The High Court of Australia is composed of seven Justices: the Chief Justice of Australia and six other Justices. There have been 56 Justices who have served as Justices of the High Court since its formation under the Judiciary Act 1903. Under Section 71 of the Australian Constitution, the judicial power of the Commonwealth of Australia is vested in the court, and it has been the highest court in the Australian court hierarchy since the passing of the Australia Act 1986. In a May 2017 speech, Justice Virginia Bell observed that "few Australians outside the law schools are likely to be able to name the Chief Justice, let alone the puisne Justices of the High Court". History Initially, there were three Justices of the High Court – Chief Justice Sir Samuel Griffith, Justice Sir Edmund Barton and Justice Richard Edward O'Connor. The number was expanded in 1906, at the request of the Justices, to five, with the appointment of Justices Sir Isaac Isaacs and H. B. Higgins. After O'Connor's death in 1912, an amendment to the Judiciary Act 1903 expanded the bench to seven. For most of 1930, two seats were left vacant due to monetary constraints placed on the court by the Depression. The economic downturn had also led to a reduction in litigation and consequently less work for the court. After Isaacs retired in 1931, his seat was left empty, and in 1933 an amendment to the Judiciary Act officially reduced the number of seats to six. However, this led to some decisions being split three-all. With the appointment of William Webb in 1946, the number of seats returned to seven, and since then the court has had seven Justices. there have been 55 Justices, thirteen of whom have been Chief Justice. Appointments to the court were for life until 1977, when a mandatory retirement age of 70 was established, though several post-1977 Justices have retired before reaching the age of 70 (William Deane resigned as a Justice to be appointed Governor-General). Composition of the High Court There have been 56 Justices of the High Court; forty-nine have been men and seven women. The first female Justice was Mary Gaudron who was a Justice from 1987 to 2003. Susan Crennan was a Justice from 2005 to 2015, and Virginia Bell from 2009 to 2021. The current Chief Justice of Australia Susan Kiefel is the first woman to have