Demographics of The Supreme Court of The United States - Age

Age

Unlike the offices of President, U.S. Representative, and U.S. Senator, there is no minimum age for Supreme Court justices set forth in the United States Constitution. However, justices tend to be appointed after having made significant achievements in law or politics, which excludes many young potential candidates from consideration. At the same time, justices appointed at too advanced an age will likely have short tenures on the Court.

The youngest justice ever appointed was Joseph Story, 32 at the time of his appointment in 1812; the oldest was Charles Evans Hughes, who was 67 at the time of his appointment as Chief Justice in 1930. (Hughes had previously been appointed to the Court as an associate justice in 1910, at the age of 48, but had resigned in 1916 to run for president.) Story went on to serve for 33 years, while Hughes served 11 years after his second appointment. The oldest justice at the time of his initial appointment was Horace Lurton, 65 at the time of his appointment in 1909. Lurton died after only four years on the Court. The oldest sitting justice to be elevated to Chief Justice was Hughes' successor, Harlan Fiske Stone, who was 68 at the time of his elevation in 1941. Stone died in 1946, only five years after his elevation.

Of the justices currently sitting, the youngest at time of appointment was Clarence Thomas, who was 43 years old at the time of his confirmation in 1991. As of the beginning of the 2010-11 term, Elena Kagan was the youngest justice sitting, at 50 years of age. The oldest person to have served on the Court was Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., who stepped down two months shy of his 91st birthday. John Paul Stevens, second only to Holmes, left the court in June 2010, two months after turning 90.

The average age of the Court as a whole fluctuates over time with the departure of older justices and the appointment of younger people to fill their seats. As of April 2009, the average age of the justices was 69 years. Just prior to the death of Chief Justice Rehnquist in September 2005, the average age was 71. After Sonia Sotomayor was appointed in August 2009, the average age at which current justices were appointed was about 53 years old.

The longest period of time in which one group of justices has served together occurred from August 3, 1994, when Stephen Breyer was appointed to replace the retired Harry Blackmun, to September 3, 2005, the death of Rehnquist, totaling 11 years and 31 days. From 1789 until 1970, justices served an average of 14.9 years. Those who have stepped down since 1970 have served an average of 25.6 years. The retirement age had jumped from an average of 68 pre-1970 to 79 for justices retiring post-1970. Between 1789 and 1970 there was a vacancy on the Court once every 1.91 years. In the next 34 years since the two appointments in 1971, there was a vacancy on average only once every 3.75 years. The typical one-term president has had one appointment opportunity instead of two.

Commentators have noted that advances in medical knowledge "have enormously increased the life expectancy of a mature person of an age likely to be considered for appointment to the Supreme Court". Combined with the reduction in responsibilities carried out by modern justices as compared to the early justices, this results in much longer potential terms of service. This has led to proposals such as imposing a mandatory retirement age for Supreme Court justices and predetermined term limits.