Since being confirmed to sit on the Supreme Court in , Anthony McLeod Kennedy — has frequently been in the middle of his bitterly divided colleagues in First Amendment cases. Kennedy retired from the Court in July In , a seat opened on the Ninth U. Ford nominated Kennedy to the position. In April , Kennedy was confirmed by the Senate, making him at age 38 the youngest federal appeals judge in the country when appointed to the bench.
Powell Jr. In early , Kennedy was easily confirmed by the Senate, which had just dealt with the highly controversial and failed nominations of Judges Robert H. Bork and Douglas H. Roberts Jr. Alito Jr. Kennedy has sided with the liberals in key decisions on school prayer, political speech and obscenity.
His overriding concern for liberty and his willingness to view the Constitution as a living document are important features of his First Amendment jurisprudence. In free-exercise cases, Kennedy has joined with his fellow conservatives on the Court in adopting the neutrality test, a test put forth by the majority in Employment Division, Department of Human Resources of Oregon v.
Smith , which upheld the denial of unemployment benefits to two Native Americans who were fired from their jobs for ingesting peyote for religious purposes. City of Hialeah that struck down a local ordinance prohibiting animal sacrifice, because the statute targeted the Santeria religion and therefore failed the neutrality test. In the area of religious establishment, Kennedy has voted with his colleagues to accommodate religion, with a few notable exceptions. In cases on the religious use of public facilities and funds, Kennedy has always been an accommodationist.
In Rosenberger v. Rector and Visitors of the University of Virginia , for example, he wrote the majority opinion that held that student religious groups were entitled to the same state university student activity funds to produce a religious newspaper that student nonreligious groups received. His opinion in Rosenberger advanced the concept of avoiding viewpoint discrimination as a leading First Amendment principle.
Similarly, in cases on the government endorsement of religion, he has also been completely accommodationist, such as in Van Orden v. Perry and McCreary County v. American Civil Liberties Union in which he voted to allow Ten Commandment displays on public grounds regardless of the circumstances surrounding their placement.
In the area of aid to religious schools, Kennedy has also accommodated religion in every instance — such as school vouchers in Zelman v. Simmons-Harris — except one. Grumet , he invalidated a public school district that the state of New York had created specifically for a community of Hasidic Jews. In school prayer cases, Kennedy generally has joined the liberals in separating church and state under the establishment clause. In both Lee v. Doe , he struck down invocations at public school functions.
However, Kennedy parted ways with the liberal wing of the Court in upholding town prayer in Town of Greece v. Bush , writing that habeas corpus applied to Guantanamo Bay prisoners and that their imprisonment under the Military Commissions Act of violated this right.
Kennedy was in private practice in San Francisco, California , from to Following his father's death, he took over his father's practice in Sacramento, California. During Kennedy's time as a law professor and attorney, he assisted then- California Governor Ronald Reagan with drafting a state tax proposal.
Kennedy has served in numerous positions during his career, including in the California Army National Guard in and on the board of the Federal Judicial Center from to Kennedy also chaired the latter committee from to Kennedy grew up in Sacramento, California.
He served as a page in the California State Senate when he was young. Kennedy graduated from C. McClatchy High School in and went on to earn his B. He spent his senior year at the London School of Economics. Kennedy's judicial philosophy often focused on his interpretation of individual constitutional rights.
Examples include his majority opinions in Boumediene v. Bush , which ruled that Guantanamo Bay prisoners have a right to habeas corpus, and Romer v. Evans , which ruled that an amendment to the Colorado state constitution barring the state and local governments from passing LGBTQ protection legislation was unconstitutional.
In the majority opinion affirming the right to same-sex marriages in Obergefell v. The Constitution grants them that right. Kennedy's Martin-Quinn score following the term was. Martin-Quinn scores were developed by political scientists Andrew Martin and Kevin Quinn from the University of Michigan, and measure the justices of the Supreme Court along an ideological continuum.
The chart below details every justice's Martin-Quinn score for the term. While vetting Kennedy for a potential nomination, some of Reagan's Justice Department lawyers said that Kennedy was too eager to inject the courts into disputes that many conservatives would rather leave to legislatures and to identify rights not expressly written in the Constitution.
Kennedy's stance favoring privacy rights also drew criticism. Kennedy cited Roe v. Wade and other privacy rights cases favorably, which one attorney called "really very distressing.
Kennedy received his commission on March 24, He was only 38 years old when he was appointed to the Ninth Circuit and was the youngest federal appellate judge in the country. In the term, Kennedy was in the majority in 92 percent of decisions. He was in the majority in more than any of the eight justices except John Roberts. In the term, Roberts was in the majority in 97 percent of decisions. He was in the majority more often than all other justices during this term.
Since the term, Roberts has been in the majority more than 80 percent of the time each term, and been in the majority more than 90 percent of the time six times. The noteworthy cases listed in this section include any case where the justice authored a majority opinion or an dissent. Other cases may be included in this decision if they set or overturn an established legal precedent, are a major point of discussion in an election campaign, receive substantial media attention related to the justice's ruling, or based on our editorial judgment that the case is noteworthy.
For more on how we decide which cases are noteworthy, click here. Justice Kennedy delivered the majority opinion of the court in the case. Same-sex couples in Kentucky , Michigan , Ohio , and Tennessee brought challenges against agencies in those states that refused to recognize same-sex marriages. The challengers, relying on the U. Supreme Court's decision in United States v. Windsor that struck down portions of the Defense of Marriage Act as unconstitutional, petitioned the court to apply similar logic to state statutes.
Specifically, the petitioners Parties presenting a petition to an appellate court for relief on appeal. Each of the different trial courts ruled in favor of the petitioners Parties presenting a petition to an appellate court for relief on appeal. In announcing the judgment of the court, Justice Kennedy, who also wrote the court's opinion in Windsor , ruled that the state bans violated the petitioners' Fourteenth Amendment rights. Justice Kennedy held that the right to marry is a fundamental right protected by both the due process clause and the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and that this right extends to same-sex couples who wish to marry as well.
As a result of the opinion, state bans on same-sex marriage were struck down across the United States. Citizens United said that it was important to protect corporate political speech in the same way that media outlets are protected.
They also argued that they did not need to disclose who was funding political ads. The FEC said that the practice would lead to a quid pro quo scenario and that corporations were not "natural persons" that should receive free speech protection.
Justice Kennedy referenced the quid pro quo argument in his ruling:. The opinion also found that the "natural persons" argument was flawed, in that there is no way to define when someone crosses over from being a person to a corporation. Kennedy completed his graduation requirements in three years and attended the London School of Economics for a year before receiving his bachelor's degree in political science from Stanford University in He then attended Harvard Law School, graduating cum laude in He subsequently served a year in the California Army National Guard.
When his father died unexpectedly in , Kennedy took over the law practice. That same year, he married Mary Davis, who he had known for several years. Together, they would have three children. Just after starting at the law office, Kennedy began acting on what would be his lifelong interest in education.
He accepted a position as professor of constitutional law at the University of the Pacific's McGeorge School of Law, where he taught from to He worked as a lobbyist in California and became friends with Ed Meese, another lobbyist with close ties to Ronald Reagan. Kennedy assisted then-Governor Reagan in drafting Proposition 1, a ballot initiative to cut state spending.
Though the proposition failed, Reagan was very appreciative of the assistance and recommended Kennedy to President Gerald Ford for an appointment to the U. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. At 38, Kennedy was the youngest federal appeals court judge in the country. His calm demeanor and friendly personality kept the deliberations civil on the often divided court.
Setting aside ideology, Kennedy took a case-by-case approach, keeping his opinions narrow and avoiding sweeping conclusions and rhetoric. This tactic earned him the respect of opposing judges and lawyers alike. Kennedy's distinguished tenure on the Ninth Circuit put him on the shortlist of candidates to fill the seat of retiring Supreme Court Justice Lewis Powell in Instead, President Reagan nominated Robert H.
Bork, whose outspoken demeanor and sharply conservative views on constitutional law and social policy led to his rejection by the Senate. The quieter Kennedy was eventually nominated and was unanimously confirmed. Early in his tenure, Kennedy proved to be markedly conservative. In his first term, he voted with Chief Justice William H.
Rehnquist and Justice Antonin Scalia , two of the court's most conservative members, more than 90 percent of the time. With Justice Sandra Day O'Connor , Kennedy contributed critical votes that led to winning conservative majorities in cases limiting congressional authority under the commerce clause of the Constitution of the United States and striking down portions of gun-control legislation.
In subsequent years, however, his decisions were more independent. Parting ways with his conservative colleagues in , Justice Kennedy co-authored with O'Connor and Justice David Souter the court's majority opinion in Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v.
Wade
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