MSNBC: Justice David Souter plans to retire from Supreme Court

[Cooked Crack]

WASHINGTON - Supreme Court Justice David Souter plans to retire, sources told NBC News Thursday night.

Speculation about Souter's plans began to swirl as the eight other justices were known to have hired the four law clerks who will work with them in the Supreme Court term that begins in October. Souter has been the lone holdout, hiring no one.

A retirement by Souter, 69, would give President Barack Obama his first chance to nominate a justice and the next few months would bring Senate confirmation hearings.

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Several government sources said that Souter had signaled his intention to retire, NBC News correspondent Pete Williams reported. It was unclear whether Souter would retire at the end of the current term or as soon as a nomination can be made.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/30508968/

Wonder how many more members of the Supremes will Obama pick.

[StillUnknown]

http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/0409/Souter.html

Obama's molding of the Supreme Court may start now:

NPR has learned that Supreme Court Justice David Souter is planning to retire at the end of the court's current term.

The court has completed hearing oral arguments for the year and will be issuing rulings and opinions until the end of June.

Souter is expected to remain on the bench until a successor has been chosen and confirmed, which may or may not be accomplished before the court reconvenes in October.

There's some basically vacuous, but plausible, conventional wisdom saying that Judge Sonia Sotomayor is a likely pick. I'd suspect, though, that Obama will be tempted to pick one of the prominent legal minds whom he knows personally, and whose philosophy he likes, given his own engagement with legal theory.

[SUSkinsFan]

This is a shame. I liked Souter.

[Ford]

Surprising. At age 69, he is younger than 5 of the other 8 justices.

[WVUforREDSKINS]

Get ready for the outrage

[McD5]

Can we please screen the new nominee to make sure they don't have tax problems?

Is that asking too much?

[Jeeb]

Can we please screen the new nominee to make sure they don't have tax problems?

Is that asking too much?

It's all part of his master plan to catch tax cheats, pay your taxes or he'll nominate you.

[cmman848]

Probably another ACLU apolozige for america far left nomimnee like Koh and the radical leftists obama appoints to his justice dept,

[Midnight Judges]

Republicans have appointed 7 out of 9 on the supreme court. Time for a more liberal court. Scalia and Kennedy can't hold out for 8 years.

[gbear]

The amazing thing is how conservative he was viewed when he first came to the court:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/01/AR2009050100318.html?hpid=opinionsbox1

But then as I look back, I'm surprised that a lot of split decisions were split. For example, I take for granted that I can't weigh a woman's potential child bearing age against her when it comes to a choice to hire or promote. That seems obvious...now. I guess before that case employers were hesitant to put a woman in a position where it would cause business problems for her to take time off to have a kid. We've come a long way in the last 20 years.

If you doubt we have moved to the right as a country, I'd put the fact that Souter, once considered a moderate to right judge, is now considered liberal. Did he change or have we?

[#98QBKiller]

Republicans have appointed 7 out of 9 on the supreme court. Time for a more liberal court. Scalia and Kennedy can't hold out for 8 years.

You're right about that.

[@DCGoldPants]

Personally. I'm sick of people wanting Justices that are hardcore left or right.

I want Centrists. This this the Supreme Court for all of the United States. Not just the folks on one side or another.

[gbear]

Souter was a centrist. He was a swing vote. Over time, the Centrist became the Left as the court moved Right.

The problem with "Centrists" is they will rarely stay that way as one of three things happen: we as a society change values, the judges change values as the get older and see more cases, or we label them based on their rulings of a few cases regardless of their overall leanings.

I'm not sure "centrists" exist on the Supreme Court. There are swing votes, and I'm not sure it's possible to have all swing votes. For every Sarge there is a Predicto. Sure there are posters in the middle, but even if you get get rid of the extremes, you just end up making somebody else the furthest to the right or left.

[Zguy28]

Get ready for the outrage

He's nominating Bill Clinton? :yikes:

[Kilmer17]

Yes. 7 of 9 appointed by the GOP. And yet the Court is evenly split. Hmmmmmmm.

The timing of this stinks like hell. He waits until Specter switches?

More proof in my eyes that the Court is now nothing but the 3rd Uber Political branch of the Govt.

That said, elections have consequences. Obama should nominate the most hardcore left wing nut bag like Ginsberg. He'll have no trouble with whomever he chooses.

2 more will happen in the next two years. IE, before the Dems can lose 60 in the Senate. It wont change the voting blocks, just the veracity of the members of the left wing on the Court. Instead of milquetoast opinions from souter, we'll get the left wing equivalent of Scalia with every decision.

[SkinInsite]

NOooooo not Souter!

[karmacop]

Yes. 7 of 9 appointed by the GOP. And yet the Court is evenly split. Hmmmmmmm.

I don't think it's "evenly split." I think it appears that way because the "center" on the Supreme Court has slowly but surely moved further and further right. Kennedy used to be viewed as a fairly reliable conservative vote (and still is), but now he's the "swing vote." Before Kennedy it was O'Connor, also a conservative nominated by Reagan.

The next few Obama nominations will do nothing except to maintain Kennedy as the swing vote, and so the Supreme Court will remain very conservative until either Kennedy or Scalia retires (I'm assuming Thomas, Roberts and Alito will be around for longer than 4-8 years). The only benefit to the left is you prevent an even further rightward movement, and you can get a few younger progressive jurists on the bench who can be there for 20-25 years (like Roberts and Alito).

[chipwhich]

Personally. I'm sick of people wanting Justices that are hardcore left or right.

I want Centrists. This this the Supreme Court for all of the United States. Not just the folks on one side or another.

Wow, unbiased, voice of reason?

Don't let midnight j hear you.

[NavyDave]

Yes. 7 of 9 appointed by the GOP. And yet the Court is evenly split. Hmmmmmmm.

The timing of this stinks like hell. He waits until Specter switches?

More proof in my eyes that the Court is now nothing but the 3rd Uber Political branch of the Govt.

That said, elections have consequences. Obama should nominate the most hardcore left wing nut bag like Ginsberg. He'll have no trouble with whomever he chooses.

2 more will happen in the next two years. IE, before the Dems can lose 60 in the Senate. It wont change the voting blocks, just the veracity of the members of the left wing on the Court. Instead of milquetoast opinions from souter, we'll get the left wing equivalent of Scalia with every decision.

I guess you youngins still can't comprehend that the GOP has had liberal voices in the Presidents ear and the Bush's were somewhat social moderates. (Remember is was Bush the Elder who pushed thru the citizens with disabilities act so now there is a lawsuit against business if they don't have wheel chair access).

Dubba ya nominated a liberal female justice candidate until the Conservative grassroots fortunately demanded someone who actually interpreted the Constitution.

Souters replacement is going to be for a living Constitution, liberal with strong positions favoring abortion, church state separation etc. So its going to be either

Sonia Sotomayor of NY's 2nd cirucit court of Appeals considered more liberal than Stevens and Ginsburg being Hispanic and of course a woman allows Obama to satisfy two voting blocks at once.

Or Elena Kagan (solicitor general)

[Ford]

I'm all for balance but I'm not sure that I agree a court made of primarily of centrists is the best idea. A lot of the most rigorous, meaningful debate and groundbreaking decisions have come from the kind of debate that arises from jurists with vastly different interpretations of the constitution and the role of the court.

I'm not sure what the outrage over the timing of his decision would be. Souter was about as stalwart a liberal voice as the court has seen. I find it hard to believe he's going to be replaced someone that will be more unpalatable to conservatives.

In any event, as someone said, however thoroughly potential nominees are vetted, you never really know what you're going to get. As already noted, Souter was seen as a pretty conservative voice when he became a justice -- there have been a lot of unpleasant surprises for appointing Presidents. Just look at the evolution of figures like Hugo Black, Earl Warren, etc.

[PeterMP]

I guess you youngins still can't comprehend that the GOP has had liberal voices in the Presidents ear and the Bush's were somewhat social moderates. (Remember is was Bush the Elder who pushed thru the citizens with disabilities act so now there is a lawsuit against business if they don't have wheel chair access).

Dubba ya nominated a liberal female justice candidate until the Conservative grassroots fortunately demanded someone who actually interpreted the Constitution.

Souters replacement is going to be for a living Constitution, liberal with strong positions favoring abortion, church state separation etc. So its going to be either

Sonia Sotomayor of NY's 2nd cirucit court of Appeals considered more liberal than Stevens and ginsburg being Hispanic and of course a woman allow Obama to satisfy to voting blocks at once.

Or Elena Kagan (solicitor general)

Do you know the justices that Bush's appointed?

[Larry]

Get ready for the outrage

Probably another ACLU apolozige for america far left nomimnee like Koh and the radical leftists obama appoints to his justice dept,

You don't get any credit, though, since your prediction was such an obvious one.

It's like predicting suicide threats in Stadium on Draft Day. There's nothing special about predicting the predictable.

[Larry]

I nominate Predicto.

[NavyDave]

Do you know the justices that Bush's appointed?

I met Bush the Elders appointment over 11 years ago Clarence Thomas. Never ran into or saw David Souter.

My circle of friends, associates with ties on the hill, etc increased over a week ago do to my brother pulling over and lending assistance to several people in a BMW involved in a hit and run in Mitchellville.

[PeterMP]

I met Bush the Elders appointment over 11 years ago Clarence Thomas. Never ran into or saw David Souter.

My circle of friends, associates with ties on the hill, etc increased over a week ago do to my brother pulling over and lending assistance to several people in a BMW involved in a hit and run in Mitchellville.

I meant "know" in the context of their names and record on the bench. You seemed to suggesting that justices appointed by the Bush's were the reason that a court that has been appointed mainly by Republicans is evenly split was somehow the fault of the Bush's.