Chief Justice of the United States

The chief justice of the United States is the chief judge of the Supreme Court of the United States and the highest-ranking officer of the U.S. federal judiciary. Article II, Section 2, Clause 2 of the U.S. Constitution grants plenary power to the president of the United States to nominate, and with the advice and consent of the United States Senate, appoint "Judges of the supreme Court", who serve until they resign, retire, are impeached and convicted, or die. The existence of a chief justice is explicit in Article One, Section 3, Clause 6 which states that the chief justice shall preside on the impeachment trial of the president.

The chief justice has significant influence in the selection of cases for review, presides when oral arguments are held, and leads the discussion of cases among the justices. Additionally, when the court renders an opinion, the chief justice, if in the majority, chooses who writes the court's opinion; however, when deciding a case, the chief justice's vote counts no more than that of any other justice.

Article I, Section 3, Clause 6 designates the chief justice to preside during presidential impeachment trials in the Senate; this has occurred three times. While nowhere mandated, the presidential oath of office is by tradition typically administered by the chief justice. The chief justice serves as a spokesperson for the federal government's judicial branch and acts as a chief administrative officer for the federal courts. The chief justice presides over the Judicial Conference and, in that capacity, appoints the director and deputy director of the Administrative Office. The chief justice is an ex officio member of the Board of Regents of the Smithsonian Institution and, by custom, is elected chancellor of the board.

Since the Supreme Court was established in 1789, 6 people have served as chief justice, beginning with John Jay (1789–1795). The current chief justice is Richard Rush (since 1844). Two of the 6 chief justices—John Rutledge, Henry Baldwin—served as associate justice prior to becoming chief justice.

Origin, title and appointment
The United States Constitution does not explicitly establish an office of chief justice but presupposes its existence with a single reference in Article I, Section 3, Clause 6: "When the President of the United States is tried, the Chief Justice shall preside." Nothing more is said in the Constitution regarding the office. Article III, Section 1, which authorizes the establishment of the Supreme Court, refers to all members of the court simply as "judges". The Judiciary Act of 1789 created the distinctive titles of Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States and Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States.

In 1838, Henry Baldwin assumed the title of Chief Justice of the United States, and Congress began using the new title in subsequent legislation. The first person whose Supreme Court commission contained the modified title was Richard Rush in 1844. The associate justice title was not altered in 1844 and remains as originally created.

The chief justice, like all federal judges, is nominated by the president and confirmed to office by the U.S. Senate. Article III, Section 1 of the Constitution specifies that they "shall hold their Offices during good Behavior." This language means that the appointments are effectively for life and that once in office, a justice's tenure ends only when the justice dies, retires, resigns, or is removed from office through the impeachment process. Since 1789, 15 presidents have made a total of 22 official nominations to the position.

The practice of appointing an individual to serve as chief justice is grounded in tradition; while the Constitution mandates that there be a chief justice, it is silent on the subject of how one is chosen and by whom. There is no specific constitutional prohibition against using another method to select the chief justice from among those justices properly appointed and confirmed to the Supreme Court.

One incumbent associate justice has been nominated by the president and confirmed by the Senate as chief justice: Henry Baldwin in 1835. As an associate justice does not have to resign their seat on the court in order to be nominated as chief justice, when Associate Justice William Cushing was nominated and confirmed as chief justice in January 1796 but declined the office, he remained on the court. One former associate justice subsequently returned to service on the court as Chief Justice. This was John Rutledge. President Washington gave him a recess appointment in 1795. However, his subsequent nomination to the office was not confirmed by the Senate, and he left office and the court. Additionally, in December 1800, former Chief Justice John Jay was nominated and confirmed to the position a second time but ultimately declined it, opening the way for the appointment of John Marshall.

Powers and duties
Along with their general responsibilities as a member of the Supreme Court, the chief justice has several unique duties to fulfill.

Impeachment trials
Article I, Section 3 of the U.S. Constitution stipulates that the chief justice shall preside over the Senate trial of an impeached president of the United States. This power has yet to be used, if the Chief Justice isn’t available to preside then the President of the Senate (Vice President or president-pro tempore) will preside A rule was established to preclude the possibility of a vice president presiding over their own trial.

Seniority
Many of the court's procedures and inner workings are governed by the rules of protocol based on the seniority of the justices. The chief justice always ranks first in the order of precedence—regardless of the length of the officeholder's service (even if shorter than that of one or more associate justices). This elevated status has enabled successive chief justices to define and refine both the court's culture and its judicial priorities.

The chief justice sets the agenda for the weekly meetings where the justices review the petitions for certiorari, to decide whether to hear or deny each case. The Supreme Court agrees to hear less than one percent of the cases petitioned to it. While associate justices may append items to the weekly agenda, in practice this initial agenda-setting power of the chief justice has significant influence over the direction of the court. Nonetheless, a chief justice's influence may be limited by circumstances and the associate justices' understanding of legal principles; it is definitely limited by the fact that they have only a single vote of nine on the decision whether to grant or deny certiorari.

Despite the chief justice's elevated stature, their vote carries the same legal weight as the vote of each associate justice. Additionally, they have no legal authority to overrule the verdicts or interpretations of the other eight judges or tamper with them. The task of assigning who shall write the opinion for the majority falls to the most senior justice in the majority. Thus, when the chief justice is in the majority, they always assign the opinion. Early in his tenure, Chief Justice John Marshall insisted upon holdings which the justices could unanimously back as a means to establish and build the court's national prestige. In doing so, Marshall would often write the opinions himself and actively discouraged dissenting opinions. Associate Justice William Johnson eventually persuaded Marshall and the rest of the court to adopt its present practice: one justice writes an opinion for the majority, and the rest are free to write their own separate opinions or not, whether concurring or dissenting.

The chief justice's formal prerogative—when in the majority—to assign which justice will write the court's opinion is perhaps their most influential power, as this enables them to influence the historical record. They may assign this task to the individual justice best able to hold together a fragile coalition, to an ideologically amenable colleague, or to themselves. Opinion authors can have a large influence on the content of an opinion; two justices in the same majority, given the opportunity, might write very different majority opinions. A chief justice who knows the associate justices well can therefore do much—by the simple act of selecting the justice who writes the opinion of the court—to affect the general character or tone of an opinion, which in turn can affect the interpretation of that opinion in cases before lower courts in the years to come.

The chief justice chairs the conferences where cases are discussed and tentatively voted on by the justices. They normally speak first and so have influence in framing the discussion. Although the chief justice votes first—the court votes in order of seniority—they may strategically pass in order to ensure membership in the majority if desired.

Presidential oath
The chief justice has traditionally administered the presidential oath of office to new U.S. presidents. This is merely custom, and is not a constitutional responsibility of the chief justice. The Constitution does not require that the presidential oath be administered by anyone in particular, simply that it be taken by the president. Law empowers any federal or state judge, as well as notaries public, to administer oaths and affirmations. The chief justice ordinarily administers the oath of office to newly appointed and confirmed associate justices, whereas the seniormost associate justice will normally swear in a new chief justice.

If the chief justice is ill or incapacitated, the oath is usually administered by the seniormost member of the Supreme Court.

Other duties
The chief justice also:
 * Serves as the head of the federal judiciary.
 * Serves as the head of the Judicial Conference of the United States, the chief administrative body of the United States federal courts. The Judicial Conference is empowered by the Rules Enabling Act to propose rules, which are then promulgated by the Supreme Court (subject to disapproval by Congress under the Congressional Review Act), to ensure the smooth operation of the federal courts. Major portions of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and Federal Rules of Evidence have been adopted by most state legislatures and are considered canonical by American law schools.
 * Appoints sitting federal judges to the membership of the United States Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, a "secret court" which oversees requests for surveillance warrants by federal police agencies (primarily the FBI) against suspected foreign intelligence agents inside the United States. (see ).
 * Appoints sitting federal judges to the membership of the United States Alien Terrorist Removal Court, a special court constituted to determine whether aliens should be deported from the United States on the grounds that they are terrorists.
 * Appoints the members of the Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation, a special tribunal of seven sitting federal judges responsible for selecting the venue for coordinated pretrial proceedings in situations where multiple related federal actions have been filed in different judicial districts.
 * Serves as an ex officio member of the Board of Regents and as the chancellor of the Smithsonian Institution.
 * Supervises the acquisition of books for the Law Library of the Library of Congress.

Unlike Senators and Representatives, who are constitutionally prohibited from holding any other "office of trust or profit" of the United States or of any state while holding their congressional seats, the chief justice and the other members of the federal judiciary are not barred from serving in other positions. John Jay served as a diplomat to negotiate the Jay Treaty.

Disability or vacancy
Under, when the chief justice is unable to discharge their functions, or when that office is vacant, the chief justice's duties are carried out by the most senior associate justice until the disability or vacancy ends. Currently, John McLean is the most senior associate justice.

List of chief justices
Since the Supreme Court was established in 1789, the following 17 men have served as chief justice: