Which interpretive method a justice uses often shapes rulings on guns, abortion, regulation, and presidential power.
Originalists ask what the Constitution's words meant to the people who ratified them — not what judges today might prefer them to mean.
Senate fights over judicial nominees are, at bottom, fights over interpretive philosophy like originalism versus living constitutionalism.
Judges examine founding-era dictionaries, debates, and practices to fix what the text meant when adopted.
That fixed meaning is then applied to modern facts — even technologies and situations the founders never imagined.
A look at the constitutional rules, historical trends and reform proposals behind a debate over how long justices should serve.
Read the guide →A long-running debate over judicial tenure has gained new prominence amid proposals to cap justices' service at 18 years.
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