Texas Supreme Court

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The Texas Supreme Court is the court of last resort for non-criminal matters (including juvenile delinquency which the law considers to be a civil matter and not criminal) in the state of Texas. A different court, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, is the court of last resort for criminal matters.

The Court is composed of a Chief Justice and eight Associate Justices. The Court meets in Austin, Texas in a building located on the state Capitol grounds, behind the Texas capitol.

Regulation of the legal profession in Texas

By statute, the Texas Supreme Court has administrative control over the State Bar of Texas, an agency of the judiciary. The Texas Supreme Court has the sole authority to license attorneys in Texas, and also appoints the members of the Board of Law Examiners which, under instructions of the Supreme Court, administers the Texas bar examination.

Justices of the Court

The Court has a Chief Justice and eight associate justices. Each member of the Court must be at least 35 years of age, a citizen of Texas, licensed to practice law in Texas, and must have practiced law (or have been a lawyer and a judge of a court of record together) for at least ten years.

Election of members of the Court

The Chief Justice and the associate justices are elected to staggered six-year terms in state-wide partisan elections. When a vacancy arises the Governor of Texas may appoint Justices, subject to Senate confirmation, to serve out the remainder of an unexpired term until the next general election. As of 2008, five of the current Justices, a majority, were originally appointed by Governor Rick Perry. The current Justices, like all the Judges of the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, are all Republican.

The place numbers have no special meaning as all justices are elected state-wide, except that the Chief Justice position is considered "Place 1".

Current Justices

Justice	Party Affiliation	Place	Date Service Began	Term Ends
Wallace B. Jefferson	Republican	Chief Justice	April 18, 2001	2008
Don R. Willett	Republican	2	August 24, 2005	2012
Harriet O'Neill	Republican	3	January 1, 1999	2010
David M. Medina	Republican	4	November 10, 2004	2012
Paul W. Green	Republican	5	January 1, 2005	2010
Nathan Hecht	Republican	6	January 1, 1989	2012
Dale Wainwright	Republican	7	January 1, 2003	2008
Phil Johnson	Republican	8	April 11, 2005	2008
Scott A. Brister	Republican	9	November 21, 2003	2010

History of membership of the Court

Succession of seats

Notes

External links

• Official Website for the Texas Supreme Court
• The Texas Reports, the decisions of the Texas Supreme Court from 1846 to 1885, hosted by the Portal to Texas History
• Texas Judiciary page from The Handbook of Texas Online
• Texas Supreme Court Historical Society

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Last updated on Monday July 14, 2008 at 14:56:46 PDT (GMT -0700)
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