Since the establishment in 1922 of the Conference of Senior Circuit Judges (renamed the Judicial Conference of the United States in 1948), the Chief Justice of the United States, or the senior associate justice if the Chief is unable, has been responsible for presiding over the conference and for summoning the senior judge, later the chief judge, on each circuit court of appeals. The size of the conference nearly doubled following an act of 1957 that provided for the appellate and district judges in each circuit to elect a district judge to represent the circuit on the conference for a term of three years. Congress had first expanded representation on the conference in 1956 with the addition of the chief judge of the Court of Claims. At that time, the judges of the Court of Customs and Patent Appeals declined to include a representative on the conference, but beginning in 1961 the chief judge of that court also served on the conference. The chief judges of these two courts continued to serve on the conference until 1982 when their courts merged to become the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. In 1986, Congress provided that the chief judge of the Court of International Trade was to serve on the Judicial Conference and in 1996 expanded the district judge term up to five years and allowed senior district judges to be members.

The following list of Judicial Conference service is organized by the circuits and courts represented. It was compiled largely from the Reports of the Proceedings of the Judicial Conference and is complete through the most recent meeting of the conference. The list contains the names of those judges who were members of the conference, rather than those who may occasionally have attended in their absence. District Judges are identified by the district in which they served.