Hhhmmm... Let's see...
modern history - history up to the present day, from some arbitrary point taken to represent the end of the Middle Ages. In some contexts it may be contrasted with “ancient” rather than “medieval” history, and start, e.g., from the fall of the Western Roman Empire.
So, it appears the term modern history covers a really, really lot of the POTUSes. Like, all of them.
But apparently, many people believe modern history only covers the period from President George W. Bush to the present.
But even if we constrain modern history to be only that of which comprises "the most recent political memories that I want to remember because it best suits my political agenda," we have people thinking that because President Bush the Younger attended Chief Justice William Rehnquist’s funeral and he was the most recent Supreme Court funeral we’ve had, these many people have the belief that it’s the norm. But it’s not. But of course, whether it's the norm or not is irrelevant to those who took a collective dump in their Republican Pants, because they either believe that noted Muslim Barack HUSSEIN Obama would burst into flames if he crossed the church’s threshold, or because he cannot bear to attend the funeral of someone he ordered smothered to death with a pillow just a week earlier.
But let's expand modern history juuuust a tad to, say, the seven most recent funerals of Supreme Court Justices, shall we? Of the last seven SC Justices to have funerals, only 3 of them were attended by the President: Bush the Junior attended the funeral for former Chief Justice William Rehnquist, Clinton the Senior attended the funerals for former Chief Justice Warren E. Burger and Justice William Brennan (but did not attend the funerals for Justices Harry Blackmun or Lewis F. Powell Jr.). Vice President Al Gore attended the funeral for Justice Thurgood Marshall, so that's something (and Biden is scheduled to attend Scalia's funeral).
Oh, but the article at the linked headline goes all "baseball statistics" on us by limiting it funerals of dead SITTING Justices, and ONLY within the modern history of the last 65 years. Do you know how many home runs Bronson Arroyo has given up in his career, at GABP, on Sundays between 2-5 PM?
So, since 1951, three Supreme Court Justices have died while SITTING on the Court:
Chief Justice Fred M. Vinson, September 8,m 1953 (attended by Dwight D. Eisenhower)
Justice Robert H. Jackson, October 9, 1954 (Dwight D. Eisenhower did NOT attend, nor did VP Nixon)
Chief Justice William Rehnquist, September 3, 2005 (attended by George W. Bush)
When Obama doesn't show up for Scalia's funeral, that will make it 2 out of 4 times (in the newly and carefully defined modern history) where sitting Presidents did not attend the funeral of a SITTING Supreme Court Justice.
I'd hardly call that "unprecedented" by any stretch.