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Trump announces list of 20 new potential Supreme Court picks
President Donald Trump on Sept. 9, 2020 announced 20 names being added to the list of Supreme Court candidates that he’s pledged to choose from if he has future vacancies to fill.
WASHINGTON - One of the most influential decisions a U.S. president can make is appointing a justice to the Supreme Court.
Justices on the Supreme Court serve lifetime appointments so the ripple effects of their appointment can be felt for decades after a president leaves office.
Since the Supreme Court was established in 1789, presidents have submitted 163 justice nominations, and of those, 126 were confirmed by the U.S. Senate.
When looking at justices who sat on the bench of the Supreme Court, President George Washington and President Franklin D. Roosevelt had the most with eight each. In recent history, President Ronald Reagan had the most with three.
William Harrison, Andrew Johnson, Zachary Taylor and Jimmy Carter are the only presidents in U.S history to not have a justice appointee confirmed to the Supreme Court.
Here is the list of the presidents who had the most justice appointments sit on the Supreme Court:
President George Washington (8) – John Rutledge, William Cushing, James Wilson, John Blair, James Iredell, Thomas Johnson, William Patterson and Samuel Chase
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President Franklin D. Roosevelt (8) - Hugo Black, Stanley Reed, Felix Frankfurter, William Douglas, Frank Murphy, James Byrnes, Robert Jackson and Wiley Rutledge
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President William Taft (5) - Horace Lurton, Charles Hughes, Willis van Devanter, Joseph Lamar and Mahlon Pitney
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President Andrew Jackson (5) – John McLean, Henry Baldwin, James Wayne, Philip Barbour and John Catron
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President Dwight D. Eisenhower (4) - John Harlan, William Brennan, Charles Whittaker and Potter Stewart
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President Benjamin Harrison (4) - David Brewer, Henry Brown, George Shiras and Howell Jackson
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President Abraham Lincoln (4) - Noah Swayne, Samuel Miller, David Davis and Stephen Field
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President Ronald Reagan (3) - Sandra Day O’Connor, Antonin Scalia and Anthony Kennedy
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President Richard Nixon (3) - Harry Blackmun, Lewis Powell and William Rehnquist
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President Harry Truman (3) - Harold Burton, Tom Clark and Sherman Minton
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President Warren Harding (3) - George Sutherland, Pierce Butler and Edward Sanford
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President Woodrow Wilson (3) - James McReynolds, Louis Brandeis and John Clarke
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President Theodore Roosevelt (3) - Oliver Holmes, William Day and William Moody
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President Grover Cleveland (3) - Lucius Lamar, Edward White and Rufus Peckham
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President Ulysses Grant (3) - William Strong, Joseph Bradley and Ward Hunt
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President Thomas Jefferson (3) – William Johnson, Brockholst Livingston and Thomas Todd
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President Donald Trump (2) - Brett Kavanaugh and Neil Gorsuch
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President Barack Obama (2) - Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor
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President Bill Clinton (2) - Stephen Breyer and Ruth Bader Ginsburg
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President George H.W. Bush (2) - David Souter and Clarence Thomas
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President Lyndon B. Johnson (2) - Thurgood Marshall and Abe Fortas
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President John F. Kennedy (2) - Raymond White and Arthur Goldberg
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President Herbert Hoover (2) - Owen Roberts and Benjamin Cardozo
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President Chester Arthur (2) - Horace Gray and Samuel Blatchford
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President Rutherford Hayes (2) - John Harlan and William Woods
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President James Polk (2) - Levi Woodbury and Robert Grier
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President Martin Van Buren (2) - John McKinley ad Peter Daniel
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President James Madison (2) – Gabriel Duvall and Joseph Story
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President John Adams (2) – Bushrod Washington and Alfred Moore
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President George W. Bush (1) - Samuel Alito Jr.
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President Gerald Ford (1) - John Paul Stevens
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President Calvin Coolidge (1) - Harlan Stone
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President William McKinley (1) - Joseph McKenna
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President James Garfield (1) - Stanley Matthews
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President James Buchanan (1) - Nathan Clifford
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President Franklin Pierce (1) - John Campbell
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President Millard Fillmore (1) - Benjamin Curtis
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President John Tyler (1) - Samuel Nelson
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President John Quincy Adams (1) – Robert Trimble
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President James Monroe (1) – Smith Thompson
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Presidents William Harrison, Andrew Johnson, Zachary Taylor and James Carter never had a justice appointee confirmed to the Supreme Court.
From left to right: Presidents William Harrison, Andrew Johnson, Jimmy Carter and Zachary Taylor (Photos via Library of Congress)