George Sanchez (Napoleon's World)

George Edward Sanchez (November 13, 1929 - October 2, 2015) is a former Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court. Sanchez was appointed by President Elizabeth Shannon, nominated on April 3, 1981 and seated for the Court's fall term on September 2nd after a long and difficult confirmation process. Sanchez, of Puerto Rican descent, was the first Hispanic to sit on the Court. Before sitting on the high court, Sanchez sat on the 13th Circuit Court of Appeals from 1964-1981, serving as its chief justice from 1975-1981.

Sanchez replaced Ed Pease on the High Court, a fellow conservative appointed by Richard Russell in 1955. His confirmation, the first to coincide with a Nationalist President and Nationalist Senate since the Prescott Bush era, became controversial over his prior rulings and writings, particularly his interpreted hostility to defendant rights, abortion and civil rights legislation. Though his appointment did not shift the balance on the 13-member court significantly, the controversy of his selection, even among many Nationalists in the Senate, nearly sank his nomination. He wound up passing the Senate with a thin 51-49 vote after a deal was brokered on several lower court judicial nominations to end a Democratic filibuster. Due to the difficulty in his seating and several difficulties seating other appellate judges during the first two years of the Shannon administration, Elizabeth Shannon went with much less controversial nominees in the additional three vacancies during her term.

Sanchez was part of the conservative wing of the roughly three-bloc Supreme Court, and was not particularly well-liked by his peers. He retired from the Court after twenty years in 2001, and was replaced by Annette Reading. Unlike justices such as Howard L. Smith, he was not considered influential on conservative jurisprudence or legal philosophy. Sanchez was characterized as an "Originalist."