At 7 00 p. M. Eastern on book v. George Washington University law school hosted a conversation with u. S. Supreme Court Justice steven breyer. They discussed the role of the constitution in todays world as well as criminal Justice Reform. Hello and welcome. We launched this series to provide more ways for you to hear from renowned leaders. The individuals who bring illuminating dialogue, insight and inspiration to our g. W. Community. This year, in our virtual environment, weve been able to extend the reach of these events even more. And we hope to host these opportunities often over the coming months. For many in our community, this will be the first of countless only at g. W. Experiences to come. Our g. W. Community is fortunate to hear directly from the leaders, doers and thinkers who make many of the decisions that affect us each day. But our students, faculty, staff and alumni arent just passive listeners in these events. Youre leading the discussions and actively creating solutions. And youre leveraging this universitys teaching and Research Mission to drive positive choing in the world. Today on Constitution Day, were honored to host u. S. Supreme Court Justice steven breyer. For a conversation with our g. W. Community. Our constitution and its interpretation by our justices has farreaching implications. It affects us in big and small ways. As individuals, as citizens of this nation, and as citizens of the world. Today well gain new insight into these implications and well get a look inside one of our nations top legal minds. Justice breyer is joined in discussion by our very own g. W. Associate ana, and dean, allen. I want to this them for their leadership to g. W. And for their help in making this event possible. Dean matthew is a visionary and strategic leader of g. W. Law. And she joined our community this year. She is a nationally recognized lawyer and legal scholar with three decades of industry and academic experience. She is an expert in Health Equity and Public Health policy and shes driven by a passion for Public Service. Associate dean morrison is the learner family associate dean for Public Interest and Public Service at g. W. Law. Hes responsible for creating pro bono opportunities for students, bringing a wide range of Public Interest programs to g. W. Law, and encouraging students to seek positions in the nonprofit and government sectors. I am now pleased to turn our program over to associate dean orrison. Asst. Dean morrison thank you. While Justice Breyer is often in dissent, hes in fact in the majority in one respect and always and that is the majority of the justices are now former law clerks with Justice Breyer having clerked for justice goldberg, followed by chief justice ren quift, and the three most recent appointees, Justice Kagen and justice gorsuch, and justice kavanaugh, all of whom clerked on the Supreme Court. Following his term on the Supreme Court, Justice Breyer worked for the antitrust division of the justice department, he was a law professor at harvard, assistant Watergate Special prosecutor and chief counsel for the Senate Judiciary committee. From that position, he went on First Circuit where he served for 14 years, in addition to his service there he was an original member of the United StatesSentencing Commission and he became the chief judge of the First Circuit and that position, he was responsible for building the magnificent First Circuit courthouse in boston. That leads me to one of two lesser known facts about the justice that are not in his biography. The first of these is that he is one of the Seven Members of the jury for the annual pritsger architecture prize, often referred to as the nobel prize for architecture. Not surprisingly, hes the only lawyer on that panel. The second unknown fact about him or lesser known fact, is that he is fluent in french. He regularly lectures, he speaks and he writes in french. And in fact this summer he was preparing to give a speech in paris all in french, which he had written out. But alas, as was said in casablanca, well always have paris, but just not this year. I want to talk about now my favorite opinion of the justices. This is not a great constitutional opinion in what people think that. Its whole Womens Health against heller stat. In that case, the state of texas imposed very stringent requirements on clinics that were used to perform abortion services. The justice concluded that that was unconstitutional, not through grand constitutional doctrine, but by a methodical diggingthrough the record where he established that there were two major flaws. First, that the serious barriers prevented women from actually obtaining their constitutional right to abortion. And second, that the requirements for admitting privileges at hospitals within 30 miles of the clinic were wholly irrelevant to the health of the women. Justice breyer, had the good sense not to say what many of us who read the opinion thought, that the only reason that texas imposed these requirements was because it didnt want anybody to get abortions and this was the best way they found to do that. Speaking of health, Justice Breyer, all of us want to know, how are you feeling today . Justice breyer absolutely fine. Thank you. Weve been friends for years and years and years. Hes dug up, dean morrison, all of these facts about me. Dean matthews i am interested in health also. May i ask a question about health as well . Justice breyer please, dean. Dean matthews because of the Justice Breyer thank you for inviting me here. Dean matthew were so glad to have you. Because of the pandemic, there are many constitutional issues being played out in front of us on the streets, on the televisions, in the news, and so in many ways constitutionalism is a part of our debate and conversation every day. I want to ask you your view about the constitution and our democracy. One of my favorite of your books is about making democracy work, a judges view. And in this Public Health crisis, many are asking, does our democracy work . Can our democracy work . What must we do to make our democracy work . What is your view about what we must do these days to make our democracy work . Justice breyer well, on the first part, the constitution, one of the privileges, and it is perhaps the biggest privilege of my own job now, is i see in front of me every single day citizens of this country, and some who arent, but every race, every religion, every point of view imaginable, and believe me, my mother used to say, theres no view so crazy that there isnt somebody whodunit hold it in america, but there are all points of view, every national origin, and they have decided to resolve their differences under law. And when i talk to some of the students about decisions they dont like, they say, well, maybe thats too bad. I say, turn on the Television Set. Turn on the Television Set and see how people in other countries decide their differences. So that document, the constitution, here im just reaching for it over here on my desk, you see, there it is, that helps bring these people together in court. And get our differences resolved. So of course this is important. And the courts by the way, just like the document, have had their ups and downs. Its not 100 plus. But on balance, it is a pretty good way to resolve all the differences we might have. And what can the student does . Same as everybody. I think the most important thing they can do, and its not so easy, participate. You dent like whats going on you dont like whats going on, get out there and try to change it. How . You think about it. You convince people. You get allies. And by the way, i usually say, to the graduating classes, i cant tell you what to do with your life. But i hope, i hope that you will spend some time participating in public life. That can be on the library board, it can be on a jury, it can be on a school board. There are thousands of ways of doing it. But do it. And all i can tell you is after working with the document, is the people who wrote this thought, if you do not work. Pate, this wont and i have really come to believe that, thats absolutely true. O stop complaining and start convincing. And thats the what are you doing about it . So that would be my thought about whats the most important thing they can do. Asst. Dean morrison i saw yesterday that the Court Announced that the october cases will be heard only by phone as they did last may. How do you think those oral arguments went . Did the strict rotation help or hurt the process . Did the time limits prevent the justices from asking followup questions . What do you think about that whole thing . Justice breyer i think theres a plus and theres a minus. And what we do is we go in order and we each have two minutes to ask questions. And then we go back and, if that time isnt used up, we go back a whole time and ask some more. And what this machine does that were working on now, and what the internet does, and what all these do, is it makes you listen. You have to listen more closely. I mean, the technical system is fine. But you still have to listen to what the others are saying. And so i thought that was a plus. Because everybody hears what everybody else is saying and what the answers are and they pay close attention. There is a minus. The minus, and i sometimes think, well, its less fun, but its less fun why . You dont necessarily have as much dialogue. You cant get the dialogue. I like it very much, to listen to what my colleagues are saying and then sometimes theres some back and forth among us. And that makes progress. And it really makes progress, as you know, because youre a good trial lawyer, you very occasionally, but sometimes you get a situation where the judge and the lawyer are on the same wave length, they dont necessarily agree, but theyre having a practical conversation about what actually they believe, not just the client, what do you think this will do if we decide this way to Bankruptcy Law . And that lawyer knows more about it than i do, Bankruptcy Law. And youll get some back and forth. Thats why learned ann, who is a great judge, had all the seats of the judges at the same eye level as the lawyers who were speaking to them. Because he wants to get that contact. And he wants to get that conversation going. So, like most things, there are pluses and there are minuses. I like it but im not sure id like to do it all the time. Asst. Dean morrison are your weekly conferences among the justices, are those entirely audio or do you have visual like we have here today . Justice breyer no, theyre audio. The reason that theyre audio is just technical. I mean, the reason that because with most of these were told by the technical people that there can be security problems. And it is even so much what we say, its if somebody decided to be disruptive from the outside, the hackers or whatever. You dont know what would happen. And i think thats whats led s to be pretty cautious. Dean Matthew Justice buyer, i would like to ask you briar, i would like to ask you about one of my favorite sections of the constitution. I keep my constitution very close by like you. Heres my little copy. Im going to turn to one of my favorite, if im allowed to say that, that i have a favorite, its my area of scholarly specialty. Its the 14th amendment. I want to ask you about that for a number of reasons. Todays Constitution Day. But ive heard it also called constitution and citizens day. And wonder, because you write so often about different parts of the 14th amendment, the due process clause, the equal protection clause. You write so often about it that i wonder if you would share with us, thinking back on your time in law school, thinking back on the time that you first encountered the 14th amendment as a constitutional concept, did it strike you as one of the most important parts . Is that why you write so often about it . Tell us why this constitutional amendment, the 14th amendment, is so important today . Justice breyer the reason we write about it often is because the cases involve it often. When i was in law school, if we brown, mark t, and will and the others, the constitution, as it then was, probably focused primarily on the commerce clause. And it was before, it was just after brown vs. Board of education, it was about a decade after, but not too much had happened yet, and the reason i think its so important now, one reason, is it extended the protections of the bill of rights to the states. So the states could couldnt take away your free speech and treat you unfairly and so forth. And the other reason, it has very basic principles. It has basic principles of treating people fairly. It has basic reasons in that due process clause that go all the way back to king john and the magna carta. The great thing about the magna carta, which the barons forced on king john, was it said, due process of law, that means king john, you cannot just put people in prison because youd like to do it. You have to follow the law too. And every one of us has that protection. And its that very basic legal principle that really is the rule of law. One, you follow the law. Two, you dont like the law, you get together with other people and you get it changed. Through a democratic process. All thats in that document. And right there, and of course from a courts point of view, you can go back 2,000 years and read what some of the thinkers thought. Some of those thinkers said, how do we get people to live together in society . How do we get them to follow the leadership of a government . Well, they can make you through force. But really they cant. And courts dont have force. Thats what hamilton said. They dont have the person, they dont have the sword purse, they dont have the sword. We cant hand out money. Theres a third way. Convince people that your decisions are fair. And justice just. And then they might respect that leadership. And then theyll follow it. As i say, there are ups and downs. But i think that probably is the best way. And it may be the only way. And the 14th amendment helps get you right there. Ith those words. Dean matthew i want to ask you about that third way and the 14th amendment. Its true, is it not, that even after making the decision that people should be treated equally and fairly, many did not follow the courts decision. Im thinking of brown v. Board of education. Many did not follow and the court was unable to enforce immediately brown v. Board of education. How do we get people, what is that third way, how do we get people to do the things the court says are constitutional . Or to not do things that it says are unconstitutional . Especially when those decisions might be unpopular. When brown was decided, it was unpopular. How do we make that third way work . Justice breyer yes, thats a good question. I wish i had a good answer. I mean, go back to brown. As i say, i finished college about five or six years after brown. I went to law school a few years after that. And you know how much integration there was in the south . Not much. Brown was 1954. You know what happened in 1955 . Nothing. I mean, next to nothing. Lucy tried to go to the university of alabama and she was kicked out. 1956, nothing. In 1957 was little rock. And thats when a judge down in little rock said, you better integrate this school, central high school, and nine brave students, black, decided they would be the ones who went into little rock high school. White. And the governor sat in front of that door and he said, no. And he had the police. And he said, you have a judges order but i have the state police. And there was a standoff and there was a lot of disagreement. And finally the president of the United States, Dwight Eisenhower, and i think this was a great thing that he did, Dwight Eisenhower called in the 101st ashe air born, the heroes of normandy, the heroes of the battle of the bulge, and they flew to little rock and 1,000 of them, they took those children by the hand and walked into the school, but they couldnt stay forever. And the governor closed the school. Closed it. And nobody was educated. But the Supreme Court in cooper v. Aaron, have the students read that one. That was one of my favorite opinions. Because in cooper v. Aaron, a Court Unanimously says, you go integrate that school, stop stopping integration. Dont do it. And thats when he closed the school. So he didnt do it. But it couldnt last. It couldnt last. So what did it take . Martin luther king, bus boy cotts, the freedom riders, that was the boycott, the freedom riders, that was the period when the nation woke up. Thats why i told, have told, the president of the court of ghana, a woman trying to bring civil rights more to ghana and protection, she said, how, why . The same question you. Had i said, i cant tell you how you build that habit but i do know this. Its not just up to judges and lawyers. Contrary to your popular elief, here, we have 330 Million People and 329 million are not lawyers. And not judges. Those are the people you have to convince. Go to the villages, go to the towns, go to the cities, theyre the ones. And by the way, it cant just be the lawyers, it cant just be the judges who try to convince them. Theyll say, oh, they have a selfinterest. No. It has to be a movement. It has to be history. It has to build a habit. You have to build a custom. And we have that custom. And it has to be a custom of following a lot of decisions you dont like. And really are wrong. I mean, somebodys wrong if its 54. So, big complicated answer, but it comes back to my first answer. [talking simultaneously] get out there and convince people youre right. And then gradually you build a habit. A habit, a custom. Which lasts a long time, we hope. It is that custom that brings to us this day, which is called law day. Which means, a rule of law. Which means, well, we have a chance, a chance at having a Fairer Society than when i grew up. Asst. Dean morrison Justice Breyer, can i ask you a somewhat less lofty question. There have been a number of recent requests for emergency relief at the court. This is apart from the Death Penalty cases which youve had for three years. Has the fact that the justices are not in the same building and not meeting together had any impact on the decision make prague sess on those emergency requests . And is the court making any special plans for the election which is in about 45 days from now, to get a deal with these emergencies, which inevitably youre going to have before the election and hopefully not after the election . Justice breyer as to Emergency Matters, my first instinct is no. It doesnt really matter that were not physically together. Because with Emergency Matters, they come up and you have to decide them very quickly. And so one judge is in charge of each circuit. Say like the fifth circuit would be judge justice so and. So and all the Emergency Matters would go to that judge. And then the judge, if its an important matter, will write a memorandum and ask it to be referred to the whole conference which means the entire court. And then well read the memorandum. And theres a law clerk, and sometimes if its a death case, for example, and sometimes even if it isnt, the professional staff of the court will know whats coming along and try to get those issues focused. And so well read the memo, the clerks will talk to each other and if necessary i will get on the phone. And talk to the judge. And then well vote on that emergency measure. But you have to do it quickly. Nd so its unusual that we grant them. I mean, usually we dont. Because theyll work their way up in the normal course. And its there have been more than unusual with this covid. But i dont think its a special procedure. I dont think that its the nature of an emergency that makes it difficult. And its not one procedure rather than another. Asst. Dean morrison of course we know [talking simultaneously] Justice Breyer i dont think well do something special. We dont know that cases will come to us. Weve learned its best, and ive learned over time, deal with the case when it comes up. Dont deal with it on the basis of whats is said in a newspaper whats said in a newspaper. Oddly enough, not oddly youll say, not odd at all, the briefs and the lawyers, papers and opinion bloss tell us about the case opinions below tell us about the casement and time after time case. And time after time i learned that the case is not the same as was reported in a single article. And i learned more about it rom those documents. [indiscernible] matter or difficult regular matter, even an interim matter. I have enough of that up here in cambridge. My claw clerks can get virtually anything to me in a day with fedex. If its necessary for know read it in an hour, i can get into my office with a computer now and i can get into my office in five minutes and its as if im at my desk in washington. And i just read the document. Just did that last night. Dean matthew if i may turn your attention away from the law for a moment. You gave some intriguing advice on your daily recently in cambridge. Some people asked you about this pandemic, about the coronavirus pandemic. And your suggestion was interesting to me. You said, people should read the last few pages of alberts the plague. So i went and did that. I want to do that right now just as a little excerpt and ask you, what did you want us to take from that . Why is that your suggestion . So, this is a doctor speaking and he said at the end, indeed, as he hastens to the cries of joy rising from the town, we remember that such joy is always in peril. He knew that those jubilant crowds did not know, but could have learned from books, that the plague never dies or disappears for good. That it can lie dormant for years and years in furniture and linen chests and it besides its time in bedrooms, sellers, trunks and book shelves, and that perhaps the day will come when, for the bain and the enlightening of them, it would rouse up its wrath again and send them forth to die in a happy city. Why is that so stirring and mportant to you . Justice breyer thats speaks to my that speaks to my generation. This coronavirus, quarantine is not necessarily [indiscernible] its a hardship for a lot of people. There are some virtues. You get more time with your grandchildren. You see that its sort of fun to be with them. You learn more about cooking. And if you have several grandchildren and children and theyre all up with you, you learn that cooking is a good , a little more pesky than you think. And it does give you a chance to read. That was one particular passage thats always meant quite a lot to me it. Shows you how times change and the plague, the plague is a book about a city in algeria dealt with the plague. I always thought, well, its really about the nazis in france. And they were the plague. And there is that analogy. But it may not be the whole thing it. May be more really about a plague. Hes telling us several things at the end. One of them is he says, why did you tell this story . He said, i told the story because i wanted to tell people how the people dealt with that plague. Some pretty well. Some terribly. It depended. And he said, i also want to tell them about what a doctor does. Now, a doctor is a person who helps other people. He doesnt floss fies, he doesnt theorize. He doesnt talk about it. He just does it. There we are. Good. Hes a help. And also, he said, and that is the final one, i want to tell them about this plague germ because it never does die. It goes into remission. And what is that germ in to me its been that part of human nature which isnt very desirable. And you cant get rid of it. And there it is. Causing trouble. Sometimes minor trouble. And sometimes major trouble. And thats what law is there about. To try to stop in large part, a rule of law is one, not the only one, but it is one of the weapons that human beings have in order to live together in ociety and to try to keep that plague germ under control. Yeah. Thats right. And that emotionally meant something to me. And maybe its having been alive as a small child in world war ii. I remember those blackout curtains coming down. In San Francisco. Alan was in the navy afterwards. But we can have a little memory of that. I remember my relatives who came from latvia who were over in San Francisco because of what was going over there in europe. Look at some of those old movies. We just got my grandchildren to see 30 minutes over tokyo. Where we bombed tokyo because they were at war with us, and the chinese saved those they saved them. And a quarter of a million chinese were killed in the effort to save americans. I mean, the world was different, but it isnt different in one respect. That plague germ is there. That sometimes is virulent not sometimes as virulent. Not sometimes as awful. But its there. And you see all [indiscernible] personally, and about the world and thats why that came to mind, when he asked me. About what i recommend. Talking simultaneously] asst. Dean morrison were not going to move to the student questions. We received more than 600 questions. We read every one of them. And were not going to ask you all of them. But we would love to have you answer all of them, but time compels us to do our next best and to put a few before you. Which dean matthew and i will now address in turn. Dean matthew, do you want to start with the first one, please . Dean matthew yes, i will. The first question, Justice Breyer, Young Americans are increasingly disillusioned with the constant value of justice. What alone justice for the judicial system . What is something that you are doing yourself as a justice, or personally, to help rebuild confidence in the judicial system . Justice breyer well, interestingly enough, i dont cant really say theres a single thing you can do. I said the main thing. People can participate. And of course my job does help me participate, in the life of government and democracy. But i think, and this is an unanswered question, i think when you write an opinion, it has to be, particularly if its on one of these subjects you were talking about that often falls under the 14th amendment, it has to be comprehensible. And it has to be understandable to people. Who are not lawyers and who are not judges. I dont always succeed at that. But you have to try. And you have to try to show why. Its either in a mainstream, or in a stream of law that has to do with justice eventually. You dont necessarily use those words. But law is an objective. Justice is an objective of law. Justice is one of the objects. Not every opinion can be just. But if it isnt, you better explain why. And you better explain why it will do to the law more harm than good. Now, our problem with that and a number of other things is people dont read the opinions. I mean, maybe a few law student does and the professors assign them. But thats a long way from the 329 Million People who arent lawyers, and thats who are interested, which is not everybody, will get their information from the press and commentators and so forth and they love to say how political [indiscernible] but thats a problem for us. Because it isnt as political as they say. Politics, thats a lone speech. But politics is not there. Its not politics. But law isnt Computer Science either. What i learned in high school does affect how i look at the world, the United States and the law. To some degree. Thats always true. O differences resolve. The law, of course, but not Computer Science and what you bring to them and that isnt well communicated. It isnt because it isnt, whether youre a democrat or a republican. It isnt whether you are a conservative or a liberal. That isnt the breakdown. That isnt the fault line. And its hard to get that across. And the less it comes across, the more people will think that were Junior League politicians. And then theyll end up with it started. I say, i cant do too much oddly enough. You, the questioner, you the student have to be the ones who understand the government. You have to be the ones who will participate. And thats going to be harder for you. Ify tell my grandchildren, hey, if you spend all day on the internet, youre not going to participate very much if youre always playing computer games. Ok . So lets get away from all the games all the time. That participation, that understanding of our system, that working, compromising, cooperation, big words, but for the fifth grade at grant school in San Francisco, they werent just big words because we worked together in small groups and got one grade for five people so, people had to cooperate. Ok . So it opens up a lot of questions. I wish i had a single answer. So its corny. But its what Thurgood Marshall said he hoped would be on his grave stone. And those are the words i did my best. Thats all we can do. Try. Asst. Dean morrison a student [indiscernible] your opinions seem logical and [indiscernible] in the method of interpreting the constitution but also give strong focus to the real world consequences of your decisions. Has there ever been a circumstance or case where you found that these two values contradicted each other . Justice breyer sure. Lots of them. I mean, there are a whole lot of principles in law. I mean, what about stair desigh sis . What about following cases that were written that might not produce such good results now . You dont follow them 100 . Sometimes you overrule a case. Where would we be if brown had not overruled plessy . But you do that too often and the law loses its stability. People cant rely on it. They dont know what advice to give to their clients and lawyers. And pretty soon you have a real mess as people try to plan for the future and they cant. So, there are balances there and many of the time i follow the cases that if [indiscernible] i might not decide that way. I might think, well, the results arent so good here either. But, other principles of law come in and drive me to that conclusion, that i wouldnt be happy with if it were the first time. Asst. Dean morrison how do you decide how much is too much in those circumstances . Justice breyer what a good question. Dont know. I mean, thats why a judge, you know well never know. Neither scalia nor i used to debate this and we had a great discussion in front of i think 2,000 students in lubbock, texas, and they came away, i think, those students thinking, we liked each other, which we do. And did. And they think that we disagree, but we agree on a lot of things. And he would say, too much emphasis on consequences and purposes and so forth, you know, youre going to have a system that you were the only one who can work. Nobody else can understand it. And besides that, youll just do what you think is good. And that will be terrible for law. Well, i dont think i do that. I dont think i do that. He says, you may not, but believe me, anybody who follows your system, theyll end up with that. That will be terrible for law. And i say, well, if you follow textualism all the time, and you just read the text and think you can get everything out of text and history, ill tell you, youre going end to up with a constitution nobody will want. Who is right . Neither of us really knows. Thats the truthful answer. Its history. Its what will happen, what our children and grandchildren will do. Its what kind of world they will bring about that will answer that and a lot of other questions. Dean matthew one of my favorite conversations between you and Justice Scalia is one , my favorite cases to teach the District Of Columbia v. Heller. Where you had a conversation like the one you described, the right way to view the world and the right way to view the law is. Its playing out for the rest of time, to be honest, Justice Breyer, that conversation between the two of you. But my ill ask next student question. Its about criminal Justice Reform. This student wants to know, what is the best way for america to move forward in genuine criminal Justice Reform and how will you participate as a justice of the Supreme Court in that reform . Justice breyer again, remember, were interpreting federal law and the constitution. And thats a small part of the legal system of the United States. So you want to make a difference, criminal law or some other place, work in your own community. Work in training police. Work in training and getting things through courts. Work in trying to see that there are communities that understand what justice is and understand the problems that you cause other people when you dont follow the rules. And i mean, all of that, local, statewide, dont think that the few cases that are in the Supreme Court or in federal law are going to be the things that will really determine how you and your children and your families and everybody else live deebt lives decent lives. I sometimes say that one of the problems with something i worked on, the sentencing guidelines. Well, one of the problems, quite honestly, in my opinion, is those guidelines are too strict. I know thats not a popular thing to say. But what happens is they have very high sentences and then congress got busy and raised the sentences and they had something called mandatory minimum sentences, which means no matter what, you have to put somebody away for, goodness knows how how long. Who is it up to . Well, its up to the courts. Oh, i see. Its up to the courts. Well, prosecutors. Prosecutors can go to a defendant and say, im going to charge you with a higher crime, with a higher penalty, or do you want to plead guilty to this one . My goodness, most of the pleas in federal court and state courts too are guilty. 90 , 95 , 85 of the time, its just a guilty plea. And all the judge is doing is deciding what the sentence was. All those people are guilty. Oh, are they . I dont know. I hope so. But im not sure. So, one of the things i sometimes suggest, and this brings us back to france, is that, hey, in france they consider a prosecutor a judge. Hes called a [speaking foreign language] and you know where he learns how to be a prosecutor . At a judges school. So why dont we send the people to the judges schools so they can be judges . If theyre going decide what the sentence is and whatevers going to happen to all these people, maybe they should get involved in being trained to do that kind of thing. I say that somewhat facetiously but not entirely. My brother, who was a prosecutor for many years, said, well, we only prosecute people who are guilty. I said, but now youre a defense lawyer and you told me that you have a few clients who arent guilty. And he said, thats true. I said, how can that be . We have better prosecutors then we had better prosecutors then. Way back. You think . So its a complicated system and its a far from perfect system. And its right to to say, but we can work on the system. Because the justices justice is where we want to end up on. And the courts cant do it perfectly. I rather like the system they had in england for quite a while. I think they do. Where people prosecute some of the time and they defend some of the time. And that way they get both points of view. So i think there are a lot of things that i mentioned a few, that i think its an important job trying to improve. Asst. Dean morrison i have the next question. And this one may be a tough one for you. If your career on the court were to be judged by the public, not law professors, by one opinion, including dissents, which one would you pick out . Justice breyer i havent thought of that. I like different ones for different reasons. An, i would rather probably affirmative action. I was a dissent in that but i spent a lot of time. I wrote a dissent that said [indiscernible] yeah, yeah. [talking simultaneously] yeah. Yeah. [talking simultaneously] my view is affirmative action. To a degree. Is permitted by the 14th amendment. That theres a difference between trying to bring people into society who either through saventers and so forth were tending to be an set ofers and so forth were tending to ancestors and so forth were tended to be excluded, which i think is what its trying to do, and excluding people from society which is what segregation tried to do. And so we have a job which is to try to bring people in and that means people i thought in that opinion, i said, good, local localities, states, the fed, governments those who arent in government, let them try something. Thats my favorite saying of franklin roosevelt. Try something. We have a problem. Try something. If that doesnt work, try Something Else. And if that doesnt work, well try Something Else again. So give them some leeway so they can try Different Things in dealing with problems that we have. Back to participation too. So i thought, dont freeze out the possibility of affirmative action to some degree with a Supreme Court opinion that says never. Which is what i thought they were headed for in the majority and i didnt agree with that. That was one. Dean matthew Justice Breyer, earlier you were speaking about how little politics has to do with the courts decision. This student asks about something a little different. Its ideology. And ive heard you speak about it before. So i hope this question gives you an opportunity to tell us the difference between ideology and politics. The question were asked, the Ideological Division among the supreme Court Justices creates significant uncertainty for the american people. Especially for decisions regarding civil rights. Do you think there is a solution to this . And if so, whats your vision for the court . In this area . Justice breyer its not politics and its not ideology either. I mean, politics. I worked with senator kennedy for a few years. Politics was, can i get the different members of the senate to our executive Committee Meetings . Is this favor to be republicans or to democrats . How does this make is it popular or unpopular . All those are political considerations. Whose call do i take first . The call from the secretary of defense or the call from the mayor of spring sneeled of course springfield. But nonetheless, thats politics. Where are the votes . No. Thats not on the court. Ideology is different. Deology, are you an adam smith he free enterpriser or are you a marxist maoist troublemaker . I mean, you know, if im deciding something by ideology, i know im doing the wrong thing. I cant say that it never has an influence. But not often and it shouldnt. Then what does . What does is these are big words in the constitution, liberty, freedom of press and so forth. And they dont define them [indiscernible] and how a person is brought up, what his background is, all kinds of things, what he thinks the countrys like, can sometimes have some influence in direction and direction is not political direction, direction tendses to be do you put more weight on text . Do you put more weight on purposes or values underlying those provisions of the constitution . And do you look at consequences in light of those values . Do i Pay Attention to text . Of course. Every judge pays attention to text. Do others Pay Attention to purposes and consequences . Of course. But the question is, to what degree . And whats the importance of the Different Things . Theres text, theres history, theres tradition. Theres precedent. Theres values and purposes and there are consequences. Those are elements or tools that judges use to interpret words in the text of the statute or constitution. All of those play a role. So put more weight on the one. So put more weight on the other. And a persons individual background does make a difference there. Its not some theory. Its how you were brought up in part and what your career is like and every one of the students out there, by the time hes 40 or 50 years old, will have views. Very abstract. Very general. About the profession that theyve lived in and how it works. Whats the law about . Your life and your decisions will reveal your own answer. Maybe to yourself too. All thats involved. All thats involved. And if there are more differences now because theres textualism going around and so forth, will that create more problems . It might. It might. We dont know. But the courts have lots of ups and downs. The courts decided some things that history shows are completely wrong. And it also shows some things where defense, and i rather like this, because judge gork said that once. He said, history sometimes shows that those dissents, though voices crying in the wilderness, were properly ignored. We dont know. But well do our best and thats what we expect the students to do. Thats what we think the lawyers will do. Try to get together. Try to compromise. Remember, those joint projects. Remember working on the school board with other people. Remember working on the Library Committee of something or other. Remember working on some Jobs Creation agency. Remember working with other people involves cooperation and compromise. And the court is no exception. Its hard to bring about where youre working with law because law for judges is a matter of principle. But theres room. Theres room. So. Well deal with that. Or try. Asst. Dean morrison i wish we had time for many more question bus we do not. So i want to express our deep thanks to our honored guest, Justice Breyer, and the outstanding students who submitted so many timely and thought provoking questions. Dean matthew and i are going to try to find a way to address more of them in a public setting before too long. And were so pleased, Justice Breyer, that you could join us. Only a g. W. Experience. Very happy Constitution Day to you all. Thanks for coming. Justice breyer thank you. Thank you. [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] [captions Copyright National able satellite corp. 2020] this statue of Young Eisenhower as a boy looking in the direction of two of his greatest accomplishments. President of the United States. And Supreme Commander of the allied expeditionary forces. Today at 7 00 p. M. Eastern on cspan2, watch live coverage of the dedication ceremony for the new dwight d. Eisenhower memorial in washington, d. C. Just off the National Mall and at the base of capitol hill. Speakers include memorial designer, former secretary of state, Memorial Commission chair, and president eisenhowers grandchildren. The dedication of the new dwight d. Eisenhower memorial, live at 7 00 p. M. Eastern on cspan2, online at cspan. Org, or listen live on the cspan radio app. P