It's On: Souter to Retire

Associate Justice David Souter is retiring from the Supreme Court:

President Obama's to-do list just got a bit longer. Supreme Court justice David Souter has told the White House he wants to retire.

The former New Hampshire Attorney General was appointed to the court in 1990 by the first President Bush.

"He recognizes the proper role of judges in upholding the democratic choices of the people through their elected representatives with constitutional constraints," President George H.W. Bush said on July 23, 1990.

He was appointed by a Republican, but David Souter was a moderate and sided with more liberal justices on a number of cases, including the "Bush vs Gore" election recount dispute in 2000.

He was a reliable liberal vote in spite of the fact that George H.W. Bush nominated him when he had the opportunity to appoint another Scalia-type.

So now Obama has the chance to remake the court and with Justices Ginsburg and Stevens probably ready to retire soon, his choices will indeed shape the direction of the court for the foreseeable future. While conservative stalwarts Roberts, Scalia, Thomas and Alito will be there (hopefully) for years, it may well come down to replacing the liberals unless Obama can win another term than all bets are off.

Who will Obama pick?

Possible nominees who have been mentioned as being on a theoretical short list include Elena Kagan, the current solicitor general who represents the government before the Supreme Court; Sonia Sotomayor, a Hispanic judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit; and Diane Wood, a federal judge in Chicago who taught at the University of Chicago at the same time future President Barack Obama was teaching constitutional law there.

I'm guessing they would all be Ginsburg clones.