They may be Supreme but they are also apparently Supremely forgettable. Two-thirds of Americans polled cannot name a single sitting Supreme Court justice. Of the relatively few who can remember a name it is that of the Chief Justice John Roberts. The least well known is Justice Stephen Breyer. Only one percent could remember them all.
Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas tied for second place with a measly sixteen percent.
Then follows Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg (13 percent), Sonia Sotomayor (13 percent), Anthony Kennedy (10 percent), Samuel Alito (5 percent), Elena Kagan (4 percent), and Stephen Breyer, (3 percent).
Of course, roughly half of people polled last year could not name a single GOP candidate for president. Forty one percent cannot name the current vice president of the United States.
We do even worse on international questions or trying to define the bill of rights.
There is a serious problem in this country, as I have previously discussed, with the lack of civics training in schools. It is a dangerous thing for citizens to be not just ignorant but detached from their political system. All governments love the uninformed and passive citizen but it makes for a dangerous void in accountability in this country.
Unfortunately, we are proving de Tocqueville correct in saying that “in a democracy, the people get the government they deserve.
Source: ABA Journal
ElaineM.
Yeah, that is a well delivered argument. Thanks for the services in the many you post.
The big point you can help on: Who is scoring all the issues before the Court? And from whose perspectives?
This clip was in re CoC briefs who are alleged to support Big Corporations. (Nothing I take issue with).
That is a heck of great batting average for the Chamber of Commerce, Elaine!
“There is a serious problem in this country, as I have previously discussed, with the lack of civics training in schools.”
I agree. One reason there is a de-emphasis on teaching civics is because it’s a subject that is usually excluded from high-stakes tests–as rafflaw said.
That said, I’m sure most of the people polled weren’t students or recent high school graduates. Many Americans don’t keep themselves informed…don’t read newspapers…don’t get news on the Internet or watch news programs on TV. That’s not the fault of the schools.
Do law students trade them?
Or maybe action figures or baseball cards?
The Beloit University incoming Freshman survey is always fascinating. However, that chronicles, for the most part, events that ocurred prior to their birth.
It’s depressing as hell but the only way SCOTUS will become part of mainstream culture is if they have a reality show, Real World SCOTUS.
Those type of questions aren’t know because that is not on the “test”. Another example that proves many were left behind.
Sometimes, somethings are better to forget…..
Ok, Professor. On Commencement Day, quiz your grads one by one. In private. Quick, name all nine justices on the Supreme Court, first name and last. Name the Chief Justice who wrote the opinion in Shelley v. Kraemer in 1948. Who was the attorney in the case heard the same day as Shelley, client’s name was Sipes? Same attorney argued Brown v. Board of Education a few years later. If they dont know then withhold the diplomas. Hell hath no ….
America is dumb and getting dumber. Take that guy running for the Senate out in the Show Me State which calls itself Mizzou.
Sometimes being in the 1% comes with no satisfaction whatsoever.
Oro Lee,
Antonin and Clarence does on the sound of the names make a nice pair.
Please advise if it is the opinions rendered or other factors involved in your association.
Could de Tokig (crazy in Swedish) have had another more optimistic meaning when he wrote those words?
Civics, we don’t teach that down here.
(A parody on the judge who is reported to have said: “We don’t do Constitutional law here.” in response to a lawyer’s citation of it.
That I was able to recall all nine makes me feel not so good about myself — the exercise was rather joyless.
My favorite part of the story? — “Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas tied [the knot].” It was instantaneous.
Are you grading on a curve here Professor?
It would make a big difference where this quiz was taken.
The Chief Bureaucrat Mr. Roberts has bent over backwards to call a fascist mandate a “tax” for the sake of Big Insurance, Big Pharma, and Big Totalitarian Government.
The Justices (sic) have also ruled recently that it is okay and legal for local police pervs and sickos to strip search people arrested for overdue parking tickets and walking a dog sans leash.
http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/04/02/10982324-supreme-court-strip-searches-in-jail-ok-even-for-minor-offenses?lite
They have also ruled that if police are at someone’s door and think they hear residents flushing marijuana down the toilet (“destroying evidence” – evidence of WHAT?!), they have a right to criminally break in and search the home without a warrant.
http://articles.latimes.com/2011/may/17/nation/la-na-court-search-20110517
A “lack of civics training in schools”? How about some civics training for these ignorant bureaucrats?
Seriously, are these schmucks even worth knowing their names?
The corporate and political classes are not interested in the masses being civics educated as long as the masses are attentively salivating about the next iThing release date,