WASHINGTON — Retired Supreme Court Justice David H. Souter, the ascetic bachelor and New Hampshire Republican who became a favorite of liberals during his nearly 20 years on the bench, has died. He was 85.
Souter died Thursday at his home in New Hampshire, the court said in a statement Friday.
He retired from the court in June 2009, giving President Barack Obama his first Supreme Court vacancy to fill. Obama, a Democrat, chose Sonia Sotomayor, the court's first Latina justice.
Souter was appointed by Republican President George H.W. Bush in 1990. He was a reliably liberal vote on abortion, church-state relations, freedom of expression and the accessibility of federal courts. Souter also dissented from the decision in Bush v. Gore in 2000, which effectively handed the presidency to George W. Bush, the son of the man who put him on the high court.
While liberals were delighted with a justice they initially feared, conservatives turned Souter's appointment into a rallying cry, ''No more Souters,'' that fueled their successful drive to move the court more firmly to the right.
In retirement, Souter warned that ignorance of how government works could undermine American democracy.
"What I worry about is that when problems are not addressed, people will not know who is responsible. And when the problems get bad enough ... some one person will come forward and say, ‘Give me total power and I will solve this problem.' That is how the Roman republic fell,'' Souter said in a 2012 interview.
His lifestyle was spare — yogurt and an apple, consumed at his desk, was a typical lunch — and he shunned Washington's social scene. He couldn't wait to leave town in early summer. As soon as the court finished its work in late June, he climbed into his Volkswagen Jetta for the drive back to the worn farmhouse where his family moved when he was 11.