Who was the only US Supreme Court Justice to be impeached?

Only one Supreme Court Justice, Samuel Chase (one of the signatories to the Declaration of Independence), has ever been impeached. The House of Representatives accused Chase of letting his Federalist political leanings affect his rulings, and served him with eight articles of impeachment in late 1804. The Senate acquitted him of all charges in 1805, establishing the right of the judiciary to independent opinion. Chase continued on the Court until his death in June 1811.


Close Calls

In 1957, at the height of McCarthyism, the Georgia General Assembly passed a joint resolution calling for "The Impeachment of Certain U.S. Supreme Court Justices" believed to be enabling Communism with their decisions. The resolution targeted Chief Justice Earl Warren and Associate Justices Hugo Black, William O. Douglas, Tom Campbell Clark, Felix Frankfurter, and Stanley Forman Reed (as well as several unnamed deceased Justices) for "...[usurping] the congressional power to make law in violation of Article I, Sections I and 8, and violated Sections 3 and 5 of the 14th Amendment and nullified the 10th Amendment of the Constitution."

Abe Fortas, who served on the Supreme Court from 1965-1969, was almost impeached due to a tax and financial scandal involving Wall Street financier, Louis Wolfson. Fortas was a Lyndon Johnson appointment. When the new President, Richard Nixon, learned of the scandal, he reportedly said Fortas should be "off of there," referring to the Supreme Court. The House of Representatives had already taken preliminary steps toward impeachment.

Chief Justice Earl Warren urged Justice Fortas to resign, to save the reputation of the Court. Fortas resisted at first, but eventually told other members of the Court he was stepping down to avoid damaging his wife's legal career. Later, he admitted another reason for leaving the Court was to save his friend, William O. Douglas, who was also under investigation for judicial impropriety.

The House of Representatives finally concluded Douglas had committed no impeachable offenses and dropped the investigation.


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