Related commentaries – Justice

God Watches Everything We Do – Job 34:16 – 34:29

George Washington Created The Supreme Court

President Washington created the Supreme Court with the Judiciary Act of 1789, and its membership was set at six. Of Washington’s first six nominations to the court, one refused, one accepted but never attended, and John Jay, the first chief justice, spent most of his tenure in Europe as a diplomat. In fact, Chief Justice Jay resigned to become governor of New York, and when later was asked to return as Chief Justice, he refused, saying he didn’t think the court would ever amount to much. All of George Washington’s appointments to the Supreme Court were lawyers. No president has ever departed from that precedent, but there’s no requirement that a justice of the Supreme Court be a lawyer. (Peter Hayes. - Encyclopedia of Illustrations #6546).