Chapter 2: An overview of the first 37 Justices (1789-1864)

Tradition also has it that each Justice is assigned a “Seat number,” with the Chief being #1. In the beginning, there are six Justices in total covering the early East coast states. As the nation expands to the west, additional seats open up – reaching to seven in 1807 (during Jefferson’s presidency) and then nine in 1837 (with Van Buren in office).

A total of 37 Justices will serve on the Court between 1789 and 1863, the end of Taney’s term.

• All but three (Wilson, Patterson and Iredell) are born in America. 
• Twenty are from Southern states and eighteen are slave-holders.
• Roughly ten come from humble roots, while another dozen are brought up amidst great wealth.
• The vast majority are associated with the early Protestant religions: Anglican, Episcopalian, Congregational, Presbyterian.
• Three are Unitarians, one is a Methodist, another a Catholic (Taney), a third a Quaker (Swayne), and a fourth likely a Deist (Marshall).
• Fifteen are members of Freemason lodges.
• Only a handful are self-educated, the rest attending the prominent universities of the era.
• Most “read the law” as apprentices after graduation, given scarcity of formal law school programs at the time.
• Fourteen have no experience as judges before their appointment: Jay, Rutledge, Paterson, Washington, Marshall, Story, Baldwin, Taney, McKinley, Curtis, Campbell, Clifford, Swayne, and Miller.
• The first thirteen are associated with the Federalist Party while the rest are Democrats, until three Republicans join after the war starts. 
• Twenty-nine are approved unanimously, while others draw some opposition, especially Buchanan’s “doughface” nominee, Nathan Clifford, who prevails by a narrow 26-23 margin. 
• Their average age when chosen is forty-nine, with the youngest at thirty-two being two “greats,” Joseph Story and William Johnson, and the oldest, Roger Taney, another great, at fifty-nine. 
• The average time served on the high court is just under seventeen years, with the shortest tenure belonging to Thomas Johnson (five months) and the longest to John Marshall (34.5 years).
• Twenty-six justices will die in office while nine others will resign, one will retire, and one (Rutledge) will be rejected by the Senate
• Ten or so are deeply invested in politics before and after reaching the bench: Jay, Paterson, Ellsworth, Story, Wayne, Taney, McLean, Woodbury, McKinley and Davis. 
• McLean and Woodbury in particular are often discussed as potential presidential nominees.
• All of the Justices are married and all but three (Cushing, Washington and Catron) have children.
• Roughly half will suffer the death of a child either at birth or a very young age. 
• Long-lives are the norm – the average being sixty-nine years at death, with twenty lasting to seventy and beyond and only one (Iredell) passing before fifty.
• Most of the individual “seats” on the bench will be filled by four different men between 1789 and 1862, with the “flow” as follows.

Roll Call of the 37 Supreme Court Justices By “Seat designation” Up To The Civil War