Antonin Scalia

Antonin Scalia was an American lawyer and jurist who served as an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court from 1986 until his death in 2016. He became a leading advocate of originalism and textualism in constitutional interpretation.

William Rehnquist: William Rehnquist was chief justice of the United States from 1986 to 2005. Rehnquist led the Court throughout Scalia’s first nineteen years as a justice.
Originalism: Originalism is a family of theories holding that constitutional meaning is fixed by its adoption-era meaning. Scalia treated the Constitution’s original public meaning as a constraint on judges.
District of Columbia v. Heller: District of Columbia v. Heller is the 2008 Supreme Court decision recognizing an individual right to possess firearms for self-defense. Scalia’s majority opinion grounded the Second Amendment right in its historical meaning.
Antonin Scalia’s majority opinion in District of Columbia v. Heller: Antonin Scalia’s majority opinion in District of Columbia v. Heller interpreted the Second Amendment as protecting an individual right to bear arms. Its historical method became central to later disputes over gun regulation.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg: Ruth Bader Ginsburg was an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court from 1993 to 2020. Their sharply different legal views coexisted with a celebrated personal friendship.
Textualism: Textualism interprets legal texts according to their ordinary public meaning rather than presumed legislative intent. Scalia made textualism a prominent method for interpreting statutes.
Crawford v. Washington: Crawford v. Washington is the 2004 Supreme Court decision limiting the use of testimonial hearsay in criminal trials. Scalia’s opinion revived a historically grounded interpretation of the Confrontation Clause.
Original public meaning: Original public meaning is the meaning a legal text would have conveyed to the public when adopted. Scalia helped make this formulation a dominant strand of contemporary originalism.
Clarence Thomas: Clarence Thomas has served as an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court since 1991. Thomas shared Scalia’s commitment to originalism but sometimes applied it more strictly.
Living constitutionalism: Living constitutionalism interprets constitutional provisions in light of changing circumstances and contemporary values. Scalia opposed allowing constitutional meaning to evolve through judicial updating.

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