Are The Supreme Court Justices Too Homogenous?

This chapter touched on the judicial powers and responsibilities of the courts in the United States as well as the process for appointing judges to fill needed roles. Until recently, the Supreme Court was dominated by white, protestant, males from privileged backgrounds. While we have strayed away from this mold with additions of African American, Hispanic American, Asian American, Jewish, Catholic, and female justices, there is in my opinion a noticeable homogeneity in terms the educational background of our Supreme Court Justices.

All nine of the current justices that occupy a spot on the Supreme Court bench are graduates of an Ivy-League law school. Five justices graduated from Harvard Law School, three justices graduated from Yale Law School, and one graduated from Colombia. These institutions are amongst the best in the nation and the world and undoubtedly produce some of the best lawyers our country has, but I believe that it is important to have a diverse bench in every area possible. The fact that these individuals were educated at the same institutions does not by any means mean they think the same and should not be something we ever hold against them but allowing ourselves to believe that only those who went to Ivy-League Law Schools can serve on the Supreme Court is dangerous.

Presidents look to find the best potential candidate that stands a good chance of being approved by the Senate. In recent years, nominations have become more and more scrutinized by the public and other government officials, and Presidents must prove more than ever why someone is a strong nomination. Educational background is one area that Senators and the media look to, in order to understand a nominees intelligence and capability. Where someone went to school is important and can be an indicator whether someone will do well in the position, unfortunately, it is easy to believe that only those who go to the Ivy-League institutions are or will ever be qualified to fill a seat on the bench but we know this is just not true.

*Not pictured is Trump Nominee, Neil Gorsuch (Harvard Law School)

Out of the top ten Law Schools ranked by US News, four (Harvard, Yale, Columbia, Penn) are Ivy-League. Stanford, Michigan, NYU, University of Chicago, UVA, and Duke are all not Ivy-League schools that have consistently produced some of the best legal minds in our country Yet, they only graduated a combined seven individuals who have gone on to become Supreme Court Justices compared to Harvard, Yale, and Columbia which have had 37 alumni who served on the bench. While I take into account that the Ivy-League schools are some of our oldest universities, the massive gap still remains shocking. It seems that our demand for excellence from nominees has limited the pool of applicants available.

Much in the same way we want to see racial, religious, and gender diversity in the Supreme Court, we should also try to strive for diversity in educational background to provide different views and perspectives that might be unseen by Ivy-League graduates. I worry by demanding perfect backgrounds from each potential justice, we make the Supreme Court worse. I would love to hear your opinions and thoughts on this issue, as it is one I am very interested.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_law_schools_attended_by_United_States_Supreme_Court_Justices

https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/scotus-education/

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/09/us/politics/09ivy.html

https://www.usnews.com/best-graduate-schools/top-law-schools/law-rankings

5 Responses to "Are The Supreme Court Justices Too Homogenous?"

Katherine Fell says:

December 6, 2017 at 2:30 pm

You make a very interesting point about the Supreme Court’s legacy of homogeneity. However, unlike the previous issues that we have discussed in class, the electorate has virtually no input in this matter, since Supreme Court Justices are directly appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate. As you previously mentioned, the vast majority of Justices have been Ivy League educated Protestant white men. Since the justices are appointed by the president and given our understanding of Converse, most Americans are not invested in how the judiciary works. In fact, most Americans can’t even name one Supreme Court Justice. Since this is the case, the underrepresentation of women, racial minorities, and other religions is not something that the people would react against. People are slow to question these disparities because they use their trust of the president as a heuristic for their trust in the Supreme Court. If they see that the president is directly choosing experienced Ivy League educated legal minds, then there is no reason to question the choices of the president. While it is really interesting that almost all of the justices who have served on the bench come from the same handful of law schools, I do not think that this is the most immediate problem when it comes to presentation on the bench.
The lack of women that have served on the Supreme Court is astonishing. For the famous 1973 Roe v. Wade case, which would impact the reproductive health of every woman in the country, there were zero women on the bench. This past year, I visited the National Art Gallery in Washington DC, where many portraits of past presidents, legislators, and justices are located. I vividly remember seeing a portrait of Sandra Day O’Connor, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Sonia Sotomayor, and Elena Kagan. These four women are the only female justices to ever serve on the Supreme Court, three of them are currently on the bench, and all of them are alive to pose for a portrait where all of them can fit comfortably. Compare this to the 109 men who have served throughout US history, creating the unfortunate tradition of having justices from such similar backgrounds. Justice Ginsburg is often asked when there will be enough women serving on the bench, and her famous response is “When there are nine.”
Yanbin Zhang says:

December 6, 2017 at 11:20 pm

It’s a really good point of view to think about the homogenous membership in supreme court. Compared with other branches of our government, the judiciary indeed received much less attention from the public. Yet the less attention on judiciary from the public is originated in its responsibility and roles in the government. Besides hearing the case across the country, the important role of the supreme court is to function as checks and balance against the other two branches. So they are more apart away from the ordinary people. That is also the reason why people don’t care about the race, ethnicity and gender diversity in the supreme court that much.
However, I do believe that there is a diversity of personal experiences needed in the supreme court. A judge’s experience and personal history are critical to how she or he approaches the job. Given this reality, the makeup of the judiciary should reflect as much as possible the public whose cases come before it. According to a report by Alliance for Justice, about 85 percent of Obama’s nominees to the federal bench have been corporate attorneys or prosecutors, or both. Fewer than 4 percent have worked as lawyers in public-interest organizations. And while 43 percent of his nominees to the federal trial courts were previously state or federal prosecutors, only 15 percent were public defenders. At the appellate level, only 4 out of 56 nominees were public defenders and 21 were prosecutors. Although I don’t think that the diversity of race, ethnicity, religion or gender is a big issue for supreme court, I strongly believe that the supreme court could only make their judgement fair to people from different classes unless the justices have different career and first-hand personal experience to understand the appeal from different people.
Spencer Yacos says:

December 6, 2017 at 11:25 pm

In the business field, it’s argued nowadays to have majors like in arts or music to stand out from the crowd. There may be some merit to finding lawyers with more diverse backgrounds as you say in your article. However, law is like an exceptionally difficult language, full of minute contradictions and interpretations. Very few intellectuals can withstand the national scrutiny they face when nominated as a supreme court justice. The crux of the problem in implementing your theory is rather simple: there is no real precedent for testing it. We never really had non-Ivy League graduates sit on the bench. The closest we can come to testing if such an idea could work is looking at more international courts and where they get their justices from. Even then there would be cultural differences, as almost every constitution across the world is younger than ours.
Alexandra Friedman says:

December 7, 2017 at 1:22 pm

I think you are right; we do need to examine the people on the supreme court. But, like Katie said, the judiciary proves to be a relatively unique case because citizens have no votes. In my opinion, the reason for the wealth of ivy league graduates can be traced back to the people who are picking the nominees: our president. There is a certain stigma associated with these universities, and since our presidents often come from similar schools, it makes sense that they would pick someone who went there. But, what worries me is that these are the people who are making decisions when often times they cannot even fathom the concepts they are making decisions about. How is a conservative, male judge, supposed to be impartial and help all of society in a situation about abortion? Even if he wants to make a fair decision, it is impossible for him to ignore his background culture or upbringing. One might reply to this by saying that’s why we have liberals and some women to match him. But, even having white liberals does not help african american and other minority citizens have people on the bench that can not only sympathize with them, but also empathize. The decisions the supreme court makes are greatly important, and we need to protect all our citizens. The best way to do this would be through diversifying the bench. Of course, we have made some progress since the bench was originally put together. But, as the country continues to grow, we need to have our judiciary do the same.
Jackson Puckey says:

December 7, 2017 at 5:33 pm

The prestige of the Ivy League relative to other universities has been up for discussion for decades. In terms of law school admissions, the most valuable acceptance letters come from the “T14,” or Top 14 schools in the country. Of the 15 schools which are generally included (in some combination) in the top 14, 8 of them are outside of the Ivy League. If you are not accepted into one of these law schools, your degree is generally considered far less valuable. This in and of itself is somewhat ridiculous, especially since such prestigious institutions as UCLA, Vanderbilt, and USC (California) are excluded from this list. However, the Ivy League itself is even further privileged than the rest of the T14. As you showed us in your post, the entire Supreme Court comes from these institutions, as do most Presidents. Ronald Reagan was the most recent President not to have attended an Ivy League institution for either undergraduate or graduate school.
While, in the modern age, this may seem unacceptable, it is important to note that the Ivy League were, until a few decades ago, practically unbeatable in terms of educational quality. While I do feel there should be greater educational diversity among the Supreme Court, many people who are of the age and ability to don the black robes are from a generation where, to be a successful lawyer, you were obligated to attend these institutions. It is true that Presidents do tend to appoint justices from a similar educational background, but that may not exclusively be their fault. In politics, there is a great deal of stigma against those who did not attend Ivy League Institutions. Presidents and Congressmen tend to seem “smarter” in the eyes of the people if they attended these universities, even if they are not extremely intelligent. The same is true in law. To reach any great heights in law, a lawyer or a judge must distinguish themselves. To attend one of these elite institutions of higher learning is one of the key ways young lawyers are able to climb the rungs of the ladder of their career. Thus it is extremely difficult to ascend to the degree of recognition necessary to be appointed to the Supreme Court unless you have attended one of these universities.

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