ABSTRACT
Anthony M. Kennedy has been a pivotal yet overlooked justice since replacing Lewis F. Powell Jr. on the US Supreme Court in 1988. Like Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, Kennedy has assumed a powerful role at the middle of a sharply divided Court under Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist. Justice Kennedy has been a key vote in the areas of religion and abortion. In cases involving the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the Constitution, he has in general upheld government funding of religious groups. In cases involving equal protection, Justice Kennedy has been a pivotal justice. He has joined a majority of the Court in requiring race-neutrality in cases involving affirmative action and majority- minority legislative districts. Justice Kennedy is willing to use judicial power to enforce his individualistic conception of the full and necessary meaning of liberty.
