rachel shelden is professor of history at penn state university in the us. she said today s supreme court is similar to how it was in the 19th century. well, the history of the court is a history of politics because the court has always been made up of political appointees and in the 19th century, especially, from the earliest years of the supreme court through the 19th century, you had justices who were nominated for their political and partisan proclivities. so, in many ways, it is a return to the way things were in the 19th century and early years of the united states. has it always been that way, though? yes, it has. it has always been political. the difference now is that americans tend to believe that the court should be apolitical, so all of the opinion polls about the supreme court rely a lot on the idea that the court must operate outside of politics. but of course that is really hard to do when the appointees come from presidents who come from particular political proclivitie