Elena Kagan
Associate Justice since 2010. She previously served as Solicitor General and as dean of Harvard Law School, after a scholarly career in administrative and First Amendment law.
- Role
- Associate Justice
- Joined the Court
- 2010 (appointed by Barack Obama)
- Martin–Quinn score
- -1.84 (latest term)
- Decisions participated in
- 973 (Spaeth, 1946–2025 span)
- Prior roles
- Solicitor General of the United States; Dean, Harvard Law School; Professor, administrative and constitutional law
How their votes have evolved, issue by issue
- Criminal procedure: 80 votes, 64% on the liberal side.
- Free speech & press: 45 votes, 64% on the liberal side.
- Immigration: 42 votes, 81% on the liberal side.
- Federalism: 38 votes, 66% on the liberal side.
- Voting & elections: 31 votes, 87% on the liberal side.
- Executive & agency power: 29 votes, 62% on the liberal side.
- Death penalty: 19 votes, 79% on the liberal side.
- Religion: 17 votes, 76% on the liberal side.
- Guns & the Second Amendment: 12 votes, 75% on the liberal side.
- Abortion & reproductive rights: 8 votes, 75% on the liberal side.
- Sexual orientation & gender identity: 8 votes, 75% on the liberal side.
- Race & affirmative action: 4 votes, 50% on the liberal side.
How they question at oral argument
Over OT2023–OT2025 (2,234 substantive questions and remarks), Kagan's questions most often probed consequences and hypotheticals (33%), the text (21%), precedent (17%). Themes are assigned by a language model (75% agreement with independent reference labels). Compare all nine Justices.
Public statements, writings & appearances
A curated, sourced timeline of 18 speeches, articles, interviews, and public statements — each with a summary and a link to the original source. The interactive version with filters and full-text search loads above.
- — Remarks at the 2026 Ninth Circuit Judicial Conference ('not a rubber stamp') (Ninth Circuit Judicial Conference, Bellevue, WA)
At her annual Ninth Circuit conference appearance, Kagan rejected the charge that the Court is a rubber stamp for the Trump administration, saying it is a very conservative court doing things conservative jurists have long wanted — which she can dislike — but not an arm of the administration; she called Trump's presence at the birthright-citizenship argument 'a non-event.'
Is this court the kind of puppet for the current administration? I think definitely not.
Topics: court legitimacy, judicial independence, judicial role
- — Testimony before House and Senate Appropriations subcommittees on the Court's FY2027 budget (U.S. House and Senate Appropriations subcommittees, Washington, DC)
In the first public budget testimony by justices since 2019, Kagan (with Barrett) defended a $228 million request driven by a surge in threats against justices, condemned inflammatory political rhetoric from any party as dangerous to judicial security, and fielded questions on the ethics code and emergency docket.
dangerous in terms of individual justices' security
Topics: judicial independence, ethics, emergency docket
- — Conversation at the 2025 Ninth Circuit Judicial Conference (Ninth Circuit Judicial Conference, Monterey, CA)
In an on-the-record conversation with attorney Cynthia Jones and Judge Michael Liburdi, Kagan discussed threats to judicial independence including noncompliance with court orders, urged the Court to give reasoned explanations when acting on the emergency docket, and described how majority opinions must be written for the median justice.
The response to perceived lawlessness of any kind is law.
Topics: judicial independence, emergency docket, judicial role
- — Sidney Shainwald Public Interest Lecture: conversation with Melissa Murray (NYU School of Law)
In a public conversation at NYU, Kagan reiterated support for an enforceable ethics code and argued that Justice Thomas's Dobbs concurrence followed logically from the majority's history-focused reasoning, which she said applies equally to contraception, interracial marriage, and same-sex marriage precedents.
Topics: ethics enforcement, dobbs, substantive due process, gender representation
- — Call for an enforcement mechanism for the Supreme Court's ethics code (Ninth Circuit Judicial Conference, Sacramento, California)
Kagan became the first sitting justice to publicly urge adding an enforcement mechanism to the Court's 2023 ethics code, suggesting the Chief Justice could appoint a committee of respected lower-court judges to apply the rules.
Topics: ethics code, ethics enforcement, judicial accountability, public confidence
- — Remarks on congressional power to regulate the Supreme Court (Ninth Circuit Judicial Conference, Portland, Oregon)
At the Ninth Circuit's 2023 judicial conference, Kagan said Congress can regulate the Supreme Court within limits, noting the Court is part of the checking-and-balancing system, and expressed hope the justices would adopt ethics measures themselves.
We're not imperial
Topics: ethics code, congressional oversight, separation of powers, checks and balances
- — Remarks on judicial legitimacy as Trienens Visiting Judicial Scholar (Northwestern Pritzker School of Law)
In a post-Dobbs Q&A, Kagan said courts earn legitimacy by adhering to precedent absent unusual circumstances, applying interpretive methodologies consistently, and avoiding unnecessary interventions, and she criticized the Court's expanded use of the shadow docket.
If you're a textualist, you're not a textualist just when it's convenient.
Topics: judicial legitimacy, stare decisis, textualism, shadow docket, dobbs aftermath
- — Testimony with Justice Alito before the House Appropriations subcommittee on the Supreme Court's budget (U.S. House Appropriations Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government)
At a March 2019 House budget hearing, Kagan disclosed that Chief Justice Roberts was studying whether to adopt an ethics code applicable to the Supreme Court, and, while stressing the value of the public seeing the institution at work, opposed live broadcast of arguments.
Topics: ethics code, cameras in court, judicial transparency, court administration
- — Conversation with Justice Sotomayor at Princeton's 'She Roars' conference (Princeton University)
Speaking alongside Justice Sotomayor the day before Justice Kavanaugh's confirmation vote, Kagan said the Court's legitimacy depends on the public not viewing it like other political institutions and questioned whether the Court would retain a 'middle' after Justices O'Connor and Kennedy.
Topics: judicial legitimacy, polarization, swing justices, court dynamics
- — The Scalia Lecture: A Dialogue with Justice Kagan on the Reading of Statutes (Harvard Law School)
In Harvard Law School's 2015 Scalia Lecture, Kagan credited Justice Scalia with transforming statutory interpretation, famously declaring that the whole Court now starts from statutory text, while defending selective use of legislative history.
we're all textualists now
Topics: textualism, statutory interpretation, scalia, legislative history
- — Confirmation hearing testimony on nomination to be Associate Justice of the Supreme Court (U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary (S. Hrg. 111-1044))
Over four days of testimony (June 28-July 1, 2010), Kagan described judging as applying law rather than personal preference, discussed her Citizens United advocacy as Solicitor General, and pledged respect for precedent while declining to grade specific decisions.
law all the way down
Topics: confirmation hearing, judicial philosophy, citizens united, precedent, judicial restraint
- — Confirmation hearing testimony on nomination to be Solicitor General of the United States (U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary (S. Hrg. 111-361))
At her Solicitor General confirmation hearing, Kagan testified that the SG's office operates under a strong presumption of defending every act of Congress, discussed Youngstown limits on presidential power, and said she would have defended the Solomon Amendment despite her personal opposition to 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell.'
Topics: solicitor general, confirmation hearing, executive power, duty to defend
- — Statements to the Harvard Law School community on military recruiting and 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' (Harvard Law School (dean-era campus letters, reported by The Harvard Crimson))
As Harvard Law dean, Kagan briefly barred military recruiters from the school's career-services office over the 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' policy, telling the community in writing that the military's discriminatory employment policy was deeply wrong, while still permitting recruiting through other channels.
the military's discriminatory employment policy is deeply wrong—both unwise and unjust
Topics: dont ask dont tell, solomon amendment, gay rights, military recruiting, harvard dean
- — Presidential Administration (Harvard Law Review (114 Harv. L. Rev. 2245))
Kagan's most influential article documents how Presidents Reagan and especially Clinton made agency regulation an extension of the President's own policy agenda, and defends presidential control of administration as promoting both accountability and effectiveness.
Topics: executive power, administrative law, presidential control, regulatory state
- — Chevron's Nondelegation Doctrine (with David J. Barron) (Supreme Court Review (2001 Sup. Ct. Rev. 201))
Barron and Kagan propose reorienting Chevron deference around which agency actor makes the interpretive decision, arguing that deference is most warranted when high-level, politically accountable officials resolve statutory ambiguity.
Topics: chevron deference, nondelegation, administrative law, statutory interpretation
- — Private Speech, Public Purpose: The Role of Governmental Motive in First Amendment Doctrine (University of Chicago Law Review (63 U. Chi. L. Rev. 413))
Kagan's major First Amendment article argues that free-speech doctrine is best understood as a tool for ferreting out improper governmental motives — hostility to particular ideas or legislative self-interest — rather than as protection of an abstract speech interest.
Topics: first amendment, governmental motive, free speech doctrine, content neutrality
- — Confirmation Messes, Old and New (reviewing Stephen L. Carter, The Confirmation Mess) (University of Chicago Law Review (62 U. Chi. L. Rev. 919))
In this book review, Kagan argues the real problem with Supreme Court confirmations is not that senators press nominees on substance but that they fail to, and she criticizes modern hearings for eliciting evasive non-answers about nominees' constitutional views.
a vapid and hollow charade
Topics: judicial nominations, confirmation process, senate, judicial selection
- — Regulation of Hate Speech and Pornography After R.A.V. (University of Chicago Law Review (60 U. Chi. L. Rev. 873))
Writing after R.A.V. v. City of St. Paul, Kagan analyzes how legislatures might design hate-speech and pornography restrictions that could survive the Court's viewpoint-neutrality doctrine, focusing on drafting choices rather than frontal challenges to the doctrine.
Topics: first amendment, hate speech, pornography, viewpoint neutrality