Since the SC justices have the ultimate job security, it seems that they would have no reason to stay consistent with their positions over time. It’s only natural to evolve mentally, especially when some of them might be on the court for decades.
I’m aware that from time to time, an SC justice gives a ruling that surprises people. But historically, have there been any who completely changed their political/philosophical leanings? And of the current ones, who seems most likely to switch sides in the future? (I realize that this question should be in IMHO, but it’s strongly related to the first one.)
As noted earlier, there have been many judges who disappointed the Presidents who appointed them. FDR expected Felix Frankfurter to be a liberal, pro-New Deal judge, but that’s not how it turned out. And David Souter turned out to be far more liberal than George Bush the elder expected.
But that’s not what the OP is asking for. The OP wants judges who started off in one direction, but gradually drifted the other way. One of the few examples I can think of is Harry Blackmun. Blackmun had been a reliably conservative judge in Minnesota, which is one reason Warren Burger recommended him to President Nixon. And for his first year or so on the bench, Harry Blackmun seemed to be a conservative judge. But by the time he left the bench, he had drifted to the far left.
There have been many who have changed their minds on important issues and done a complete 180 here and there, but as far as getting on the SCOTUS bench and surprising the hell outta everyone, the “stealth justice” David Souter does comes to mind. One conservative group who endorsed him called their optimistic predictions about him “miserably innaccurate”. he’s pretty much a moderate who wanders all over the place, but when you were hoping for a Scalia or a Rehnquist, he turned out to be a huge disappointment for some. I’ll try to think of others more in line with the OP.
Thought of one, sort of. Hugo Black was a former member of the Klan who eventually became one of the Court’s staunchest supporter of desegregation and civil rights.
Yeeesh. Nobody has mentioned “Hanging” Earl Warren? While he had no appellate judicial experience to compare, he was known, as California governor, as “tough” on crime and was an active agitator for Executive Order 9066, removing the Japanese citizens to concentration camps. By the time he retired, “Impeach Earl Warren” (for his “liberal” decisions) was a constant rallying cry among the John Birch Society and similar rightwing nutcase groups.
It would appear that Justice Black probably doesn’t fit the answer to the OP. He evidently was a KKK member for a brief time in 1923, and, by the time he was noninated to the court, he was the antithesis of what a person who belonged to the KKK would have been.
The judges do change their relative positions on the spectrum over time. Generally that is not a change in philosophy or jurisprudential orientation, but is due to a shift in the types of cases brought and the stances of their colleagues. Thus John Paul Stevens was considered a centrist in 1976 when Ford named him, but has been recognized as a strong liberal voice in the past few years. Hugo Black appeared conservative to some in his last few years on the court – because some other justices were pushing beyond his absolutist interpretation of the Bill of Rights. (However, the Klan story is not reflective of his personal stance, but of the political realities behind a young man getting elected to public office in 1920s Alabama, and he said starting in the 1930s and continuing to the end of his life that he regretted ever having done it.)
Whizzer White was sort of the anti-Stevens; a centrist Democrat who, by the time he retired, was considered solidly in the conservative camp. Although White probably was never as conservative as Stevens now is “liberal.”
As astorian noted, Justice Blackmun was a solid conservative during his first year on the Court; indeed, he and Burger, who hailed from the same state, were known as the Minnesota Twins until Blackmun began moving to the left.
Well, Chief Justice Salmon P. Chase wrote a majority opinion in 1871 declaring the Legal Tender Act of 1862 unconstitutional. One of the authors of the Act was Lincoln’s Treasury Secretary, Salmon P. Chase.
Well, there was the famous Switch in Time that Saved Nine in 1937. Prior to 1937, the Supreme Court invalidated many New Deal programs, such as the AAA, under a doctrine called economic substantive due process, over vigorous dissents. (Economic substantive due process, to oversimplify, is the idea that the due process clause of the 14th am – “no state shall make or enforce any law that deprives any citizen of life, liberty, or property without due process of law” – protects certain economic rights, such as “liberty” of contract, from government intervention.) FDR went so far as to propose a court-packing plan to change the personnel on the court to influence the outcomes of cases: for each justice over 70 who wouldn’t retire, another would be appointed (you got it, the obstructionist justices were mostly old). The plan never went into effect (and not just because it was widely criticized): in 1937, Justice Owen Roberts (if I remember correctly) began voting the other way, to uphold economic legislation, five votes to four. (The four dissenting justices who formerly held a majority continued dissenting to these decisions and were dubbed “The Four Horsemen.”)
Of course, not every judge who voted one way in case A and then the other way in case B really had changed their mind about the constitutional principle at issue. Justice Harlan, a proponent of judicial restraint, would follow cases in which he had originally dissented, even though he still thought the original case wrongly decided. [sorry, too lazy to dig up a cite]
I think it’s important to keep in mind that, at least ideally, the justices are not taking stances that are “liberal” or “conservative” but in keeping with their understanding of the proper way to interpret the Constitution. Thus, William Brennan was a devout Catholic who was, I’m given to understand, personally of the belief that abortion was sinful. But he was also a strong supporter of Roe v. Wade and abortion rights, because in his understanding of the Constitution, the right of the woman to control her own body trumped the power of the state to regulate her activities. Likewise, Felix Frankfurter was a strong liberal in his political views, but tended to write fairly conservative decisions owing to his belief in judicial self-restraint. And Sandra Day O’Connor believes firmly in stare decisis and will target her vote to uphold a ruling that does not overturn previous decisions, often even when the controlling ruling is contrary to her own jurisprudential views.
To say that, e.g., Wiccans have the right to hold their ceremonies under the First Amendment is not to support the faith of Wicca, but rather the rights of American citizens who happen to practice it.
And of the current ones, who are likely to switch? Sorry, couldn’t find a link, but I recall reading online (I think it might have been Roll Call) that of the current justices, one SC historian/expert predicted that Stephen Breyer would be sliding to the right and Clarence Thomas (!!!) to the left . . .
And although Byron “Whizzer” White, appointed by Kennedy, did become a solid conservative jurist, I remember him commenting that he would wait until a Democrat was in the White House before retiring, since a Democrat President had appointed him. He retired in '93.