Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson was welcomed there Friday with a traditional investiture ceremony attended by President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris and their spouses.
Jackson’s formal swearing-in for her lifetime appointment as the first Black woman on Supreme Court came three months after Chief Justice John Roberts conducted her first, official swearing-in.
Roberts and the seven other justices were in attendance for Friday’s ceremony, along with her husband Patrick Jackson, Attorney General Merrick Garland and Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar, who represents the United States government in cases at the high court.
Jackson repeated the oath she took in June when she replaced Justice Stephen Breyer, who had retired.
US Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson speaks with Chief Justice John Roberts on the steps of the US Supreme Court, immediately following the investiture ceremony of Justice Jackson, in Washington, DC, September 30, 2022.
Saul Loeb | AFP | Getty Images
During Friday’s ceremony, Jackson, like every other new justice since 1972, sat in the chair that once belonged to Chief Justice John Marshall, whose three decades of service on the Supreme Court made him the longest-serving chief justice, and one of the most influential members of the court in history.
Jackson was confirmed by the Senate in April by a vote of 53-47.
She will hear her first oral arguments as a justice when the court’s new term begins Monday.
Jackson’s appearance on the bench will come on the heels of a Monmouth University poll released Friday, which found that nearly 6 in 10 Americans said the Supreme Court is “out of touch.” The court sparked controversy in June when it overturned the federal constitutional right to abortion that had been in place since its 1973 decision in the case known as Roe v. Wade.
The same poll also found 66% of Americans would support term limits for Supreme Court justices.