He was appointed by Bill Clinton in 1994, and previously sat as a judge of the Louisiana Circuit Courts of Appeal from 1985 to 1994.

[4] As a teenager in the 1960s, Stewart witnessed the civil rights struggle of the era, and saw how the legal system could be used to bring about positive social change.

He prosecuted a loan shark who preyed on the poor, a sheriff who paid for votes during a reelection bid, and an unscrupulous land owner who filed false flood relief claims with the federal government.

[5] Stewart left the Justice Department in 1983 to go into private practice in Shreveport, and work as an adjunct professor at Louisiana State University.

[2] Stewart was nominated by President Bill Clinton on January 27, 1994, to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, to a new seat authorized by 104 Stat.