You knew it was coming.  You’ve known it since November 4th (officially January 20th).  You know it happens every so often during a presidential administration.  You know that the president will appoint a Supreme Court justice.  It’s fairly inevitable that it’s going to happen, with few exceptions.  Wikipedia tells me that 39 Presidents have appointed at least one justice.

And every time a new president is elected, members of the other party freak out.  I suppose it’s for good reason.  After all, the choice of a justice a president makes could end up on the bench for years, perhaps decades.   The oldest, John Paul Stevens, has been on since 1975.  Their vote on cases might help shift the course of law and history for a long time.

The concern this time around was that there are currently five justices above the age of 70 serving at the Supreme Court, and two are older than 75.  If any of them retire or die, that’s a justice that President Obama gets to replace.  So that was enough for Republicans to get stressed over.

Then the news dropped today: Justice David Souter will retire this year.

Souter, of course, is close, but isn’t in the “70 or over” club, being 69 and all.  He’ll get his club card later this year.  I don’t think there’s much to worry about with Souter.  He was already a member of the liberal wing of the Court, so Obama will appoint him with another liberal.  Supposedly.  Weirder things have happened.  Like the now liberal Souter being appointed by Republican George H.W. Bush.

Okay, so most likely one liberal for another.  The question of which is to what degree will it be?  There will be endless discussion about this for months until Obama makes a choice.

But how about the rest of the club?  What’s the breakdown?  I count three liberals (Breyer, Ginsburg, and Stevens), one conservative (Scalia), and the in-between guy (Kennedy).  Feel free to debate that last one, but that’s how he’s perceived.  It just so happens that two of the oldest are also among the liberals.  It’s very likely that Obama might have to appoint at least two more justices.  There’s a slimmer chance that it could be more.

As happened under Bush with the Democrats, the Republicans now fear this possibility.  Frankly, I’m a little unphased by all of the utter terror spouted by either side whenever this subject comes up for renewal.  While I understand the significance of an appointment, it seems unlikely that Obama will put more than three justices on the bench.  The last President to appoint more than that to the Court was Dwight Eisenhower, who put five there.  Assuming that Obama appoints two more justices to replace the oldest ones, the Court will still be 4-4-1.  Even if three out and out socialists replace the outgoers (which I also consider unlikely), nothing is going to change how the court votes.  The liberals will still generally vote liberal.  The conservatives will still generally vote conservative.  And Kennedy will still decide the fate of a bunch of cases.  As it’s been for years.

Of course, that last paragraph makes a lot of assumptions.  After all, it could be Kennedy who gets replaced.  But there are a lot of ‘could haves’ in this situation.  Both Ginsberg and Stevens could have kicked the bucket or retired any time during the last eight years, and then the Court would currently be 6-2-1 in favor of the conservative wing.  That was the Democrats’ fear.  And now it’s just the other way around.

I’ll wait and see how they actually vote once on the Court.  While the most recent liberal appointments have generally stayed that way, the Republican Presidents have a mixed track record about the ongoing histories of their appointments.  Souter, Stevens, Kennedy, and formerly O’Connor have all been Republican appointments that have either turned liberal or moderated (or were already moderate in) their voting record once on the Supreme Court.

So precedent says that a liberal justice will stay liberal.  I suppose we’ll have to wait and see if that remains true under Obama.