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Monday, Oct. 3, 2005

Prior to his confirmation as the 17th chief justice of the Supreme Court, John Roberts served from 2003 to 2005 on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.

Roberts, 50, previously practiced law at Washington's Hogan & Hartson from 1986 to 1989 and 1993 to 2003. Between 1989 and 1993, he was the principal deputy solicitor general in the first Bush administration, helping formulate the administration's position in Supreme Court cases. During the Reagan administration, he served as an aide to Attorney General William French Smith from 1981 to 1982 and as an aide to White House counsel Fred Fielding from 1982 to 1986.

Roberts, born in Buffalo, New York, on Jan. 27, 1955, grew up in Indiana, where he captained his high school football team and worked summers in a steel mill to help pay his way through college. He received his undergraduate and law school education at Harvard.

Upon graduation from from law school, Roberts clerked for Justice Henry J. Friendly of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. From 1980 through 1981, Roberts clerked for then-Associate Justice William H. Rehnquist on the Supreme Court.

Roberts currently lives in Bethesda, Maryland, with his wife, Jane, and their two children, Jack and Josie.

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