Favorite all-time Supreme Court Justice

[LynneSin]

I use to say that Thurgood Marshall was my favorite but lately Ruth Bader Ginsberg has been slowly creeping up behind the legendary Marshall and could possibly be the best.

I know there are many other awesome SCOTUS justices out there but personally I think Marshall and Ginsberg are two of the best. I'd like to take this to a poll and see what you folks think.

I've listed some of the greatest (of the last couple of decades) out there of all time but I did leave a blank for anyone who wants to add in their own 2 cents.

12 votes, 0 passes | Time left: Unlimited
	Thurgood Marshall
	5 (42%)
	Ruth Bader Ginsburg
	4 (33%)
	Stephen Breyer
	0 (0%)
	Sonia Sotomayor
	0 (0%)
	Elena Kagan
	0 (0%)
	John Paul Stevens (best thing Ford ever did)
	1 (8%)
	David Souter (Appointed by Sr Bush but turned out to be pretty progressive)
	0 (0%)
	Harry Blackmun (Nixon appointee and one of the most progressive to serve the bench)
	1 (8%)
	Another Progressive Nominee not listed (write-in)
	1 (8%)
	I love Scalia and Thomas (and I should be banned since I'm a Trump supporter too!)
	0 (0%)
	0 DU members did not wish to select any of the options provided.
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[tonyt53]

1. Marshall set the bar height for other Justices.

[PJMcK]

3. Sadly, his replacement can't see that high (n/t)

[LynneSin]

6. You'd have to dig a hole the size of the Mariana Trench

to get to the level of Thomas. And then put Marshall on Mount Everest. That's about how close those 2 are.

[BlueCaliDem]

9. Couldn't have said it better, LynneSin. SPOT. ON. eom

[Raster]

2. I heartily concur!

[Nevernose]

4. We are all such nerds

If there were SCOTUS trading cards, it would be DUers that owned them.

I selected pass because I couldn't decide between Marshall and Blackmun.

[Stellar]

5. This one was hard...

I love the notorious R.B.G., but I learned to love Thurgood Marshall when I was a child so I chose him.

[Else You Are Mad]

7. Can I take into consideration....

The best written and easiest to read opinions?

[merrily]

8. I can't choose just one.

Justice John Marshall (Don't know much about him, but he had to be brilliant; using a relatively minor, unimportant case, he created the principle of judicial review!)

Justice Stephen Douglas

Justice Earl Warren

Justice Thurgood Marshall

Justice John Stevens

Justice Ruth Ginsburg

I cannot pare it down beyond those six. I just can't.

Breyer, meh. I have to give Sotomayor and Kagan more time on the bench before I can assess them. In particular, I want to see what they do after Ginsburg leaves the bench. I have high hopes for Sotomayor than for Kagan, but I hope I am proven wrong.

I am not nominating Sandra Day O'Connor as an all time great justice, but she did fight for a "health of the mother" exception to every bad decision a Republican court made about choice. She deserves kudos for that. She had to work as a legal secretary after being graduated from law school because no one was hiring women lawyers in her day. I give her props for that, too.

[First Speaker]

10. My vote goes to John Harlan...

...the ex-slaveholder who, in 1896, was the only dissident against the Plessy vs Ferguson ruling--the case that enshrined "separate but equal" in the Constitution. He was the only one who basically said that there was no such thing as second-class citizenship. History is full of ironies, and this--a slaveholder opposing Jim Crow--is a classic.

[Gormy Cuss]

11. Louis Brandeis n/t

[trotsky]

12. Gotta go with my Minnesota connection, Harry Blackmun.

Wrote Roe v Wade.

[geek tragedy]

13. No Brennan?

In terms of writing, I'm partial to Oliver Wendell Holmes.

[Proud Public Servant]

14. All of these pale in comparison

To Louis Brandeis, William O. Douglas, and William Brennan. Those were the real giants of the modern Court. RGB comes very, very close, though.

[FuzzyRabbit]

15. William O. Douglas and Earl Warren

[Herman4747]

16. Brandeis, Cardozo, Warren, Holmes not there???

What's up with this poll?

[LynneSin]

18. 10 Limit hench option #9

[no_hypocrisy]

17. I really like Benjamin Cardozo.

Not only are his opinions so readable that you don't have to be a law graduate to understand them, but they reflect a grand appreciation for humanity, human nature, and respect for when you respect precedence and when you know it's time to develop the law.