Three conservative Supreme Court justices skip State of the Union

President Obama prepares for final State of the Union

Three conservative justices on the Supreme Court were noticeably absent from President Obama's final State of the Union address on Tuesday night.

Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito and Antonin Scalia were not present in the House chamber as the rest of their colleagues filed in.

The trio also skipped the president's address last year and Scalia has missed the State of the Union more than a dozen times. In 2013, Scalia called the event "a childish spectacle."

On Tuesday, Chief Justices John Roberts attended Mr. Obama's final address as did Anthony Kennedy, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Elena Kagan, Sonia Sotomayor and Stephen Breyer.

President Obama is talking about the future of the U.S. in his speech, with the 2016 presidential election at stake. The next president could appoint three or four new justices on the high court based on their ages and rumors of retirement.

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