Memo to media: We had other judges with little to no judicial experience

Two of the past four chief justices did not have prior judicial experience. William Rehnquist and Earl Warren -- two of the past four chief justices -- had never been judges before their appointments as justices. Both were nominated by Republican presidents.

Former Chief Justice John Marshall and former associate Justices Louis Brandeis and Felix Frankfurter had no prior judicial experience. Former Chief Justice John Marshall, frequently referred to as the "great chief justice," and former associate Justices Louis Brandeis and Felix Frankfurter also had no judicial experience at the time of their Supreme Court appointments.

Kagan has not had judicial experience because GOP blocked her nomination. Kagan was nominated to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in 1999 by President Clinton, and the Senate, then controlled by Republicans, blocked her nomination.

Clarence Thomas had been a judge for only 16 months when he was nominated for a Supreme Court position. Thomas had only been a judge for 16 months when George H.W. Bush nominated him for the Supreme Court.

Citing Frankfurter, GOP Sen. Hatch stated, "I have long believed that prior judicial experience is not a prerequisite for successful judicial service." On March 19, 2009, during the floor debate on Kagan's nomination to be solicitor general, Republican Sen. Orrin Hatch (UT) stated:

I have long believed that prior judicial experience is not a prerequisite for successful judicial service. Justice Felix Frankfurter taught at Harvard Law School from 1921 until President Franklin D. Roosevelt appointed him to the Supreme Court in 1939. During that time, by the way, he turned down the opportunity to become Solicitor General. But Justice Frankfurter famously wrote in 1957 that the correlation between prior judicial experience and fitness for the Supreme Court is, as he put it, "precisely zero.''

Indeed, 40 of 111 Supreme Court justices had no prior judicial experience. From Findlaw.com:

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