Law Commons^™

Choosing A Chief Justice: Presidential Prerogative Or A Job For The Court?, Todd E. Pettys

Todd E. Pettys

After identifying the original rationales for our longstanding tradition of permitting the President and Senate to decide which of the Court’s nine members will serve as Chief Justice, I argue that those rationales are anachronistic, that the tradition creates unnecessary conflicts of interest and separation-of-powers concerns, and that the Court’s members should be permitted to decide for themselves which of them will serve as Chief Justice.