Welcome to the Summit Series with Ari Melber.
We are joined now by a very special guest at
the summit of the legal profession.
Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer was nominated to the Supreme
Court by President Clinton and served for 28 years before
retiring in
2022, stepping down from the Supreme Court bench.
And his new book is Reading the Constitution.
Why I Chose Pragmatism, Not Textualism,
Out Now. Welcome. Thank you very much.
I have a question about rules for you.
Let's talk about that big decision overturning Roe.
Dobbs. Where were you when you heard that a draft
opinion leaked of it?
I don't know where I was.
I can't remember where I was.
What did you think? But that's what I can remember.
Yeah. I thought this was pretty unfortunate.
Yeah, very, very unusual to have something like very,
very unusual. Is it fair to say that at this
moment
you, a member of that court,
don't know who leaked it?
Yeah, that's correct. And the Chief Justice took this seriously.
They did a process, but as you know,
that didn't resolve it.
Does it concern you that it was leaked?
Do you think there was a goal or a motive
from within the court?
And should we expect more leaks or not of draft
opinions?
Cause unlike you and I were speaking before we sat
down,
unlike every other part of government in Washington,
what everyone thinks of the court,
it generally has not had that problem and a lot
of judges are concerned about that.
So you can give you the floor on all of
that.
I I would be concerned,
but it's not the first time.
Interestingly enough,
I read at least one book,
if I remember, which said that Dred Scott,
which I think would be viewed
among a group of students of the subject as as
one of the worst,
if not the very worst
decision reached by the court.
There is some view that that was leaked
or that somebody told President Buchanan before it was released.
That's possible. That's possible. It doesn't happen often.
When it's happened, it hasn't been desirable and the the
court is pretty good.
Not perfect, obviously, but pretty good at not
releasing things privately and not leaking things,
Obviously not perfect. Yeah. But there's a concern or a
view out there that maybe it would came from within
the court.
You know, am I to to distort the process or
to lock in a vote?
Do you have any view of that possible?
I I I can't because I don't know.
Yeah. You see, I really don't know.
I and and and and I hesitate to speculate on
something as serious as that.
Hmm. And whether it'll continue to happen.
We have no idea. We think not.
I mean, we, you and I,
you've worked at the court,
you've seen it's a pretty closed
because people might change their minds,
you know, until the very last minute people can change
their minds.
The charges. My last question on that,
do you recall any justices discussing it with you?
Was it something you guys talk about around the water
cooler,
so to speak, not around the water cooler,
but I think every people I spoke to
but more or less shared the attitude I have this
very serious matter.
Yeah.
You have said with regard to
how we run the court
that if there was some kind of time limit for
justices
without going into them having to worry about their next
job,
that could be a workable
solution to some of the other concerns people have it.
It might. I mean, tell me about that.
I don't know whether would or would not be a
solution to other problems.
When, when, when? I've discussed this in the past.
People have talked about changing
the system at the court.
And we have a system where the Constitution says appointed
in good behavior,
which is to be taken to mean life.
I could change that. Maybe you'd need a constitutional amendment.
I don't know. I haven't looked into that much.
But you, you made what I've said about it.
But you made a choice to figure out how you
wanted to serve.
When we spoke, this was now almost a decade ago.
Here's what you told me.
You've been on the court over 20 years.
How do you know in a job where only you
decide,
how do you know when it's time to retire?
That's a good question and
I feel, I will know.
I feel so far I seem to be able to
do the job and there there will perhaps be some
indication or I'll think about it,
but I haven't thought it through enough yet to be
able to give you much guidance on when I'll
retire. And that's what you did.
You chose to retire other people,
and I say this not just in the court but
in Congress,
where some people have very long terms because they kind
of benefit from incumbency on the court,
where it's really only up to the justice.
Pretty much people
put that decision off so long,
shall we say, with all due respect
that they die on the job.
And here we are in a modern society with a
lot of challenges,
and there's a lot of people who say that's not
the best solution.
So you found a way to serve
a good long term and then bow out,
give up power. If you want to put it in
the Washingtonian tradition,
would it be better to have a system that
at 18 or 20 or 22 years has some cap
on Supreme Court justices?
It would make the decision earlier because even though I
was about 83 years old,
that sounds old. But but you know,
it's it's a hard decision.
It's a personal decision. You think of a lot of
different things
and that's why I said,
you know, it might be better,
but it has to be a long term because you
don't want the person looking for another job
because that could be corruptive in its own way,
right. You don't want that.
But you maybe. I mean,
I think the committee that that the president set up
looked into that and I want to read that again
and so forth.
But their personal decisions and
there's an old joke, which I don't know if it's
true or not.
Supposedly when Holmes was 90,
he was thinking of retiring.
And who did they send in to see him?
They sent in someone to see him.
Like maybe it was Brandeis,
I don't know. But one of the judges and to
tell him,
the other judges thought maybe it was about time.
So. And Holmes had said the same thing too.
Was it?
Who was the California judge?
I think anyway Judge whoever was Brandeis,
whoever would have said to Holmes,
do you remember the day
that the court sent you in to say
justice so and so to tell him that really it
might be about time for him to step down
and Holmes or whoever replied supposedly yes I do remember.
And a dirtier day's work I've never done
right. Right. That was a complicated decision.
Complicated and and a big question for society here especially
because as we all know it's great.
You said eight, you said 83 sounds old.
That was your words, right.
It doesn't sound old. But you
as I understand it's now the new,
it's the new 20 or or the new 70.
But whatever it is with,
with, with health and medical technology,
people are living longer than ever.
And we expect that to continue.
But it creates an imbalance.
We talked about pragmatism from how people originally started.
So that's why it was interesting to get your views
on it.
You know, usually we we listen as you all ask
questions.
We rarely get to ask you questions.
So that's why it's fascinating.
But it's a little bit more than a personal decision
in this sense.
People ask me a lot.
If you just go to the the
view of people maybe who aren't lawyers,
maybe a lot who are lawyers,
they think these decisions, which
you're quite right, I wrote or participated in writing,
rather strong dissents. I didn't like those decisions,
but they think they're all political.
I don't. I don't think it's political.
It's something sort of like political,
but it takes too long to explain.
Unless they read it in the book.
Yeah, all right. But the the
Well, it's sort. But what?
Paul Freund was a great
a great
law professor at Harvard. He said
politics in the court, no judge,
no judge decides the case on the basis of the
temperature of the day
that every judge is affected by the climate of the
season.
That's well put. I mean,
that's very interesting because it leads to something else I
want to ask you about
that's serious. You have a former president who's also running
for office
who is going through our justice system,
and as we know, he's legally presumed innocent and the
process plays out.
But unlike almost all defendants,
he is repeatedly attacking judges,
almost daring the system to see what it might do.
For example, attacking the judge overseeing the New York trial
as totally compromised,
he should be removed. Attacking his daughter?
He published online lies about his daughter that are false.
I'm not going to repeat them here.
By 1 count from Reuters,
the number of threats and hostile communications made towards judges
and their court staff
has more than tripled since 2015.
You are a judge and as a
as a Supreme Court Justice retired,
you still go on and can judge federal appeals,
which we were discussing.
Is that kind of attack
protected free speech or is it wrong?
And what do we do about increasing documented threats against
judges in our country Now you have several parts to
that.
And and the part that you really want me to
answer,
I can't answer because I am in the habit
and a part of a system.
I thought you said you don't read minds.
How do you know that we want your your answer
on that.
I'm guessing you're you happen to be right.
Yeah. I can't. I can't.
I can't answer the the political parts.
You're careful to avoid anything regarding the defendant.
Trump, understood. You can say not with regard to but
regard to anyone regard to anyone.
They're very to physically threaten someone,
to physically threaten a judge to physically threaten
a civil servant, to physically threaten someone who works in
the government,
to physically threaten someone who doesn't work in the government
is wrong.
I mean that isn't exactly a a
brilliant insight, but I think
99.999% of all Americans would say don't do not physically
threaten other people.
And it's not just that
physical harm caused a person is is not
right, but we in this country.
And that's why this document is so relevant and why
what Freine said and Heart and Sacks about law is
so relevant.
Every race, every religion, every point of view.
My mother used to say that.
She used to say there's no point of view.
So crazy there isn't somebody here who doesn't know this.
And she said they all look online.
No, she said. Now she said look in Los Angeles,
because that's because you're also sure.
But. But we've learned to live together.
Yeah. And what? What Senator Kennedy said when I work
for him,
you find people who disagree with you and you talk
to them
and don't just talk to them about why you're right
and they're wrong.
Listen to them. And if you listen long enough,
you will discover
something that you agree with.
I like that you are writing about and discussing for
the public
how to interpret the Constitution.
Why does that matter to a a regular citizen who's
not a lawyer and how do you do it?
I want regular citizens who are not a lawyers.
By the way,
320 million people in this country,
319 millionaire, not lawyers. That comes as a surprise.
But nonetheless, I want them to know,
how does the Supreme Court work?
How do courts work? How do federal courts work?
It's an important part of the government and the law
that governs them,
and I want them to see it.
It's through my eyes. I've been a judge totally 40
years,
so I've had some experience there.
And I don't guarantee that I have the only way
to do it,
or I even have the best way to do it
secretly.
I think I do it nonetheless,
and I. But I want them to know,
and particularly now because they're sort of competing ways of
doing it,
There's what I think of as a traditional way
Chief Justice John Marshall, Oliver Wendell Holmes,
Brandeis Cardoza learned at hand.
And what's that? Well, you read the words
and the word says costs.
And you say, does that include the cost of an
educational expert?
Well, read it again. It says cost
three times. Cost, cost, cost doesn't tell you so.
Most of the words in cases in the Constitution or
statutes in the Supreme Court are tough.
If it says fish, that doesn't mean carrot.
But what does it mean?
So traditionally, I think very good judges whom I admire
and learned in law school to admire
what they've done is they look
who wrote this, why there's a purpose,
what's the purpose? It might help you.
And what are the consequences if you read it one
way or the other.
And how do the values,
if you read it one way or the other,
stack up with the Constitution of the United States and
the values that are containing that you still pack.
So we talk about what does bear arms mean?
You still bear the Constitution.
You carry that with you every day and it's it's
less of a problem than bearing arms,
I would imagine. And so
when we see these words that
take significance, bear arms, due process,
free speech. When you say pragmatism,
how does that enlighten or reveal what those words should
mean?
Today, I think the word pragmatism is simply a shorthand
to say what what Chief Justice John Marshall said years
ago.
When you get a difficult set of words,
you use the materials that you can find that will
help and in particular
purposes, the values here in democracy,
human rights and so forth,
Equality. They'll help in many cases,
not all. But the pragmatism is a shorthand way of
saying
try to with the Constitution
maintain those values. John Marshall said this is going to
last for a long time.
It will deal with problems and situations that we now
he's saying in
1788 or 1800 that we now can see only dimly,
if at all. And that's what they wrote this for
and statutes to work it out
was the educational experts costs included in the word costs
or not?
Yeah, I think you have to read a lot,
get an answer to that.
And in the book we we mentioned bear arms,
which brings me to one of
your dissents
in that somewhat controversial case about what is the right
to bear arms mean.
Certainly the United States has historically had weapons,
but we've now been told by this,
by the court it's actually a greater right than
originally thought. You dissented. You wrote that guns today pose
a,
quote, unique threat to American Society,
if not properly regulated. Explain to us
in plain English, if you can,
how you drew that conclusion with the approach you take.
Now, first, can I give you another example?
And then go to there?
Sure. Look, this is what I tell the 7th graders.
They're not so easy to entertain the 7th grade,
right? So I say, here's what we do.
They want to know, perhaps.
What does the judge do in an appeals court?
Court, Supreme Court, I said I I read an article.
It said a biology teacher
going from Nantes to Paris.
A French biology teacher had 20 live snails in a
basket.
Conductor comes up, looks at the basket.
Have you paid a fare for the snails?
What are you crazy? Says the biology teacher.
Snails read what it says.
It says no animals on the train except in a
basket and pay half fare.
But these are snails. They're like,
you know,
bugs. Yeah, right, exactly. They don't mean that they mean
dogs or cats.
Or,
says the conductor, is a snail an animal?
Yes, Sir. So I asked that in the class.
I don't have to say another word.
They're fighting like, man, a snail's an animal.
Well, what about a mosquito?
I mean, really ridiculous. And I can just sneak out,
you see. But that's what we do.
No, we don't do it with snails.
But you supported it. One thing,
we did it with right to keep and bear arms.
OK, how do we do it?
How do we do it?
I say, of course, look to the words.
Now, I was a very
strong dissenter on that because.
And we received a brief from some linguists
and they said they'd looked up bear arms
and there were 120,000 examples between
1760 or 1720 and 1760.
And they all had to do with the militia.
So. But the majority didn't agree with that.
OK, And how and how much does it matter that
guns are so dangerous and such a big problem?
That was the main point.
I said, well, look,
this had a purpose and it wasn't to subject everybody
to the fact that in the United States there are
400 million guns and we're number one in the world.
And Yemen is #2, and
there are a lot of deaths and there are a
lot of injuries.
And just look at them.
They range from policemen killed on duty
to spouses killed during an argument and even at football
games.
It can happen, you know,
people get too excited. And so of course,
that's a very strong reason in trying to keep this
country together that we do something about guns.
And of course they wouldn't have written a set
phrase in here which said you can't.
And anyway, how do you know,
Mr. Majority, you know, I can go on for about
an hour on this time,
but I said we look to history.
That's what Nino said. Nino,
Scalia, we debated this. We were good friends,
but we didn't agree on these things.
And I said, look, you mean I'm supposed to look
back to see what people thought
Hunt centuries ago was a weapon equivalent to a gun?
I said I looked that up in Wikipedia,
just 'cause I knew I was going to discuss this
with you,
Nino, this was outside of court,
I said. But they talk about a skill ladder
and a haldabard and an Asian fire.
He threw it over the ramparts,
I think, to burn everybody up.
Did you know what those were?
I certainly didn't. You think I'm supposed to do things
via history.
I'm not an historian. I'll do my best if I
have to,
but I'm not an historian and you tell me I
can't go and look at the fact
that there are a certain number of
people walking down the street,
children in schools, spouses at home,
policemen trying to keep law and order,
innocent people caught by accident.
There are all kinds of things that happen when you
have too many guns.
So regulation of guns must have been part of the
idea behind this Second Amendment,
though you couldn't forbid them entirely,
which is striking. And you,
you write about this and someone hears this and thinks,
OK, what would this have to do with
row and issues around pregnancy and abortion?
And yet you write about how
you need some realistic or factual bearing for the words
and the understanding at the time.
And so I want to read again from you
discussing originalism, this idea of,
oh, you just start there and you refer to some
of those
complexities you say
if you use just this original approach?
It would limit rights protected under the 14th Amendment,
to quote those contemplated by men who existed at a
time when women were not considered to have a legal
identity separate from their husbands.
End Quote
and that strong dissent to the decision over ruling Roe.
Roe is a term more famous than Dobbs,
but that was the name of this case,
As many of our viewers probably do know,
you and the dissenters, right,
that that decision overturning Rd.
discards a known, workable, predictable standard in favor of something
novel and probably far more complicated.
Explain Explain to us how that connects,
because you're looking at how you interpret that based on
history
and what seems to be
an arguable contradiction For the majority.
They say they're doing something
so original and yet you're arguing that it's actually novel,
complicated, new. It's a new problem they've created.
And and this is a rather deep question
because of
the
principle in Roe.
There are many, many principles,
many, many, many arguments on on our side,
I think were the better arguments of the centers.
But Roe is overturning a case.
Dobbs is overturning Roe, and they are overturning Casey.
And those are cases that been around for 50 years,
30 years. They've been around a long time,
and some people think they work badly,
but other people think they work well.
And giving a woman a choice.
There's a principle in law called starry decisis.
They put them in Latin in order to show
they're the only ones that understand it.
But nonetheless, sorry. Decisis simply means don't overturn cases.
If they've been decided, they're decided even if they're wrong.
Never overturn a case. No.
Sometimes you can, and sometimes it's a very good thing
to overturn 1.
Plessy versus Ferguson was overturned
by Brown versus Board of Education saying goodbye to Jim
Crow.
A very good idea. But be careful how often you
do it,
because if you do it too often,
you will create of law a mess.
People will not know what to follow.
Everybody who has a lawyer will tell that lawyer let's
overrule such and such.
So the principle that you're trying to follow there is
a workable principle.
It's a principle that says keep to the law,
but under certain circumstances, rare perhaps,
but you can't overrule a case.
Now, why do I bring that up in there?
Because the people who like to say,
hey, all you do is read the words.
I read costs. Yeah, read costs.
Will that tell me the answer?
Well, they seem to think it will,
but I don't know how.
All right.
But they say, read the words.
And if you follow our system,
you will read the words.
It will be fair, it will be easy.
It will be simple and it will,
it will stop judges from substituting
what they personally think is good or bad
for the law. So you keep the judges under control.
So I say you've made four promises.
I don't think you can keep any.
I don't think you can keep the simple part
or the clear part. I mean I can give you
50 examples of text cost maybe even one as simple
and that just isn't clear.
So if you think you can be simple and clear
or more simple and clear than Marshall and Holmes and
all those people.
Hey you know right down there.
I'm sorry that you changed the background because I think
it was New York and I have behind you we
still have a little bit of New York do you?
Well, I have, if you think,
if you think that right there,
you know, you can create a simple clear system with
those words that are in our cases.
Yeah, well, I have a bridge to sell you.
It's just on the other side of that big tower
there.
And no, but more than that,
more than that,
you're going to overrule cases,
Mr. Textualist or Mr. Originalist,
You're going to overrule them.
Which ones? Which ones are you going to overrule every
case
that wasn't decided by a textualist or
originalist method? You know what?
That's all of them. We're almost all.
We're all before. Hey, we'll end up with no law.
Oh, you're not going to do that.
Of course you're not going to do that.
You're going to overrule the ones you think are really
wrong.
Stop
the ones you think are really wrong.
The ones you, the judge,
think are really wrong, she doesn't that sound
like what you just accused me of right?
Well, let me jump in because on that point
that's what many people felt was wrong with the decision
overturning Roe which you dissented against
and among other points the the the majority said this
is simple.
They'll overturn it. It'll go back to the states.
It'll be as you say.
As you say, they say,
a simple process from there,
that's not what's happened.
The dissent warned about that.
You said no one should be,
quote, confident. The majority is done with its work.
The right that Roe, in case he recognized,
doesn't stand alone. And you talk about the other rights
linked to it.
You also wrote, quote, women lacking financial resources will suffer
more from today's decision.
An economist who spoke with NPR said in the first
year since that Roe decision was struck down,
100,000 lower income women would now be restricted from getting
an abortion,
whereas people who are wealthier might be able to evade
the restriction through travel and other means.
So is it fair to have something that seems to
discriminate,
among other reasons on wealth?
So you'll pardon my confirmation or potential flattery,
but you and the dissenters
were prescient. You were right.
What do we take from that now
that this isn't resolved? We've seen in our audience is
well aware of the fights that are going on
in some places criminalizing abortion,
in some places criminalizing or preventing IVF,
fertility and other measures. How do you feel being right?
What should we take from this?
No, I don't feel good about being right because I
don't like the result.
And why I wrote this book was not just to
explain the result in that case,
but to say really more than people think,
more than people think. It's not a question of politics.
It's not a question of the judges being politicians.
I would put higher on the list,
higher on the list of reasons they got there.
You know, I can't read another person's mind.
But cases that I think are pretty unfortunate,
of which there are several here,
I think it's a method.
It's a method that they are adopting.
It is a way of thinking about law.
It is an approach to the interpretation of law.
And the best way for me to try to change
that approach,
since I am a lawyer,
since I am a judge,
since it is what I've learned,
is to explain, explain to people who aren't on the
court
or explain to people who are on the court.
Don't you see where you're going?
So far it hasn't been so great,
and maybe it'll even be worse.
It's time to stop, and it's time to go back
to the more traditional methods of looking at consequences,
of looking at purposes, at looking at values.
Where will we be if we do not
keep the values that are here
underlying this document? And they're pretty general
democracy, human rights,
equality,
rule of law, separation of powers
at 7 year old when he stopped fighting about the
snails in the basket Can try learning.
Yeah, I want to ask you a little bit about
your careers arc
and then do, if you will,
what we call a lightning round.
And we have a few little questions at the end.
But I asked about your arc because
whether someone wants to be an actual lawyer,
or they're interested in justice,
or they're just planning out their life,
you've lived a very rich and interesting one here.
Obviously, you've served, I believe,
in all three branches, which is rare.
Many people go into one branch and work their way
up.
You've served at the summit
of the judicial branch, obviously as a Supreme Court Justice.
If we go back to your training as a lawyer,
is there anything looking back now in this decade of
your life,
in your 80s,
that you think was really important,
that trained or seasoned you in ways that you might
not have fully appreciated at the time?
And for people watching, thinking I might like to try
to go up Briar Summit,
I'm. I don't know if I'll make it on the
court,
but I might like to do important things or be
in the room where it happens,
as Hamilton says. And specifically,
I'm curious if now that you're on the court,
whether it mattered that you were a prosecutor,
that you were in the Watergate office,
that you were in the Senate doing legal work,
share with us anything that looking back on it with
the wisdom now that that prepared you or seasoned you.
Then
I tell the students who are thinking of law,
Law's not perfect, it's a career,
but it has two things to offer.
It requires you to have a heart and it requires
you to have a head.
And maybe one of those is missing in some people,
not usually the heart, but but you can do it
and you're there to help somebody else,
not just yourself, OK? And they like that.
And that is a virtue,
not the only virtue. And there are plenty of vices,
but that is a good one.
They like that. But being in the other branches,
did that help you? Of course.
It gave you some knowledge.
It gave you some. I was very lucky in who
I worked for.
Very lucky. And I'd worked for Arthur Goldberg when he
was on the Supreme Court.
I was his law clerk.
I worked for Don Turner when he ran the antitrust
division
of the Justice Department. And I learned a lot,
which helped me in teaching.
Certainly I worked for Archie Cox when he was running
the Watergate.
I was an assistant, a lowly assistant,
too. But I saw in action an honest man.
I mean, Archie Cox is in my mind always the
honest man.
No, no politics with how he investigated president,
he said on television. He said that when he said
I didn't come here to upset a presidential appointment,
I came here to find out what had happened in
the Watergate.
That's what I was appointed to do and that's what
I've tried to do.
And I work for Ted Kennedy,
who is great fun, great fun.
I heard him once up at Hyannis talking to the
staff and he said
my father told him he says
he's here to help get hire people who will help,
Who will they help? They'll help each other,
they'll help me, says Kennedy.
And they'll help people in the country who need some
help
and that's what we're trying to do.
I thought that was pretty good.
And my father gave me one piece of relevant advice.
He said, whatever you do,
whatever you choose,
look, do your best at that job.
Do your best. Take into account what other people think
and do your best. And maybe somebody will notice and
you'll get a better job.
Or maybe they won't. And if they don't,
you will have the satisfaction of having done a good
job.
No, lose. Do the work.
Well. Don't worry about advertising it and networking it.
Yeah, I mean, correct. Let other people see.
Pay attention to other people.
See what they think. Now,
don't just do it, 'cause they think it,
but
pay attention and see how this job can do better.
Given the fact that we're in a country that
and my father, look, somebody might notice that and say,
hey, he's not a bad guy
or woman or whatever you want to be be,
but
do the job and do it as well as you
can.
Yeah, all right. This is what we call a lightning
round.
It's in a word or a sentence or finish this
sentence.
Now you are a man of letters and wisdom,
so maybe you'll go longer than a sentence.
But we've done this with Eric Holder,
Bill Gates. People try to do it in a sentence
because that's kind of the fun part.
The topics will be familiar to you.
The best thing about being a Supreme Court Justice is
doing the job,
I president told me. The applause
disappears very fast and you're left with the job doing
the doing the job,
not the celebration of you through joining.
I like that. The worst thing about being a justice
is
the worst thing is you don't see too many people
too often.
The worst thing is you.
It is a little isolating.
When they start saying you're great,
that's when you have to run.
I don't know how you'll answer this,
but I knew I might end up on the Supreme
Court.
When
when the president appointed me by telephone and said I
want to appoint you to the Supreme Court.
Well, what about that was that was President Clinton's second
appointment?
That's correct. What about the first appointment he had where
he met with you in person and didn't pick you?
Were you thinking I might.
I might get this. No.
Why not? I didn't think.
Yeah. Well, look, if you are honest,
yes. With yourself, at least you should be.
You know when you see the people,
they're considering that that actually I think I'm pretty good,
but I have to admit that they're pretty good too.
And then among that, damn it,
love that my decision, love that we could learn from
that.
I thought it was over when when I was appointed.
You mean I thought it was over.
However you interpret that, No.
I thought, oh, well, I thought it was over when
the president called me the first time and said thank
you for coming,
but I've decided to appoint.
He was very nice. So he does.
I didn't know. He does make a call.
Yeah, he did. You were under consideration.
I'm not picking you. Yeah,
Yeah. But he was very nice.
Short, Very nice short call.
Or you'd talk about things.
Medium, medium, best advice you've gotten.
Best advice you've gotten. Well,
I didn't tell you what.
My father gave us his first advice.
I told you his second.
OK, first stay on the payroll.
Pragmatic.
The book or art, I turn to for inspiration is
the person,
I think all the students.
And now I'm talking to them what they should read
about this country.
Yeah. Education of Henry Adams.
OK, in a word or a sentence.
The Constitution.
Long lasting ideals of Americans that we've been able in
help to help give to the world.
Textualism. Textualism is a nice thought but it won't work.
Pragmatism. Pragmatism is a is a simple
it's it's the what's the word
it's the things underneath it that are important that looking
to purposes,
looking to consequences, looking to values.
Originalism. Originalism is a cousin of textualism that may it
will not work and bore it to be tried too
much.
It would hurt this document.
I have three legal names.
Archie Cox, Archie Cox, Honesty,
Chief Justice Roberts. Chief Justice Roberts trying his best and
a decent person
and Katanji Brown Jackson. Katanji Brown Jackson is my successor
and she's a hard working and intelligent woman who
we will see and she will see
the final three.
Failure to you means to me.
To me means you can't fail.
If you try as hard as you can,
you try your best, you do your best.
Nobody can do better than that.
And you don't let up on the Supreme Court any
more than when you're a doctor.
No doctor says, oh, I've seen this disease 50 times.
I'm not really going to treat this patient as much.
No one says such a thing.
And when you're a judge,
it's the same. You can have a case,
You've seen a fifty time way
to these two people here.
It means a lot and you give your best and
that's what they do.
Excellent. Not just ones who agree with me either.
That's excellent answer. I I sometimes think about that when
we're covering something terrible.
When covering a shooting and however much you feel,
part of you doesn't even want to be do it.
The people watching trying to get information,
it could be their community.
So you have that same stakes,
right?
Success to you means means you did your best.
OK that's a Thurgood Marshall.
I read wanted on his tombstone.
I did my best. Well he did he did pretty
good.
And finally, justice, the final one,
reaching the summit means reaching the summit means you've convinced
enough people that you're actually going to get your,
what you've fought through on on the particular case.
Justice Breyer, thanks for joining me.
Thank you.