Supreme Court Nominations Name: Forty Years of Nominees. Okay, not quite fortybut almost! The table called "Nominees, 1980 - Present" shows every person nominated for the Supreme Court since Sandra Day O'Connor. Use the table to think through and answer the questions below.

1. Do some math to fill in the mini-table.

Then, answer the question.

| Current Supreme Court Justices

Percent nominated by Republican presidents Percent nominated by Democratic presidents

2. Justice Antonin Scalia died on February

13, 2016, leaving only eight justices on the Court-four appointed by Republican presidents and four appointed by Democratic presidents. The vacancy went unfilled for over a year. Yet during this time, very few Court opinions

Justice Scalia were a 4-4 split. What might this tell you about the relationship between politics and judicial decisions?

If judicial decisions were strictly political, how might you expect the vote on every case to come out?