1. John Roberts has been described as having a moderate conservative judicial philosophy, though he is primarily an institutionalist.
61 Facts About John Roberts
1. 2.
Later, John Roberts served as a law clerk for Judge Henry Friendly and Justice William Rehnquist.
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John Roberts presided over the first impeachment trial of President Donald Trump.
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John Roberts's father had Irish and Welsh ancestry and his mother was a descendant of Slovak immigrants from Szepes, Hungary.
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John Roberts has two younger sisters, Margaret and Barbara; an elder sister, Kathy, died in 2021.
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John Roberts spent his early childhood years in Hamburg, New York, where his father worked as an electrical engineer for the Bethlehem Steel Corporation's factory in Lackawanna.
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John Roberts participated in choir and drama, and was a co-editor of the school newspaper.
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John Roberts graduated in 1973 as class valedictorian, becoming the first graduate of the La Lumiere School to enroll at Harvard University.
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At Harvard College, John Roberts dedicated himself to studying history, his academic major.
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John Roberts had entered Harvard as a sophomore with second-year standing based on his academic achievements in high school.
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John Roberts first roomed in Straus Hall before moving to Leverett House.
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John Roberts gained a reputation as a serious student who valued formalism.
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John Roberts focused on modern European history and maintained an interest in politics.
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John Roberts later regretted that he traveled into Boston on only a couple of occasions during his time at Harvard, being too preoccupied with his studies.
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Rehnquist recommended him to Ken Starr, who was chief of staff to attorney general William French Smith, and John Roberts was named a special assistant to the attorney general.
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From 1982 to 1986, John Roberts was an associate with the White House Counsel.
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John Roberts built a successful practice as an appellate lawyer, heading the firm's division for appellate advocacy.
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John Roberts made his first appearance before the Supreme Court in United States v Halper, arguing against the government, and the Court unanimously upheld his arguments.
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John Roberts argued for a number of conservative positions, including those against abortion, an extensive federal jurisdiction and policies that afforded special benefits to minority groups.
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When Starr recused himself in Metro Broadcasting, Inc v FCC, Roberts took his place, arguing that the use of racial preferences by the Federal Communications Commission was unconstitutional.
21.
When Clarence Thomas was confirmed to the Supreme Court in 1991, John Roberts's proven experience in complex litigation for the Bush administration made him a leading candidate to fill Thomas's vacancy on the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.
22.
On January 27,1992, Bush nominated John Roberts, who had just turned 37 years old, to the DC Circuit, and Starr urged Senator Joe Biden, chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, to schedule a hearing despite an upcoming election year.
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In January 1993, John Roberts returned to Hogan and Hartson, where, finding great success as an advocate, he began to regularly appear again before the Supreme Court.
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John Roberts was Hogan and Hartson's most prominent partner, arguing 18 Supreme Court cases from 1993 to 2003 and 20 in nationwide appellate courts while doing work pro bono, demonstrating expertise in a wide variety of different fields.
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John Roberts, who had not worked in government while Bill Clinton was in office, did not appear on lists compiled by Bush supporters, advocacy groups, or the media, but nonetheless remained a strong candidate for a Republican nomination and was poised to be re-nominated to the DC Circuit, often used as a platform for Supreme Court nomination.
26.
Unlike in 1992 when his first nomination stalled in the Democratic-majority Senate, John Roberts's nomination came when Republicans had secured a one-vote Senate majority.
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In 2002, Republicans regained control of the Senate and John Roberts finally received a hearing by the Senate Judiciary Committee.
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John Roberts authored 49 opinions during his two-year service on the DC Circuit, many of which concerned decisions by the Federal Communications Commission and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.
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One case, Hedgepeth ex rel Hedgepeth v Washington Metropolitan Area Transit, garnered media attention when Roberts found that Washington police properly detained a 12-year-old girl who ate in violation of a zero tolerance policy against eating in a metro station.
30.
John Roberts's nomination was the first Supreme Court nomination since Stephen Breyer's in 1994.
31.
John Roberts said the following about federalism in a 1999 radio interview:.
32.
Bush administration, Roberts signed a legal brief urging the court to overturn Roe v Wade.
33.
In private meetings with senators before his confirmation, John Roberts testified that Roe was settled law, but added that it was subject to the legal principle of stare decisis, meaning that while the Court must give some weight to the precedent, it was not legally bound to uphold it.
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John Roberts was confirmed by what was, historically, a narrow margin for a Supreme Court justice, but all subsequent confirmation votes have been even narrower.
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John Roberts appears to place great stock in the process-oriented tools and doctrinal rules that guard against the aggregation of judicial power and keep judicial discretion in check: jurisdictional limits, structural federalism, textualism, and the procedural rules that govern the scope of judicial review.
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John Roberts did not preside over Trump's second impeachment trial, believing that the Constitution requires only that the chief justice preside in the trial of a sitting president, not of a former president.
37.
John Roberts seems to want more consensus from the Court.
38.
On June 26,2018, Roberts wrote the majority opinion in Trump v Hawaii, upholding the Trump administration's travel ban against seven nations, five of which had a Muslim majority.
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Additionally, John Roberts wrote that the proclamation and its travel ban did not violate the Free Exercise Clause, as Trump's statements in support of the ban could be justified on the basis of national security.
40.
On July 9,2020, Roberts wrote the majority opinion in Trump v Vance, regarding presidential immunity from criminal subpoenas relating to the president's personal information.
41.
On July 9,2020, Roberts wrote the majority opinion in Trump v Mazars USA, LLP, regarding the authority of congressional subpoenas relating to certain personal information relating to the president.
42.
On July 1,2024, Roberts wrote the majority opinion in Trump v United States, writing that a president has absolute immunity for acts committed as president within their constitutional purview, presumptive immunity for official acts, and no immunity for unofficial acts.
43.
In 2010, Roberts joined the opinion of the Court in Citizens United v FEC, which struck down provisions of BCRA that restricted unions, corporations, and profitable organizations from independent political spending and prohibited the broadcasting of political media funded by them within 60 days of general elections or 30 days of primary elections.
44.
John Roberts wrote his own concurring opinion "to address the important principles of judicial restraint and stare decisis implicated in this case".
45.
In 2015, Roberts joined the liberal justices in Williams-Yulee v Florida Bar, holding that the First Amendment does not prohibit states from barring judges and judicial candidates from personally soliciting funds for their election campaigns.
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John Roberts criticized the decision as inconsistent with prior case law and for partly basing its reasoning on its perception of social custom.
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John Roberts said the social expectation test was flawed because the Fourth Amendment protects a legitimate expectation of privacy, not social expectations.
48.
In Gonzales v Carhart, Roberts voted with the majority to uphold the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act.
49.
Thomas filed a concurring opinion contending that Roe v Wade and Casey should be reversed; Roberts did not join that opinion.
50.
In 2022, Roberts declined to join the majority opinion in Dobbs v Jackson Women's Health Organization, which overturned Roe v Wade.
51.
John Roberts opposes the use of race in assigning students to particular schools, including for purposes such as maintaining integrated schools.
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John Roberts sees such plans as discrimination in violation of the Constitution's Equal Protection Clause and Brown v Board of Education.
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On June 29,2023, Roberts wrote the majority opinion in Students for Fair Admissions v Harvard and Students for Fair Admissions v University of North Carolina, which held that race-based affirmative action in both public and private universities violates the Equal Protection Clause.
54.
On March 2,2011, Roberts wrote the majority opinion in Snyder v Phelps, holding that speech as a matter of public concern, even if considered offense or outrageous, cannot be the basis of liability for a tort of emotional stress.
55.
In Pavan v Smith, the Supreme Court "summarily overruled" the Arkansas Supreme Court's decision that the state does not have to list same-sex spouses on birth certificates; Thomas, Alito, and Gorsuch dissented, but Roberts joined the majority.
56.
In October 2020, John Roberts joined the justices in an "apparently unanimous" decision to reject an appeal from Kim Davis, who refused to provide marriage licenses to same-sex couples.
57.
In 2007, John Roberts received an honorary degree from the College of the Holy Cross.
58.
John Roberts delivered a commencement address at Holy Cross that year.
59.
In 2023, Roberts was awarded the Henry J Friendly Medal of the American Law Institute.
60.
In 2007, John Roberts had a seizure at his vacation home in St George, Maine, and stayed overnight at a hospital in Rockport, Maine; doctors found no identifiable cause.
61.
On June 21,2020, John Roberts fell at a Maryland country club; his forehead required sutures and he stayed overnight in the hospital for observation.