chief justice

/tʃif ˌdʒʌstəs/

Other forms: chief justices

Definitions of chief justice

1. noun

   the judge who presides over a supreme court
   examples:

   Warren Earl Burger

   United States jurist appointed chief justice of the United States Supreme Court by Richard Nixon (1907-1995)

   Salmon Portland Chase

   United States politician and jurist who served as chief justice of the United States Supreme Court (1808-1873)

   Oliver Ellsworth

   United States jurist and the third chief justice of the United States Supreme Court (1745-1807)

   Melville Weston Fuller

   United States jurist and chief justice of the United States Supreme Court (1833-1910)

   Charles Evans Hughes

   United States jurist who served as chief justice of the United States Supreme Court (1862-1948)

   John Jay

   United States diplomat and jurist who negotiated peace treaties with Britain and served as the first chief justice of the United States Supreme Court (1745-1829)

   John Marshall

   United States jurist; as chief justice of the Supreme Court he established the principles of United States constitutional law (1755-1835)

   William Hubbs Rehnquist

   United States jurist who served as an associate justice on the United States Supreme Court from 1972 until 1986, when he was appointed chief justice (born in 1924)

   John Rutledge

   United States jurist and second chief justice of the United States Supreme Court; he was appointed by George Washington and briefly served as chief justice but was ultimately rejected by the United States Senate (1739-1800)

   Harlan Fisk Stone

   United States jurist who was named chief justice of the United States Supreme Court in 1941 by Franklin D. Roosevelt (1872-1946)

   William Howard Taft

   27th President of the United States and later chief justice of the United States Supreme Court (1857-1930)

   Roger Brooke Taney

   United States jurist who served as chief justice of the United States Supreme Court; remembered for his ruling that slaves and their descendants have no rights as citizens (1777-1864)

   Frederick Moore Vinson

   United States jurist who served as chief justice of the Supreme Court (1890-1953)

   Morrison Remick Waite

   United States jurist who was appointed chief justice of the United States Supreme Court in 1874 by President Grant (1816-1888)

   Earl Warren

   United States jurist who served as chief justice of the United States Supreme Court (1891-1974)

   Edward Douglas White Jr.

   United States jurist appointed chief justice of the United States Supreme Court in 1910 by President Taft; noted for his work on antitrust legislation (1845-1921)

   type of:

   judge, jurist, justice

   a public official authorized to decide questions brought before a court of justice