Landmark cases produced in partnership with the National Constitution center. Exploring the human stories and constitutional dramas behind 12 Historic Supreme Court decisions. Mr chief justice. Good evening, welcome to see spencers landmark cases. Tonights case is the New York Times Company Versus the United States, in this 1971 case, the Supreme Court ruled six to three against the knicks this Nixon Administration in a big win for journalism. The decision upheld the New York Times in the Washington Post, which you just saw depicted in this recent movie, the right to project published classified information on the history of the vietnam war over significant objections from the pentagon and the white house. We have to terrific guests at the table tonight, to help us understand how this case unfolded. And what it means for us today in our society. Let me introduce you to flloyd abrams, the bestknown First Amendment lawyer counsel in the New York Times case and he is the attorney in new y
A reflection under gerald ford and nixon under an American Society that said, these people can sit downstairs in the movie theater, they can register to vote, why are a majority of americans can support this. My general view is, affirmative action has been enhanced. Thats what i told the president. And he was pleased to know. That when you lose, what five to four . Eight to one . Seven to one . What it is all said that in the ninth hitting you lost great. Decision all persons having business for the honorable Supreme Court. Landmark cases, see spans special history series, produced in partnership with the National Constitution center, exploring the human stories and constitutional dramas behind 12 Historic Supreme Court decisions. Mr. Chief justice and may it please the Court Welcome to landmark cases. Tonight, affirmative action, in 19 78th a Supreme Court issued the decision in this on what is called the bakke case the ucs affirmative Action Program was declared unconstitutional. The
Earnest miranda number 18 the rule against weight. Quite often, and many of our famous decisions are ones that the court took that were quite unpopular. Let us go through a few places that illustrate very dramatically and visually, what it means to live any society of 310 million different people who helped stick together because they believed in the rule of law. Good evening and welcome to cspans landmark cases. Tonight, the 12th and final in our history series. The 1973 roe v. Wade decision, a decision that has continued to rock american Political Landscape 40 years plus after the decision was made. We will learn more about that in the next 90 minutes. First we will start with the cbs evening news report on the night the decision was announced. Lets watch. Good evening, the landmark ruling the Supreme Court today legalized abortions. The cases from texas and your must set the decision to end the pregnancy during the first three months belongs to the woman and her doctor, not the gove
Historical society this is almost an hour. Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen, on behalf of the trustees of the historical society, welcome to our 42nd annual lecture. Before we do anything else, i will ask everyone to take out their phones and turn them off. Even on silent mode, they will interfere with the sound system here in the court. I am greg joseph, president of the society. Welcome. We are delighted to have you here today. We are honored to have resident emeritus of nyu john sexton, whose topic tonight is Warren Burger, the founder of our society and of immense importance to us. There is no one more qualified than president sexton to deliver this lecture. He was a Warren Burger clerk, but he had a long history before that. President sexton earned his ba in history and in a and phd and religion, and taught religion in brooklyn before he went to harvard law school. He went to harvard law school, graduating 1979 magna cum laude, and was the Supreme Court editor of the harvard la
Host we get to talk about the Supreme Court history for an hour. I want to start by understanding the court today. The way our court is structured and how it has evolved, how does the chief justice in this era wield authority . What tools do they have . Elizabeth the answer to that question is, in this era, as always, the chief justice, first and foremost, is the head and steward of one of our three ranches of government. I think there are some unique spects about that job in the sense that the court is not a political branch. It was deliberately designed not to be. The chief has a difficult job, because, im sure you heard this expression. The chief is chief among equals. They cannot control the other justices. They have the power to cajole, but not control. And there are some Great Stories throughout history that illustrate that very well. Host specifically, does the chief have a role in what cases are heard, and who writes the opinions . Elizabeth those are probably two of the princi