Who appointed Charles R. Breyer?

President William J. Clinton appointed Charles R. Breyer to the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California in 1997.

Was Charles R. Breyer appointed by a Democrat or a Republican?

Charles R. Breyer was appointed by President William J. Clinton, a Democrat. JudicialFinder records the appointing president's party, not a judge's own politics.

What was Charles R. Breyer's confirmation vote?

Charles R. Breyer was confirmed by voice vote on November 8, 1997. No senator-by-senator tally was recorded.

Northern District of California / Appointed 1997 / Senior status since 2011

Charles R. Breyer

Judge, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California

Appointed by President William J. Clinton in 1997 and confirmed by voice vote, Charles R. Breyer is a Judge on the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California. He earned a law degree from University of California, Berkeley, School of Law in 1966. Rulings & record ↓ Sources ↓

Born: 1941 · age 85
Appointed by: William J. Clinton, 1997
Confirmed: by voice vote
Education: Harvard College 1963 · University of California, Berkeley, Law 1966
Succeeded: Delwen Lowell Jensen
Succeeded by: William Horsley Orrick III

Federal judicial service

Year	Court	Appointed by	Vote
1997	Northern District of California succeeded Delwen Lowell Jensen	Clinton (D)	Voice vote

Party letters show the appointing president’s party, not the judge’s own. A voice vote means the chamber approved aloud. No senator-by-senator tally is recorded.

Confirmation vote

Voice vote

The Senate approved this confirmation aloud, with no senator-by-senator tally recorded. Recorded roll-call votes begin in 1989.

Education

Harvard College	A.B.	1963
University of California, Berkeley, School of Law	J.D.	1966

Judicial Record

Caseload & case types

In our data, Breyer was assigned 11,803 district-court cases (1986–2026). Median time from filing to termination: 320 days across 7,931 closed cases.

Personal-injury torts32%

Other civil matters15%

Other federal statutes10%

Civil rights7%

Contract7%

Prisoner & habeas7%

Other21%

Case assignment is from CourtListener’s PACER-derived docket records: a partial sample, not a complete caseload, reflecting the judge last assigned each case. How we count.

On appeal

Of 407 of Breyer’s decisions reviewed on the merits by the U.S. courts of appeals in our data, 346 were affirmed, 43 reversed or vacated, and 18 affirmed in part and reversed in part. This is a historical count of appellate outcomes for cases we could match, not a judgment of the judge, and not a complete record. How we count.

In our data, Breyer authored 124 published opinions for the court (1998–2011). Most cited: Surber v. Reliance National Indemnity Co. (50 citations).

A selective record from published opinions in the CourtListener corpus, not every ruling; most unpublished district orders are not included. Counts and rankings are objective and recomputable: how we count. We describe the record, not the judge.

Recent & notable rulings

Year	Case	Citation	Cited
2000	Surber v. Reliance National Indemnity Co.	110 F. Supp. 2d 1227	50
2001	Firoozye v. Earthlink Network	153 F. Supp. 2d 1115	48
2002	Singh v. Jutla & C.D. & R's Oil, Inc.	214 F. Supp. 2d 1056	34
2007	In Re Bextra & Celebrex Marketing Sales Practices & Product Liability Litigation	524 F. Supp. 2d 1166	30
2009	Lockwood v. Conagra Foods, Inc.	597 F. Supp. 2d 1028	29
2009	In Re Brocade Communications Systems, Inc. Derivative Litigation	615 F. Supp. 2d 1018	26
2006	Perez-Encinas v. Amerus Life Insurance	468 F. Supp. 2d 1127	24
2000	Husain v. Olympic Airways	116 F. Supp. 2d 1121	24
2000	Towers v. Boyd (In Re Boyd)	243 B.R. 756	23
1999	Volk v. United States	57 F. Supp. 2d 888	21
2005	United States v. Chevron U.S.A. Inc.	380 F. Supp. 2d 1104	18
2009	Haskell v. Brown	677 F. Supp. 2d 1187	16
1999	Soo v. United Parcel Service, Inc.	73 F. Supp. 2d 1126	16
1999	Hexcel Corp. v. Stepan Co. (In Re Hexcel Corp.)	239 B.R. 564	16
1998	ZEE MEDICAL DISTRIBUTOR ASSOC. v. Zee Medical, Inc.	23 F. Supp. 2d 1151	15

Showing the 15 most-cited of 124 authored opinions in our data. “Cited” is inbound citations across the CourtListener corpus. Case links open the ruling’s full text (CourtListener) or its page here; read the methodology and verify against the primary source.

Questions & answers

Who appointed Charles R. Breyer?: President William J. Clinton appointed Charles R. Breyer to the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California in 1997.
Was Charles R. Breyer appointed by a Democrat or a Republican?: Charles R. Breyer was appointed by President William J. Clinton, a Democrat. JudicialFinder records the appointing president's party, not a judge's own politics.
What was Charles R. Breyer's confirmation vote?: Charles R. Breyer was confirmed by voice vote on November 8, 1997. No senator-by-senator tally was recorded.
Which court is Charles R. Breyer on?: Charles R. Breyer is a Judge on the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.

Sources

Each fact on this page traces to a primary public record.

How we source & reconcile data → Data & Sources

See something wrong? Report an error. Fixes are logged in the corrections log.

28 years on the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California. Data as of 2026-08-10. Informational only; verify against the primary source before relying. Not a consumer report (FCRA).