Programs to watch out for. Sunday night, criminologist violentatzer tracks the crime in america through the 1960s. We had this demographic bulge after the war when the soldiers came home given the prosperity of the country. We had many people marrying and having children, having families. These children, the baby boomer generation, reached their most comedogenic years in the late 60s and the early 70s. Who y, he argues that while technology sometimes solves troubling social and economic problems, its not the main driver progress. What book tv all weekend every weekend on cspan2. Justice Antonin Scalia has died at the age of 79. Coming up, a q and a interview with Justice Scalia. Thats followed by a 2009. Nterview later, Justice Scalia shares his view on the First Amendment in a discussion that also included Justice Ruth Bader ginsburg. This week on q a our guest is Supreme Court associate justice antonin skull. Is called reading the law. Interpretation of legal texts. Lamb your book reading the law, why now . Why now . Calia because i finished working on it. Brian lamb how important is this book . This is theia first time i really tried to pull together all of the interpretive causes that i consider important, textualism, and regionalism. No use of legislative history. Described the opposing theories of interpretation. And most importantly i have gone through the steps that a textual list has to take. In order to produce a correct reading of the text. Namely the socalled canons of interpretation. Ancient andrgely common sense how language is used. Brian lamb whod you expect to read this. Scalia i hope judges and lawyers and law students will read it. I hope legislators will read it. Important that legislators know how their language will be interpreted by the courts as it is for the courts to know how they ought to interpret the language. Lamb im not a lawyer. Justice scalia the addition to the general public. It would give the general reader world ofinto the judges. About deciding on the meaning of enacted texts. All, most important of what is the true fault line in judges. Judges. Ishing the fall line is not conservative versus liberal. It is rather theories of interpretation which differ. Lamb im going to read long paragraph the road. One final personal note. Thatjudicial author knows there is some and fears they may be many opinions that he has joined or written over the past 30 years that contradict what is written here. Whether because of the demands of starry decisiveness or because wisdom has come late. Worse still, your judicial author does not swear that the opinions he joins her rights in the future will comply with what is written here, whether because of starry decisiveness, because wisdom continues to come late, or because a judge must remain open to persuasion by counsel. Forthe prospect of gotcha past and future inconsistencies holds no fear. Scalia i thought that was pretty clever. Brian it is food for questions. Scalia you said thus and such in your opinion 22 years ago. I did not review all of my opinions to make sure that every one of them comports with the truth set forth here. I did not want to have to do that. For the future any judge has to be open to persuasion. To acknowledge his past ignorance if necessary. Swear that i will follow this. But probably will. Gotchas come wife, from academia. Many in academia. Most of them. Why do they disagree . They prefer theories that augment the power of the judge. And hence the power of the law professor. The theory of interpretation set forth here is a very humbling one. It does not leave a whole lot up thehe policy discretion of judges. In fact it leaves nothing up to the policy discretion of the judge. The name of the game is to give a fair reading of what the peoples representatives have enacted. That is what a judge is supposed to do. To someone who wants to do good. Office to do things that he thinks are good for the society. Zeal one willt not like the approach set forth in this book. Part everyhe earlier lawyer every citizen concerned about how the judiciary can rise above politics should find this book invaluable. You just got accused of being political. Was i accused of being political . I dont read that stuff. Sometimes i speak to groups about judging judges. Judges unlesse you know what they are working with. Like thecause you outcome of an opinion you think thats a good judge. Unless you want your judges to. Gnore the text it is either a regulation or a statute or the constitution. Unless you want them to ignore the text is really unfair to judges to say i like the result therefore thats a good judge. You have to read the opinion. And see the sections of the statute they are dealing with. Trying to reconcile it. And then you can say this guy did a terrible job. Thats an intelligent criticism. My opinions dont always come out the same way. Its not always conservative. Respects i should be the pinup of the criminal defense bar. A number of my opinions have defended the rights of criminal defendants. A lawhough i am socially and order conservatives. To say what it ought to be able to say what the constitution demands. Brian we had a group of teachers here i asked them what they would ask you. They want to know what you would advise teachers to teach the constitution. I ama first of all, appalled that americans get out of high school and college and even getting out of law School Without ever having read the federalist papers. If you want to have the proper we that and indeed a you should have the constitution is to realize how brilliant were the men who put that piece of work together. That shines through in the federalist papers. Im always astounded that i can ask a group of law students how many of you have read the federalist papers. 86 have. You should not be able to get high School Without being exposed to the federalist papers. Brian is it really something you should Read High School . Scalia yes, the whole thing. People read the famous numbers. Only if you read the whole thing to realize what a breadth of knowledge these people had. They were not doing it by the seatofthepants. They had experience in various systems of government in this country and abroad. From that experience they deduced what James Madison the new science of government. No you never tried that before. People are to appreciate that. It had never happened before and will probably never happen again. That a of government will be devised by a seminar. You cant appreciate that unless you seep yourself in the times including reading the federalist papers. List at the beginning you a whole bunch of people that you , we counted 23 of your former clerks. We had a former clerk of use here. I want to run this little thing. We had a very intense argument about some statutory interpretation case. He took me out and said you need to talk to my clerks now. Were all very conservative. They had marked me as a liberal. I was interested in this was the coliseum. The lines were called in. I had to sit there and be beaten up by these conservatives. Came and said i need to talk to you for a minute. Im going to give you the job but you can tell my clerks. I had to go out and not fumble for the next two hours. I hear that six months later the clerks came in and said you need to hire your fourth clerk. And they were outraged that he wouldve hired somebody who was not of the party. Scalia if he says so. It did not make as much of an impression upon me is that upon him. I have had four times 26. Thats a lot of clerks. Brian how often have you hired a clerk doesnt think like you do . Scalia infrequently but not never. I dont care what the policy preferences of the clerk are. In fact, other things being equal i would prefer clerk who has instincts that are the opposite of mine. I find it very hard to find are hardlerks who minded and not wishywashy. Who applies rules of law rather than speculating about what the best result would be. What i do and i dont my clerks doing it. When i have been able the find a , a flint minded liberal as in the law clerk you just saw they have been invaluable. They come at the problem from the opposite social perspective. They are a check upon what a judge joyce has to worry most instead of is applying the law he is really just applying his own wishes. That is bad judging. Brian when i read that line about every citizen being consumed, those of the words of frank easterbrook. His brother is gregg easterbrook. Why is he your forward writer . Scalia we were colleagues on the faculty of the university of chicago in the 80s. He went on to be judge on the seventh Circuit Court of appeals. Forward because there is one other name associated with the two ,rincipal theories in this book textualism and original as him, it is frank easterbrook. If i had to pick somebody to replace me on the Supreme Court it would be frank. We tend to see things the same. We are both applying the same principles of textualism and original as him. Lamb poodle scientists and editorial writers and synnex often depict judges as doing nothing more than writing their preferences into the law. Scalia that is certainly true. To understand always to forgive all. Sell newspapers. Theubt that they read opinion carefully. They have a gut reaction that this is a terrible result. Sometimes its a terrible results because that is the terrible statute congress road. A judge or to be garbage in, garbage out. Dealing with an inane statute you are duty bound to produce an inane results. A lot of those editorials and just kneejerk opposition to the consequence and not a dispassionate intelligent process ofof the interpretation that the judge went through. Lamb one of prior justices Justice Scalia. If a writer did what i just described thed case consisted of this section and it had to be reconciled with this other section he would lose his readership in no time. Surprisedt at all that the newspapers tend to evaluate a case simply on the basis of whether the results seems like a good result. That is all the readers interested in. Lamb we prepared for this interview. Your people at the Publishing House told us theyre all kinds of rules of things we couldnt ask you. Justice scalia you can ask anything you want. I just want answered and wanted. Brian lamb i know you dont want to talk about bush versus gore again. Let me show you a clip from an interview with piers morgan. You answered everything were not supposed to ask you. Piers morgan what has been the most contentious case . Justice scalia the one that created the most waves of disagreement was bush versus gore. Up all the time. My usual response is get over it. Lamb u. N. On to explain further. Justice scalia past cases, you can ask me about that. Brian lamb judges have tenure for life. Why does everybody worry about things they say in public and not having cameras in the room and all that stuff . I am sensitive judges what toe express their views on the law in their opinions. Everything that was said about the opinion in bush versus gore was set forth in the opinion that i joined. Beyond that im just either repeating myself or adding things that really were not the basis for my decision. I dont like drawing the courts into the political maelstrom. By having their opinions repeatedly poured over especially the controversial. Nes i dont think it is the role of the judge to give an account of himself to the people. It is the tradition of commonlaw judges not to reply to press criticism. We get clobbered by the press all the time. I cant tell you how many wonderful letters have written to the washington post. Satisfaction and then they are ripped up and thrown away. You dont send them. That is the tradition of the commonlaw judge. It is because what the judge has to say is in the opinion. Lamb jonas kubik talked about you. Biskupic at the end of there were nine minutes of the court complaining about how the court had gone wrong. Independent counsel statute, romer versus evans. He does have wonder just about every term. They are always vintage and it was interesting. The idea that he would go outside the record and complain obamas order about undocumented immigrants. He did get a lot of very negative press on that. The couple of people even suggested he should step down. I think he will still be doing what he does. Justice scalia shes right about that. There are innumerable cases in newspaperite articles. There is no rule that you cant cite any public materials and opinions. Only cite the record . Matter is settual for decision of course you can only use the matters set forth in the record. That is not the purpose for which i use it at all. We use the Public Records all the time. It had nothing to do with the factual determination. Opinionhould read the to see what my thinking was. Brian lamb were you surprised about the reaction after mentioning president obama . The arizona decision. Each adr on said you were to resign. Justice scalia who . Brent lamm he is a columnist for the washington post. Justice scalia i was surprised. I wouldve thought the purpose for which i used the president statement and did not criticize the president statement. I said it might be right. The only point i made from it was that the attorney general had argued before us that there was no reason the government enforcing immigration laws. Sibley enforcement priorities. He didnt have enough money. To decide who goes first and whatnot. Was that evende if that was true. In my view a sovereign state or thee able to supplement adequate enforcement with its own funds to the want to. And then i had to moreover it has since come to light that the problem is not just inadequacy of enforcement funds. Unwillingness pressure good reasons of the government to enforce the law. For that purpose i cited the president statement. Which seem to be perfectly fair. I did not see the president statement was wrong. I just say with the attorney general had told us. Concerning enforcement priorities. Since he is the Public Record shows. Problem. Ole read hemb im going to was sentenced to have you explain it to the nonlawyers. The teachers will never forgive me. Ists should object to being called a strict constructionists. Whether they know it or not that is an irretrievably pejorative term. Justice scalia people tell me that pejorative is the proper term. Lamb strict constructionism as opposed to fair reading textualism is not a doctrine to be taken seriously. Justice scalia theres an old statute that made it a crime to lay hands on a priest. Does that mean if you shake hands or pattern on the shoulder its a crime . Of course not. The word is used colloquially to mean violent attack upon a priest. Amendment, if you are a strict constructionists you would say that the First Amendment does not prohibit congress from censoring handwritten letters because it only protects freedom of speech and of the press. Is neitheren letter speech nor a product of the press. That is not the understood meaning of the First Amendment. It protects freedom of expression. Those to adjust the most common ones. Brian lamb can you give us a laymans definition of textual list . Scalia a textual ist is someone who believes that the meaning of the statute is to be derived exclusively from the text enacted by congress and signed by the president or else passed over his veto. The text is the sole source that the judge or to be using in making his judgments. Lamb the last part of this book is 13 falsehoods exposed. The first one is the false notion that the spirit of the statute to prevail over its letter. Are you exposing this is your idea or is this what is taught in law school . Scalia it is said in thatSupreme Court opinions the letter of the law is contrary to its spirit and so forth. That is nonsense. The letter of the law is the letter of the law. That is what we are governed by. Not some judicial determination of spirit. Which could be anything. The statement comes up all the time that it is an empowerment and the text says this. That is contrary to the spirit of the law and were going to go ahead and do whatever we like. That is not democratic selfgovernment. If people cant have their representatives write a statute has to be applied as written. Lamb every time you make second. His is the 62n the false notion that words should be strictly construed. Justice scalia you want to construe it reasonably. You dont want to construe it sloppily. What were the ordinary reader of english interpreters this statement to me . Obviously being used in a very technical sense. Lamb one of the justices often in the book is josephs story. He was the youngest justice ever. He had seven children. You have had nine children. Have 28 grandchildren. Now you have 34 grandchildren. Justice scalia 33. If you give me enough time and will come up with all the names. Joseph story back in the 19th century. Why so much of him in the book . Justice scalia is one of the greats. He wrote the first commentary on the constitution of the united states. While he was a justice. He was a professor at harvard law school. A great intellectual. Intellectualsding on the early court. Lamb he also published and taught school. And publish books. Justice scalia. Judges always been part of the intellectual life of this country. Unlike in europe where judges are more like bureaucrats. System arecommon law part of the intellectual discourse. You have the court of appeals level, like Henry Friendly and learned hand. Lamb we had our cameras in front of you and justice breyer. Scalia youre going to see if the good guy one of the bad guy one. That is not true unless you believe that every statute ever written produces a sensible result. [laughter] the ideal role for the honest judge is garbage in, garbage out. You are supposed to interpret the statutes reasonably even if you dont agree with the result. It is not up to do you to decide what is garbage. Youou bear that in mind eitherbe more careful to praise or criticize judges just because you like the outcome of the case. Lamb you have sent colorful things over the years. Justice scalia i do it in my opinion sometimes. To make the opinions more readable. Hich is a good thing especially dissenting opinions. No reason toly read dissenting opinion because they are on the losing side. If you are a lawyer you want to know what role you have to follow. When you write the dissenting opinion, is mainly for the law students. This center will be published in our system even when they disagree with it. They have to produce both sides of the case so they can be vibrant discussion of it in class. I like to make the dissent clear and readable and interesting. Even funny sometimes. Lamb how much of an impact if you