Supreme Court justice Anthony Kenneday said he’s retiring at the end of July, meaning the court will hold just eight justices until a new nominee gets confirmed by the U.S. Senate.
Eight justices also manned the court between February 2016 when Justice Antonin Scalia died and Neil Gorsuch was confirmed on April 7, 2017.
However, it turns out, the original U.S. Constitution did not set the number of justices on the Supreme Court. Therefore, it was up to Congress to decide, and in 1801, it set the number at five. But things didn’t stay that way for long.
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