Justice Anthony Kennedy

Anthony McLeod Kennedy (born July 23, 1936) has been a US Supreme Court Associate Justice since 1988.

Kennedy was born in Sacramento, California. He has no relation to the famous Kennedy family of American politics. He married Mary Davis and has three children.

He received his B.A. from Stanford University and the London School of Economics, and his LL.B. from Harvard Law School. He was in private practice in San Francisco, California from 1961-1963, as well as in Sacramento, California from 1963-1975. From 1965 to 1988, he was a Professor of Constitutional Law at the McGeorge School of Law, University of the Pacific.

He has served in numerous positions during his career, including a member of the California Army National Guard in 1961, the board of the Federal Judicial Center from 1987-1988, and two committees of the Judicial Conference of the United States: the Advisory Panel on Financial Disclosure Reports and Judicial Activities, subsequently renamed the Advisory Committee on Codes of Conduct, from 1979-1987, and the Committee on Pacific Territories from 1979_1990, which he chaired from 1982_1990. He was appointed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit by President Ford in 1975.

In 1987, Associate Justice Lewis Powell retired. President Reagan first nominated Robert Bork to replace him. Bork was viewed as too conservative by the Democratic Senate, and his nomination was not confirmed. Reagan then nominated Douglas H. Ginsburg, but he withdrew his name when allegation arose that he once smoked marijuana. Finally, Reagan nominated Kennedy as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, and he took his seat February 18, 1988.

A moderate conservative, Justice Kennedy represents the deciding vote on many Constitutional issues with Justice O'Connor. He has generally supported the right to personal privacy as against the state's police power: in 2003, he sided with the more liberal members of the Court in Lawrence v. Texas. Writing for the Court, Kennedy invalidated the criminal prohibitions against homosexual sodomy under the United States Constitution in an opinion filled with passionate rhetoric. Kennedy had previously written the Court's opinion invalidating a provision in the Colorado Constitution denying homosexuals the right to bring local discrimination claims, and had joined O'Connor and David Souter in a plurality opinion in the case of Planned Parenthood v. Casey (1992), which re-affirmed the Roe v. Wade decision recognizing the right to abortion.

On the other hand, Kennedy has joined with Court majorities in decisions favoring states' rights and capital punishment and invalidating federal and state affirmative action programs.

External links

• Supreme court official bio (PDF) (http://www.supremecourtus.gov/about/biographiescurrent.pdf)
• LookSmart - Anthony Kennedy (http://search.looksmart.com/p/browse/us1/us317916/us53716/us62703/us10211698/us551221/us551229/us551233/) directory category
• Yahoo - Anthony Kennedy (http://dir.yahoo.com/Government/U_S__Government/Judicial_Branch/Supreme_Court/Justices/Kennedy__Anthony/) directory category