan, Charles Whittaker, Potter Stewart, Warren Burger, Harry Blackmun, Lewis F. Powell Jr., John Paul Stevens, O’Connor, Anthony Kennedy, and Souter. The only really reliable conservative on the Court before Antonin Scalia’s nomination in 1986 was William Rehnquist. Most notoriously, five of the seven members of the Roe v. Wade majority were Republican appointees.