CACrown ArchivesThe cinema collection
Menu
Research dossier · General Reference

Samuel Alito

Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States since 2006

Cross-disciplinary reference desk with index cards, atlas, dictionary and catalogue
General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionSep 23, 2026
Entity authorityQ11138
Source-derived summary

Samuel Anthony Alito Jr. ( ə-LEE-toh; born April 1, 1950) is an American jurist who serves as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. He was nominated to the high court by President George W. Bush on October 31, 2005, and has served on it since January 31, 2006. After Antonin Scalia, Alito is the second Italian American justice to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court.

Alito was raised in Hamilton Township, New Jersey, and graduated from Princeton University and Yale Law School. After law school, he worked as an assistant attorney general for the Office of Legal Counsel and served as the U.S. attorney for the District of New Jersey. In 1990, Alito was appointed as a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, where he served until joining the Supreme Court. He has called himself a "practical originalist" and is a member of the Supreme Court's conservative bloc.

Alito has written majority opinions in the landmark cases McDonald v. Chicago (2010) on firearm rights, Burwell v.

Editorial summary

The public source identifies “Samuel Alito” as associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States since 2006. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Samuel, Alito and Associate.

Editorial reviewA dependable orientation record for establishing vocabulary, names and a first evidence trail. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1950, 2005, 2006, 1990—that can be checked directly. The authority record carries competing date values—1950-01-01, 1950-04-01—which should remain separate until their references and qualifiers are resolved. Its value is orientation rather than verdict, with Samuel, Alito and Associate providing the first useful test.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Samuel Alito”, the useful work is to connect “associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States since 2006” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.

Evidence profile

The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 23, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q11138. VIAF identifies the subject as 44041062. The Library of Congress control number is no2005102615. 4 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 2 carry qualifiers and 1 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1950, 2005, 2006 and 1990.

Critical limits

The absence of detail may reflect summary conventions rather than a lack of surviving documentation. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

Best used for
  • Subject orientation
  • Search vocabulary
  • Locating named sources
Verify next

The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Samuel Alito”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Samuel Alito primary sources, Samuel Alito archive and Samuel research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Samuel Alito”?
  2. Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
  3. Which institution is responsible for the underlying evidence?
Subject index

Search terms from this dossier

Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from Samuel Alito” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.