Transcripts For CSPAN2 Discussion With Justice Stephen Breyer 20240712

Im delighted to welcome you to the first discussion this fall in our president ial distinguished event series. 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 gw community. This year in a virtual environment we have been able to extend the reach of this against even more. 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 gw experiences to come. Our gw community is fortunate to her directly from the leaders, doers and thinkers who make many of the decisions that affect us each day. With our students, faculty, staff and alumni are not just passive blisters in these events. You are leaving the discussions and actively creating solutions. And youre leveraging this universities teaching to drive positive change in the world. Today on Constitution Day we are honored to host u. S. Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer for conversation with our gw 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 the citizens of the world. Today we will gain new insight into these implications and will get a look inside one of our nations top legal minds. Justice breyer is joint and discussion by our very own gw mujahideen and associate dean alan morrison. I especially want to thank them both for the leadership for gw and for the help in making this event possible. Dean nasr is a a visionary and strategic leader of gw law and she join our community this year. She is a National Recognized lawyer and legal scholar with three decades of industry and academic experience. She has an expert in Health Equity and Public Health policy and she is driven by a passion for Public Service. Associate dean morrison is a learned family associate dean for Public Interest and Public Service at gw law. Law. He is responsible for creating pro bono opportunities for students, bring a wide range of Public Interest programs to gw law and encouraging students to seek positions in the nonprofit and government sectors. I am not pleased to turn our program over to associate dean morrison. Thank you, president leblanc, and its my great privilege and honor to welcome associate Justice Stephen breyer was about to start his 27th term on the Supreme Court. Ill Justice Breyer is often said hes in fact, in the majority in one respect and always, that is the majority of the justices are now former law clerks with Justice Breyer having clerk for justice gober followed by chief Justice Rehnquist and the three most recent appointees of justice kagan, Justice Gorsuch and Justice Kavanaugh all of whom clerked on the Supreme Court. Following his term of the supreme Court Justice breyer work for the antitrust division at theso justice department, was law professor at harvard, assistant Watergate Special prosecutor and chief counsel of the Senate Judiciary committee. From that position heha went on the First Circuit where he served 14 years in addition to a service he was an original member of the trend united stas Sentencing Commission and he became the chief judge of the First Circuit, and that position he was responsible for building the magnificent First Circuit court house boston. That leads me to one of two lesserknown 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 architecture prize often referred to as the nobel prize for architecture. Not surprisingly he is the only panel. On that the second unknown fact about it or lesserknown fact is that he is fluent in french. He lectures, speaks and writes in french. In fact, theg 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 we always have paris 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 normally people think that. It is whole Womans Health against halberstadt. In that case the state of texas impose very stringent requirements on clinics that were used to perform abortion services. Justice concluded that was unconstitutional not to grant constitutionalra doctrine but by methodical dig into the record where he established there were two major flaws. First the series barriers prevented women from actual obtaining their constitutional right to abortion, and second, that the requirement for admitting privileges at hospitals within 30 miles of the clinic were wholly irrelevant to the health of the women. 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 were so glad to have you. But because of the pandemic there p are many constitutional issues being played out in frt of us on the streets, on the Television Come in the news. In many ways constitutionalism is a 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 isis about making democracy wor, and in this Public Health crisis manyes are asking does our democracy work . Cant 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 . On the service part, 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 are not, every race, every religion, and the point of view imaginable, and believe me my mother used to say theres no view so crazy that there is an somebody who does hold in america but there are all different points of view. Every National Origin and then decided to resolve the differences under law. When i talked to some of the students about decisions they dont like, they say david thats too bad, i say turn on the Television Set. Turn on the Television Set and see how people and a few other countries decide their differences. So that document, the constitution, here im just reaching fort 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. 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 students do . Same as everybody. I think the most important thing they can do, and its not so easy, participate. You dont like whats going on . It out there and try to change it. How . You think about it. You convince people to you get allies. And by the way, i usually say to the graduatingra classes, i cant see 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 a library board. They can be on a jury. It can be on a school board. There are thousands of wasted doing it, but do it. And all i can tell you is after working with the document come is a people who wrote this hot, if you do not participate, this wont work. Add i have really come to believe that that is absolutely true. So stop complaining and start convincing, and that the what are you doing about it . So that would be my thoughts about whats the most important thing they could do. I saw yesterday that the Court Announced that thehe octor cases will be heard only by phone as he did last may. How do you think those oral argumentss went . Did the strict rotation help or hurt the process . Did the time limits prevent the justices from asking followup questions . What you think about the whole thing . I think there ispl a plus ana minus. What we do is we cope in order and each have two minutes to ask questions, and then we go back and, if that time is it used up, we go back a whole time and ask some more. What this machine does that we are working on now, and what the internetet does, what all of the do, is 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 that would here is what everybody else is saying and what the answers are and they pay close attention. Now, there is a minus. A minus, and i sometimes think well, its less fun, but its less fun why . You dont necessarily have as much dialogue. You can get the dialogue. I like it very much to listen to what my colleagues are saying is that sometimes there some backandforth 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 on the same wavelength but dont necessarily agree, but they are having a front to conversation about what actually they believe, not justl client. What do you think this will do if we decide this way to Bankruptcy Law . And that lawyer knows more about it than iu do, Bankruptcy Law, and you will get some backandforth. Thats of all the seats of the judges of the same eye level as a lawyers who are speaking to them. Because he wants to get that contact and he wants to get that conversation going. So like most things that are pluses and minuses. I like it but im not sure id like to do it all the time. All your weekly conferences among the justices entirely you have visual like we have here today . No, they are audio. The reason that there are audio is just technical. I mean, the reason really is because with most of these we are told by the technical people that there could be security problems. It is even so much we say, if somebody b decides to be distracted from outside or the hackers or whatever and you dont know what would happen. I think thats what his latest be pretty cautious. Justice breyer, i i would le to ask you about one of my favorite sessions of the constitution, and i keep my constitution very close by, so heres my little copy. Im going to turn to one of my favorites and if im allowed say that, that i have favored. Its my area of scholarly specialty and it is a 14th amendment. I want to t ask you about that r a number of reasons. Todays Constitution Day but i also recalled constitution and citizens day. And i wonder, because you write so often about different parts of the 14th amendment, the due processes 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 is one of the most importantt parts, is that why yu writes often about it . Tell us why this constitutional amendment, the 14th amendment, is so important today. The reason we write about is often is the case is involved very often. When i was in law school come if we go back to that, ernie brown, mark and will and the others, the constitution as it then was probably focus primarily on the commerce clause. It was before, it was just after brown v. Board of education. Its about a decade after not too much had happened yet. The reason i think its so important now, when reason, is it extended the protections of the billl of rights to the states. So the states couldnt take away a free speechke and the states couldnt treat you unfairly and so forth. The other reason, it had a 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 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 you would like o it. You have to follow the law, too. And every onene of us has that protection. And its that very basic legal principles that really is the rule of law. Okay . One, you follow the law. Two, you dont dont like the law, he get together with other people and you get it changed through a democratic process. All that is in that document. And right there, and, of course, from a court point of view, you can go back 2000 years and read what some of the thinkers thought. Some of thosee thinkers said hw do we get people to live together in society . How do we get them to follow the leadership ofsh the government . They could make you through force, but they cant, and courts dont have force. Thats what hamilton said. They dont have the perverse pd they dont have the sword. We cant hand out money. Theres a third way. Convince people that your decisions are fair and just, and then they might respect that leadership, and then they will follow it. As i i say there are ups and downs. I think that probably is the best way. And it may be the only way. And the 14th amendment helps get you right there with those words. Justice breyer, i want ask ask you about that third way and the 14th amendment. It is true, is it not, that even after making the decisions that people should be treated equally and fairly come many did not follow the courts decision. I think of brown v. The board of education, many did not follow and the court was unable to enforce immediately brown v. The board of education. How do we get people, what is that third way, howdo to get people to do the things the court says our c constitutional . Or to not do things that it says arel unconstitutional . Especially when those decisions might be unpopular, when brown was decided it was unpopular. How do we make that third way work . Yes, thats a brown. As i say, i finished college about five orn. Six years after brown. I went to law school two years after that, and you know how much integration there wasmu in the south . Not much. Brown w was 1954. You know what happened in 1955 . 1955 . Nothing. I mean next to t nothing. Lucy try to go to university of alabama and sheas was kicked out the 1956, nothing. In 1950s in 1950s have little rock and thats when a judge in little rock said you better integrate the school, central high school, and nine grade students, black, decided they would bebe the ones who would go to little rock high school, white. And the governor sat in front of that door and he said, no. And he had h the police and he said, you have judges order but i have state police here there was a standoff andnd there was a lot of disagreement and finally the president of the United States, Dwight Eisenhower, at a think this was a great thing that he did, Dwight Eisenhower called in the 101st airborne, the heroes of normandy, the heroes of thehe battle of the bulge. And they flew b to little rock d 1000 of them, they took those children by the hand and walked into the school, but they couldnt stay forever. The governor close the school, closed it, and nobody was educated. But the Supreme Court in cooper versus erin, have students read that one, that is one of my favorite opinions because the Court Unanimously said you go in an integrated school, stop stopping integration, dont do it. Thats when he closed the school. He didnt do it. But it couldnt last. It couldnt last. What did it take . Martin luther king, bus boycotts, the freedom writers, that was the time when the nation woke up. So thats why i tell and the president of the courtto of ghaa a woman whoto is trying to bring civil rights taconic and protection come come she said how, why, the same question yet. 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 belief here and everybody, with 330 Million People and 329 million are not lawyers and not judges. Those of the people you have to convince. Go to the villages, go to the town, go to the citys. They are the ones. By the way, it cant just be the lawyers they cant just be the judges who try to convince it. They have self interest. No. It has to be a movement. It has to be history. It has to you to build a custom and we have custom and it has to be a custom of following a lot of decisions you dont like. Really are wrong. Somebody is wrong if it is 54. Big complicated answer. Comes back to my first answer [inaudible] get out there and convince people you are right and then gradually you build aab habit, a custom which lasts a long time we hope. It is that custom that brings us to 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 and when i grew up. Can ask you with some that have been a number of recent request for emergency belief. This is apart. From death penaly cases which have had for years. Has t the fact that jesses are t in the same building and not beating together had any impact on the decisionmaking process on those emergency requests . Is the court making any special plans for the election which is about 45 days from now to get empty with these emergencies which inevitably you will have before the election and hopefully not after the election. As to Emergency Matters, my first instinct is no, it doesnt really matter we are not physically together. Because with Emergency Matters that make him a bind you to decide them very quickly. Andck so one judge is in chargef each of the circuit, they like the fifth circuit would be justice so and so and all 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 w conference, which means the entire court. And then we will read the memorandum, and there the law clerks and sometimes if its a death case or sometimes if it even isnt, the professional staff of the court will know its coming along and try to get those issues focused here so well read the memo, the courts will talk to each other and if necessary i will get on the phone. And talk to the judge and then we will vote on that emergency measure your but you have to do it quickly, and so its unusual that we grant them. I mean, usually we dont because they it will work the way up in the normal course. There have been more than unusual with his covid, but it dont think its a special procedure. I dont think its the nature of an emergency that makes it difficult. Its not one procedure rather thanre another. What of course we know theres going to be i dont think will do something special. Know if that cases will come to us. We have learned its best, and ive learned over time, deal with the case when it comes up. Dont deal with it on the basis of what isin said in a newspape. Oddly enough, not oddly you say, not odd at all, the briefs and the lawyers, papers and opinions below tell us about the case. Time after time i learned that the case is not the same as was reported in a single article, and i t learned more about it fm those documents. Difficult hearing matter or difficult regular matter, even anan inner matter i would get tt and being appear in kindergarten have to come my law clerks can virtually get anything to it today with fedex. If it is necessary for me to read it in an hour i can get into office with the computer now and and i can get into my e in five minutes. Its as if im at my desk in washington and i just read the document. I did that last night. Dean matthew . Justice breyer, it may turn your attention away from the law for a moment. You gave some intriguing advice on your daily run recently in cambridge. As some peopledg 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 the plate. So i went and did that. I i want to do that right now, a little excerpt and ask you what you want us to take from that . Why is that your suggestion . Pieces at the end, indeed as he hastened to the cries of joy rising from the town, we remember such joy is always in peril. He knew that those jubilant crowds did not know but couldve learnedea some books, that the plague never dies or disappears for good, that it can lie dormant for years and years in furniture, and that by its time in veterans, sellers, trunk and bookshelves and for perhaps the day will come when, for the bane and for theni lightning of them, it would rouse up its wrath again and send them forth to die in a happy city. Why is that so storing an important to you . That speaks to my generation. I mean, this coronavirus, quarantine is not necessarily pleasant. Its a hardship for a lot of people and there are some virtues. I mean, you get more time with her grandchildren. You see its sort of fun to be with them and you learn more about cooking. And if you have several grandchildren and children and their there with you you learn that cooking is a good thing. A little more pesky than you think. And the other things it does give you a little chance to read. That was one particular passage thats always been quite a lot to me. It shows you how times change, and the plague, the plate is a book about the city in algeria dealt with the plague. I always thought, well, its really about the nazis in france, and they were the plague. There is that analogy, but it may not be the whole thing. It may be more really about the plague. Hes telling us several things at the end. One of them is, he says, why did you tell the story . He said, i told the story because wanted to telll people how the people dealt with that plague. Some pretty welcome some terribly. It depended. And he said also want to tell them about what a doctor does. Now, a doctor as a person who else of the people. He doesnt for loss of arise. He doesnt talk about it. He just doesnt. There we are. Good. And also he said, that is the part of what i want tell them aboutth this plague germs becaue it never does die. It goes into remission. What isha that germs to me . Its been that part of human nature which isnt very desirable. You cant get rid of it, and there it is causing trouble. Sometimes minor trouble and sometimes major trouble. And thats what law is thereabout, to try to stop in large part. 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 society and to try to keep that plague germ under control. Yeah, thats right. And that emotionally meant something to me. And maybe having been allies as a small child in one or two, 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 of mine who came from latvia were over in San Francisco because of what was going on over there in europe. Go look at some of those old movies. We just got my grandchildren to see 30 minutes over tokyo will be bombed tokyo because they were at war with us, and the chinese saved them. A quarter of the nine chinese were killed in the effort to save americans. I i mean, the world was differet but it isnt o different in one respect. That plague germs is there. Not sometimes as virulent, not sometimes as awful, but its there. [inaudible] and about the world and thats why that came to mind when asked me about what would i recommend. Were not going to move to the student questions yet. We received more than 600 questions and we read every one of them, and were not going to ask you all of them but we would love to have your 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 not address in turn. Dean matthew, you want to start with the first one, please . Yes, i will. The first question, Justice Breyer,. Young americans are increasingly disillusioned with the constant value of justice. What is something that you are doing yourself as a justice, or personally, to help rebuild confidence in the judicial system . Well,e interestingly enoughi cant really say theres a single thing you can do. I said the main thing, people can participate and, of course, 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 o one of these subjects you are talking about it often falls under the 14th amendment, it has to be comprehensive. And it has tond be understandabe 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. Just is one of the objects. Not every opinion can be just, but if it isnt you better explain why and you better explain what it will do to the law more harm than good. Now, our problem with that at a number of other things is people dont read the opinions. Maybe a few law students do of the professors assigned then, but thats a long way from the 329 Million People who are not lawyers and those who are interested,l which is that everybody, will get theirfo information from the press and comedy and so forth, and they look to say how political important. But thats a problem for us because it isnt as political as they say. Politics, that alone speech of politics is not there. Its not politics. But law is in Computer Science either. What i learned in high school in the 50s and so forth does affect how i look at the world, the United States and the law, to some degree. Thats always true. So differences resolved themselves around these big words and somewhat the law, of course, but not Computer Science and what you bring to them, and that is and will communicate. It isnt because it isnt, whether youre a democrat or republican. It isnt whether youre a conservative or a liberal. That isnt the break again. That the fault line, and its hard to get that across. And the less they comes across, the more people will think that we are Junior League politicians and then they will end up we have started. I say i cant do too much, oddly enough. You, thegh questioner, you the student have to be the one to understand the government. You have to be the ones who will participate, and thats going to be harder for you. If i tell my grandchildren hey, if youoi spent all day on the internet, you are not going to participate very much if youre always playing computer games, okay . So lets get away from all the games all the time. That participation, that understanding of our system, be willing to work with you, compromising, cooperation, big words, but for the fifth grade at grantgr school in san francio they were notnc just big words because weau worked together in small groups and got one great for five people so people that cooperate, okay . So it opens up a lot of questions. I i wish i i had a single answeo its corny, but its what Thurgood Marshall said he hoped would be on his gravestone, those of the words i did my best. Thats all we can do, try. A student [inaudible] your opinion seem logical and [inaudible] in the method of interpreting the constitution but also gives strong focus to the realworld consequences of their decisions. Has or ever been a circumstance or case we found these two values contradict each other . Sure. Lots of them. I mean, there are whole lot principles in law. I mean, what about stare decisis . Whatat about following cases tht were written that might not produce such good results networks you dont follow them 100 00 can sometimes you overrud the case. Where would we be if brown had not overruled plessy . But you do that too often at 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 up there and many of the time i follow the cases that if i were decided in a new i might decide that way. I might think, well, the results are not so good here either. But other principles of law come in a draw me to the conclusion, that it wouldnt be happy with if it were the first time. How decide how much is too much in the circumstances . What a good question. Dont know. I mean, thats what a judge, you know, well, we will never know. Dents in lubbock, texas, and they came away, i think, those students thinking, we liked each other, which we and did. And they think that we disagree, but we agree on a lot of things. And he would say, he would say too much emphasis on consequences, if youre going to have a system where you are the only one who can work, nobody else can understand it and besidesthat , youll just do what you think is good and thatwill be terrible. I dont think i do that. I dont think i do that. He said you may not believe me, anybody who follows your system will end up with that. It will be terrible forlaw and i say if you follow textualism all the time and you just read the text and think you can get everything out of text and history youre going to end up with the constitution nobody will want. Whos right . Neither of us really knows. Thats the truth of the answer. What will happen is what our children and grandchildren will do , what kind of world they will bring about. We answer that and a lot of other questions. Matthew. One of my favorite conversations between you and Justice Scalia is one of my favorite cases to teach which is heller and its about the right way to view the world and the white way to view the law and its playing out for the rest of time that conversation between the two of you but my task is to ask the next student question and boits about criminal Justice Reform. Justice breyer, what is the best way for america to move forward in genuine criminal Justice Reform and how will you felicitate as a justice inthe Supreme Court in that reform . Again, 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 in criminal law or mesome other place, working your own community, work in changing police. T work in training in the courts, work in trying to see that your communities understand what justice is and understand the problems that you cause other people when you dont follow the rules and all of that. Local, statewide. Dont think that the few cases in the Supreme Court or in federal law are going to be the things that will really determinehow you and your children and families and everybody else live decent lives. I sometimes say that one of the problems with something i worked on, the sentencing guidelines. H 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 people in congress raise the sentences and they have mandatory minimum sentences which means no matter what youve got to put somebodyaway for goodness knows how long , not just a lot of years andso forth. Its up to the courts. I see, its up to the courts prosecutors , prosecutors can go to a defendant and say im going to charge you with a higher crime and a higher penalty or do you want to play plea guilty to this one . I say my goodness most of the pleas and federal courts are guilty. 85 percent, 90 percent of the time its just a guilty plea and all the judges doing is deciding what the sentence was and all those people are guilty. Are they . I dont know, i hope so but , im not sure so thats one of the things i sometimes suggest and this brings us back to france is that in france they consider a prosecutor as judge. And you know where he learns how to be a prosecutor . At the Judges School . So why do we send prosecutors to the Judges School so they can be judges if theyre here to decide what the sentence is and whatevers going to happen to edall these people maybe they should get involved in being trained to do that kind of thing. I say that someonetfishy ussicily. And my brother who is 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 you have a few clients who are guilty and he says thats true. How can that be . We have better prosecutors than way back. Its a complicated system and its a far from perfect system and its trite to say that we can work through the system because the justices is where we want to end up on. The courts, we cant do it perfectly but they liked the system they had in england for quite a while where people prosecute some of the time and theydefend some of the time and that way they get both points of view. So i think there are a lot of things that i think its important trying to improve. I have the nextquestion 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 dissent, which one would you pickout . You know, i havent thought of that. Id like to pick ones for different reasons. But i would rather think its a difficultproblem but probably affirmative action , i spent a lot of time. [inaudible] my view is toaffirmative action to a degree is permitted by the 14th amendment. That theres a difference between trying to bring people into society who either through ancestors and so forth were tending to be excludedwhich is what i think affirmative action when it works properly is trying to do. And excluding people from society which was what segregation tried to do and so we have a job which is to try to bring people in and that means people i bought in that opinion isaid good. Local localities, states, governments, let them try something. Thats my favorite thing of franklin roosevelt. Try something. We have aproblem. Try something. If that doesnt work, try Something Else and if that doesnt work will try Something Else again. Give them some leeway that they can try Different Things dealing with problems that we have. Its active participation to. So i thought dont freeze out the possibility of affirmative action to some degree with the Supreme Court opinion that says never which d itis what i thought they were headed for in the majorityand i didnt agree. That was one. Ian matthew. Earlier you were speaking about how little politics has to do with the courts decision. This is about something different, its ideology and i heard you speak about it before so i hope this question gives youan opportunity to tell us the difference between theology and politics. Lothe 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 hafor the court in this area . Its not politics and its not ideology either. Politics, i worked with senator kennedy for a few years and politics was can i get the different members of the senate to our executive committeemeetings. Is this the same for republicans or democrats . . How does it make a senator popular or unpopular or are there Political Considerations e . Whos called do i take first, the secretary of defense or the mayor ofspringfield . Of coursespringfield but nonetheless. Thats politics. Thats not on the court. Ideology is different. Ideology, are you a adam smith Free Enterprise are or are you a marxist maoist troublemaker. 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 pressand so forth and they dont define themselves. How person is brought up, what his background is our all kinds of things. What he thinks the country is like can sometimes have some influence in direction and direction is not political direction. Direction tends 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 totext, of course. Every judge pays attention. They told themselves letsPay Attention to purposes and consequences, of course. But the question is to what degree and whats the importance of certain things. Of text, theres history, theres tradition, theres precedent. Theres values and purposes and consequences. Those are elements or tools judges use to interpret words in the text of the statute or theconstitution. All of those play a role. Some put more weight on the one, some put more weight on the other and a persons individual background does make a difference there y. Not some theory. Hthow you were brought up like every one of the students there, they will have views, very abstract, very generous about the profession that they lived in and how it works. Whats the law about . You have an articulate answer to that. Your life and your decision will reveal or your own answer and maybe toyourself. All thats involved. And if there are more differences henow because untheres extra going around and so forth will that create moreproblems . It might. We dont know. But the court has lots of ups and downs. The courts decide some things that history shows are completely wrong. And it also shows some things where dissent, i rather like this does judge gorsuch said those voices crying in the wilderness were properly ignored. We dont know. But we will do our best. We expect the students todo that. 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 job creation agency. Remember working with other people involves cooperation and compromise and the court is no exception. Its hard to bring about when youre working with law and for judges as a matter of principle but theres room. Theres room. But we will deal with that or try. I wish we had time for many more questions. I want to express our deep thanks to our Justice Breyer and the outstanding students who submit so many thoughtprovoking questions. We will find a way to address more of them in a public setting before too long and were so pleased Justice Breyer that you could n join us. Im a very happy Constitution Day to you all and thanks for coming. Thank you. Sunday on q a author and historian Harold Holzer on his book the president versus the press. Mister holzer talks about president s from fdr to donald trump. When President Trump tweets only in the morning as he does almost daily, the news cycle immediately bends to his latest issue, idea, rant, attack and half of the days news cycle is devoted to rehashing his tweet and analyzing it and in the case of talking heads pushing back against iton some networks. This is nothing short of genius on the part of mister trump. Obama may have created the first twitter president but trump is a president of such mastery of twitter as he ranks i think with fdr and jfk in television. Harold holzer at eastern on cspans q a. President donald trump and joe biden are set to debate tuesday, september 29. Biden supports Cutting Police funding and he has pledged to end the cares bill. Just last week joe proudly accepted the endorsement of the procriminal antipolice portland District Attorney who has a policy of releasing rioters, vandals, criminals and violent extremists without charge. He lied to the american people. He knowingly and willingly lied about the threat it posed to the country for months. He had the information. He knew how dangerous it was at while this deadly disease ripped through our nation he failed to do his job on purpose. It was a lifeanddeath betrayal of the american people. Watch live coverage of the first president ial debate tuesday, september 29 on cspan and watched all of these bands debate coverage either live or ondemand at cspan. Org debates. Find allpresident ial debates from our Video Library and theres also a link to our campaign 20 20 website with campaign videos, candidate information and election results. Go to cspan. Org debates or listen live on the free radio app