35 Facts About Justice John Roberts

1.

Justice John Roberts has been described as having a conservative judicial philosophy but, above all, as an institutionalist.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,875
2.

Justice John Roberts has shown a willingness to work with the Supreme Court's liberal bloc, and after the retirement of Anthony Kennedy in 2018, he had been regarded as the primary swing vote on the Court.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,876
3.

Justice John Roberts is no longer the median vote since Amy Coney Barrett replaced Ruth Bader Ginsburg in 2020.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,877
4.

Justice John Roberts grew up in northwestern Indiana and was educated in Catholic schools.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,878
5.

Justice John Roberts studied history at Harvard University and then attended Harvard Law School, where he was managing editor of the Harvard Law Review.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,879
6.

Justice John Roberts's father had Irish and Welsh ancestry, and his mother was a descendant of Slovak immigrants from Szepes, Hungary.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,880
7.

Justice John Roberts has an elder sister, Kathy, and two younger sisters, Peggy and Barbara.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,881
8.

Justice John Roberts spent his early childhood years in Hamburg, New York, where his father worked as an electrical engineer for the Bethlehem Steel Corporation at its large factory in Lackawanna.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,882
9.

Justice John Roberts attended La Lumiere School, a small but affluent and academically rigorous Catholic boarding school in La Porte, Indiana, where he was captain of the school's football team and was a regional champion in wrestling.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,883
10.

Justice John Roberts participated in choir and drama, and co-edited the school newspaper.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,884
11.

Justice John Roberts then studied history at Harvard University, entering with sophomore standing based on his high academic achievement in high school.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,885
12.

Justice John Roberts served as the acting solicitor general for the case of Metro Broadcasting, Inc v FCC when the solicitor general, Ken Starr, had a conflict of interest.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,886
13.

Justice John Roberts became the head of the firm's appellate practice, and became an adjunct professor at the Georgetown University Law Center.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,887
14.

Justice John Roberts represented 19 states in United States v Microsoft.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,888
15.

In 2000, Justice John Roberts advised Jeb Bush, then governor of Florida, concerning Bush's actions in the Florida election recount during the presidential election.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,889
16.

Justice John Roberts's sued, alleging that an adult would have only received a citation for the same offense, while children must be detained until parents are notified.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,890
17.

In Hamdan v Rumsfeld, Roberts was part of a unanimous circuit panel overturning the district court ruling and upholding military tribunals set up by the Bush Administration for trying terrorism suspects known as enemy combatants.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,891
18.

Justice John Roberts's nomination was the first Supreme Court nomination since Stephen Breyer in 1994.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,892
19.

Justice John Roberts stated the following about federalism in a 1999 radio interview:.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,893
20.

Justice John Roberts Holmes described assessing the constitutionality of an act of Congress as the gravest duty that the Supreme Court is called upon to perform.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,894
21.

At his nomination hearing Justice John Roberts testified that the legal memos represented the views of the administration he was representing at the time and not necessarily his own.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,895
22.

Bush Administration, Roberts signed a legal brief urging the court to overturn Roe v Wade.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,896
23.

In private meetings with senators before his confirmation, Justice 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.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,897
24.

Justice 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.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,898
25.

Justice John Roberts criticized the majority opinion as inconsistent with prior case law and for partly basing its reasoning on its perception of social custom.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,899
26.

Justice John Roberts said the social expectation test was flawed because the Fourth Amendment protects a legitimate expectation of privacy, not social expectations.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,900
27.

In 2022, Roberts declined to join the majority opinion in Dobbs v Jackson Women's Health Organization, which overturned Roe v Wade.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,901
28.

Justice John Roberts wrote a concurring opinion supporting only the decision to uphold the Mississippi abortion statute, stating that the right to an abortion should "extend far enough to ensure a reasonable opportunity to choose, but need not extend any further".

FactSnippet No. 1,080,902
29.

Justice John Roberts opposes the use of race in assigning students to particular schools, including for purposes such as maintaining integrated schools.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,903
30.

Justice John Roberts sees such plans as discrimination in violation of the Constitution's Equal Protection Clause and Brown v Board of Education.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,904
31.

In Pavan v Smith, the Supreme Court "summarily overruled" the Arkansas Supreme Court's decision that the state did not have to list same-sex spouses on birth certificates; Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, and Neil Gorsuch dissented, but Roberts did not join their dissent, leaving open speculation that he might have ruled with the majority.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,905
32.

In October 2020, 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.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,906
33.

In Shelby County v Holder, Roberts struck down requirements that states and localities with a history of racially motivated voter suppression obtain federal preclearance before implementing any changes to voting laws.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,907
34.

In 2007, Justice John Roberts had a seizure at his vacation home in St George, Maineand stayed overnight at a hospital in Rockport, Maine;doctors found no identifiable cause.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,908
35.

In 2010, Justice John Roberts sold his stock in Pfizer because he was set to hear two pending cases involving the company.

FactSnippet No. 1,080,909