VP-elect Biden Chooses Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens To Swear Him In

According to The Legal Times, Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens, the oldest and longest-serving justice on the Supreme Court, will swear in VP-Elect Joseph Biden as Vice President next month on Innauguration Day.

Vigorous and sharp at 88, he has served on the court for 32 years. In criminal-law and death-penalty cases, Stevens has voted against the government and in favor of the individual more frequently than any other sitting justice.

He files more dissents and separate opinions than any of his colleagues. He is the court's most outspoken defender of the need for judicial oversight of executive power. And in recent years, he has written majority opinions in two of the most important cases ruling against the Bush Administration's treatment of suspected enemy combatants in the war on terror -- an issue the court is revisiting this term when it hears appeals by Guantánamo detainees, challenging their lack of access to federal courts.

Justice Stevens was named to the Court in 1975 by President Gerald Ford. It is rare for a Vice President to be sworn in by a justice appointed by a president of the opposite party, so VP-elect Biden's choice to have Stevens swear him in can be seen as a bipartisan gesture -- though Justice Stevens is usually regarded as one of the most liberal justices on the Court.

According to family members and former law clerks, Justice Stevens still writes the first draft of his opinions. He uses the Internet, studied French before a recent vacation in Europe, and has become hooked on Sudoku number puzzles.

In addition, Stevens has survived prostate cancer, and had a bypass heart operation in the 1970s. Since then he's followed a low-fat diet, eating only a grapefruit for lunch.

Comments

[SparkyDash]

Good for Justice Stevens...Nice choice Joe.

[eleutheros]

Nice gesture on Biden's part. Who will PE Obama ask? Ginsburg?

[bill76]

Presidents are sworn in by the Chief Justice, in this case John Roberts.

[eleutheros]

Chief Justice is tradition ... Obama could choose someone other than the corporate shill, John Roberts.

[noneIn2008]

Who is the Biden guy? I heard of him a couple months ago, then????

[SparkyDash]

Soon to be the most awesome Vice President this country has ever seen ;-)

You know, tall, honest, statesman from Delaware, respects the US Constitution...that guy.

[lobo1939]

I am so thankful that Obama made it and we have a chance that the SC vacancies will not go to misogynist or other persons opposed to civil rights. The conservatives have come close and I expect a bitter fight by the republicans in the senate to block any Obama appointment since we do not have the 60 vote plurality. But at least over the next four years if there is a retirement or death on the SC we can preserve the present balance.

[edgeways]

I think the Republicans would be playing with political dynamite if they filibustered a SCOTUS nomination for any but the most dire of reasons.

[BSERIUS]

Borked