Table 3: “Do you think Justices should consider the party in control of the White House and senate as they decide when to retire?,” July 2021 The partisan information in the question boosted support for political timing of retirements across partisan identification among respondents, especially Democrats, as shown in Tables 3 and 4. Do you think Justices should consider the party in control of the White House and Senate as they decide when to retire?” With this wording, 39% said justices should consider party control, while 60 percent said they should not. Some Democrats are urging Breyer to retire now while there are a Democratic president and Senate. He was nominated to the court in 1994 by President Clinton. The other random half of respondents was provided more information and context in the form of an alternative question: “Justice Stephen Breyer is 82 years old and the oldest member of the Court. This item was asked of a random half of all those surveyed at the time. When asked, “Do you think justices should consider the party in control of the White House and Senate as they decide when to retire?” 28% said justices should consider party control, while 72% said they should not consider this. However, when given information that some Democrats were urging Justice Stephen Breyer to retire while there was a Democratic president and Democratic control of the Senate, more people supported a justice’s retiring with politics in mind, although it remained a minority overall. In the Marquette Law Poll’s Supreme Court survey of July 2021, a national sample of 1,010 adults were asked about the role of partisan control of the presidency and Senate in the timing of Supreme Court retirements.Ī majority of the public thought that justices should not consider partisan control of the presidency and Senate when deciding the timing of their retirements. “Should Justice Breyer retire?” from July 16-26, 2021

Table 2: Percent of people nationwide who rated Justice Breyer, and their ratings, September 2019-January 2022 The trend in favorability of Justice Breyer is shown in Table 2. Table 1: Recognition and favorability ratings of justices, January 2022 Table 1 shows the public’s ability to rate, and the favorability ratings, of all nine justices in the Jan. 10-21, 2022, survey. Justice Breyer has consistently been the least well-known justice among the general public, with fewer than 25% able to offer an opinion of him. This news release describes what has been found about opinions of Breyer and of the way court selections have been handled. The Marquette Law Poll has examined nationwide opinion about the Supreme Court six times, beginning in 2019. 26, before word of Breyer’s plans circulated, the Marquette Law School Poll's Supreme Court Survey found that only 21% of people nationwide said they knew enough about Breyer to have an opinion about him.īut, Breyer’s impending departure from the Court puts on the front burner the nomination and confirmation process for members of the Court, and the Marquette Law Poll surveys provide insight into public opinion about how those steps have been handled in recent years. Supreme Court, he consistently ranked as the justice whom the fewest Americans know. MILWAUKEE -Even to the day it was reported that Justice Stephen Breyer is retiring from the U.S. Charles Franklin, director of the Marquette Law School Poll Marquette Law School Poll national surveys of public opinion about the nation’s high court offer insight as a long-time but low-profile justice leaves the Court and high-profile nomination processes take the spotlight Marquette Law Poll Guide: Justice Breyer data from U.S.

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