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Supreme Court · Associate Justice

John Stevens

Republican appointee: Appointed by Gerald Ford (R)

Served 1975–2010 · 35 terms

Confirmed 98–0

Biography

John Paul Stevens was an American lawyer and jurist who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1975 to 2010. He was the second-oldest and fourth-longest-serving justice in U.S. Supreme Court history. At the time of his death in 2019 at age 99, he was the longest-lived Supreme Court justice ever.

Source: Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0

Ideology over time

Stevens and the 19 justices who overlapped with Stevens, 1975–2009

−8−6−4−20+2+41975198019851990199520002005More conservativeMore liberalThomasScaliaBurgerAlitoRehnquistJ. RobertsPowellWhiteKennedyO'ConnorBreyerSouterSotomayorGinsburgBlackmunStevensBrennanMarshall
  • John Stevens
  • 95% credible interval
  • Peer, appointed by a Democrat
  • Peer, appointed by a Republican
  • Court median
How to read this

Martin–Quinn scores place each justice on a single liberal–conservative dimension, estimated from their votes across terms, with scores allowed to shift from one term to the next. Higher is more conservative. The shaded band is the credible interval: wider when the record is thin, especially in a justice’s first terms, and narrower as votes accumulate.

Where Stevens sits among all justices

Career average, every justice in the data set

−4−20+2+4−3.400.08

Stevens’s range across terms

Served alongside Stevens

19 justices

Closest career average first. Filled dot: the peer. Ring: Stevens.

JusticeTogetherCareer avg
William Brennan1975–1989career average −1.78 versus Stevens at −1.81Ruth Ginsburg1993–2009career average −1.76 versus Stevens at −1.81Stephen Breyer1994–2009career average −1.32 versus Stevens at −1.81Thurgood Marshall1975–1990career average −2.82 versus Stevens at −1.81David Souter1990–2008career average −0.77 versus Stevens at −1.81Sonia Sotomayor2009career average −3.27 versus Stevens at −1.81Harry Blackmun1975–1993career average −0.03 versus Stevens at −1.81Potter Stewart1975–1980career average 0.40 versus Stevens at −1.81Byron White1975–1992career average 0.44 versus Stevens at −1.81Anthony Kennedy1987–2009career average 0.68 versus Stevens at −1.81John Roberts2005–2009career average 0.81 versus Stevens at −1.81Lewis Powell1975–1986career average 0.97 versus Stevens at −1.81Sandra O'Connor1981–2005career average 1.02 versus Stevens at −1.81William Douglas1975career average −4.70 versus Stevens at −1.81Warren Burger1975–1985career average 1.89 versus Stevens at −1.81Samuel Alito2005–2009career average 2.00 versus Stevens at −1.81Antonin Scalia1986–2009career average 2.50 versus Stevens at −1.81William Rehnquist1975–2004career average 2.97 versus Stevens at −1.81Clarence Thomas1991–2009career average 3.40 versus Stevens at −1.81

How Stevens voted

Every argued case Stevens took part in, newest first, with how Stevens voted in each: with the majority, in dissent, or in an equally divided Court. A Liberal or Conservative tag is the Supreme Court Database’s coding of who prevailed in the case, not a rating of the justices.

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    Data notes

    The Decisions page’s argued cases with this justice’s vote from the Supreme Court Database. “Majority” includes a concurrence; a vote that dissented in part is coded by the side the justice took overall. Cases the justice sat out and equally divided cases are left out of the percentages. “Wrote” means authored an opinion. Source: Supreme Court Database (Spaeth et al.).

    Report a correction

    Scores: Martin, Andrew D. and Kevin M. Quinn. 2002. “Dynamic Ideal Point Estimation via Markov Chain Monte Carlo for the U.S. Supreme Court, 1953–1999.” Political Analysis 10:134–153, from mqscores.wustl.edu. Appointment data: Federal Judicial Center biographical directory. Biographies: Wikipedia, text abridged, under CC BY-SA 4.0. Portraits: public-domain images via Wikimedia Commons.