Here is a look at the life of Stephen Breyer, associate justice of the US Supreme Court.
Personal:
Birth date: August 15, 1938
Birth place: San Francisco, California
Birth name: Stephen Gerald Breyer
Father: Irving Breyer, an attorney
Mother: Anne (Roberts) Breyer
Marriage: Joanna (Hare) Breyer (September 4, 1967-present)
Children: Chloe, Nell and Michael
Education: Stanford University, A.B., 1959; Oxford University (Marshall Scholar), B.A., 1961; Harvard Law School, LL.B., 1964, graduated magna cum laude
Religion: Jewish
Other Facts:
Nominated by President Bill Clinton in 1994.
Former assistant prosecutor during the Watergate hearings in the 1970s.
Awarded the prominent Distinguished Eagle Scout Award, eligible only to those who have been an Eagle Scout for at least 25 years.
Timeline:
1964-1965 – Law clerk for Justice Arthur Goldberg, US Supreme Court.
1965-1967 – Special assistant to the assistant attorney general at the US Department of Justice.
1967-1994 – Holds various positions at Harvard University Law School, including professor and lecturer.
1974-1975 – Special counsel for the US Senate Judiciary Committee.
1977-1980 – Professor of government at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.
1979-1980 – Chief counsel for the US Senate Judiciary Committee.
1981-1990 – Serves as a judge for the US Court of Appeals for the First Circuit.
1985-1989 – Member of the US Sentencing Commission.
1990-1994 – Serves as the chief judge of the US Court of Appeals for the First Circuit.
August 3, 1994 – Sworn in to the Supreme Court by President Clinton, filling the seat held by former Justice Harry Blackmun.
June 2004 – Named by Chief Justice William Rehnquist to lead a panel of justices to consider ways to police members of the federal judiciary while allowing them to maintain their traditional level of independence.
September 2005 – Breyer’s book, “Active Liberty: Interpreting our Democratic Constitution,” is published.
October 30, 2008 – Fordham University Law School – a Jesuit school – gives an award to Breyer, causing some controversy due to his pro-abortion stance.
September 2010 – His book, “Making Our Democracy Work,” is published.
February 9, 2012 – While vacationing on the Caribbean island of Nevis, Breyer is robbed by an intruder armed with a machete. No one is hurt in the incident.
April 26, 2013 – Injures his right shoulder in a fall from his bicycle. The injury requires reverse shoulder replacement surgery the following day.
June 29, 2015 – In the case Glossip v. Gross, Breyer raises the question of whether thedeath penalty is unconstitutional in a 40-page minority dissenting opinion, which Ruth Bader Ginsburg joins. The judges vote 5-4 to uphold the use of a controversial drug for lethal injection in executions.
September 2015 – Breyer’s book, “The Court and the World: American Law and the New Global Realities,” is published.
May 23, 2016 – During a public appearance, Breyer says he does not feel the Supreme Court is diminished without an immediate fill-in for Justice Antonin Scalia, who died earlier in the year, and having a possible 4-4 vote split would only make an impact in a few of the 70 to 80 cases they hear each year.
