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working as clerks for thurgood marshall. they discuss his personal, his skill as a story teller and his impact on their careers. the supreme court historical society hosted this event in the supreme court chamber. it's just over an hour. >> i'm john ginsburg. i will introduce our panel for this evening in this look back at justice thurgood marshall. to my immediate left if you have not guessed it is justice ellena kagan. justice kagan was with justice marshall what year? >> '87. >> it comes like yesterday. >> 1987. >> that was after having attended princeton, and then oxford, and then harvard for law. and served in judge mikva's

claims as a law clerk. all of our panelists this evening clerked for one judge or another on the d.c. circuit. as did i. >> it's a good court. >> it was a great court. and was this the white house counsel's office in the clinton administration, and the policy council as deputy director. couldn't keep a job, apparently. taught at the university of chicago law school. and then after getting tenure there, moved on. and settled at harvard. not very long after that became the dean of harvard law school. then couldn't keep that job either and then became slitter general first, and associate justice of the supreme court. judge paul engle myer went to

harvard. and harvard for law school as he will about. clerked for judge wald on the d.c. circuit and was in the solicitor's office when drew days was slitter general. then was in private practice before going on the bench. and professional randall kennedy n the it'll middle, to my left who was a rhodes scholar a graduate of the yale law school, clerked for judge scully wright on the d.c. circuit. joined the faculty in 1984 and has been a protective prolific author of books. most of his colleagues are writing law review articles. he is writing books.

and a member of the american act me of arts and sciences and the american philosophical association. we have an array of three marshall clerks -- four with myself, i was there as well in '74 to '75, four d.c. circuit clerks, and all of us, like virtually all of our other alumni of justice marshall's chambers we were affected in our careers and in our lives of the experience having been in his chambers and in close contact with him for a year. we are going to reminisce a little bit if that's okay. i am not sure there will be more to it than that for you. but the hope is that that is of some interest. so i am going to start with you

ellena unless you want to pass. you didn't let people pass in class, did you? >> no, never. >> all right. so why don't you tell us about how the clerkship affected your career. >> you are starting with the big one. how it affected my career. you know, i think clerking on this court affects everybody's career who does it. i mean, it's probably more than is justified. it's, you know, something that does -- you put this on your resume, and a lot of times doors open. sometimes justifiably so, and sometimes not. but i think you know, what's much more important to me is just how the experience of clerking for justice marshall affected who i was and what i thought was important in the

world. he was -- you couldn't survive a year in his chambers without realizing that there were things that you knew nothing about. and it was -- it was, an eye-opening experience in many respects other than just learning about the law. and it gave you an appreciation for people who had fought for justice all their lives. and the importance of their work. especially his work. and it made you think about what you were doing and why you were doing it. and not that -- you know, one could never hope to have a career that was so much justice-seeking as his was.

but i think the -- his voice in my head never went away in terms of trying to figure out what i was doing, and why. >> so you still hear the call, knuckle head? >> knuckle head was on a bad day. shorty was on a good day. >> knuckle head you had to share with everyone else. shorty was maybe just yours. paul, do you have something on the same question about the arc of your career? >> much of what ellena said -- everything she said, i agree with. from my perspective, if you came to the clerkship thinking about doing public service and you spent year with the greatest legal public servant of the 20th century it could only reinforce that impulse. that was certainly the case for me in all the ways that ellena

described. i was delighted that he was enthusiast particular that i wanted to be on -- an u.s. attorney. from my point of view, hearing his stories about trial courts lit a fire under me to be a trial lawyer and engage with the craft of being in courtroom. it reminded me of how important it was to know the facts and to know the record. one of the lessons you will learn from justice marshall is as important as the law is facts are probably in most cases much more important and listening to the way he recounted the cases in his career and how decisive evidence and witnesses had been really taught you as a lawyer that the craft involved in

getting one with the evidence. as a judge, i think about him almost every day, and i think about him in this context. i think about the defendants in my courtroom. i think about the family members who are there for sentencing or pleas in particular and that this may be the only day for these people in which they are ever in a courtroom. one of the things you learn from justice marshall is you want to make sure there is a decency and honor and dignity that attends the way that a judge comports himself in court so that for the people who are in a federal court only way day in their lives they feel treated fairly. that's something i learned from him and i have taken with me. and i have got his pictures up in my chambers on the steps of the court in 1954. i walk in every day and it reminds me that we are in the

justice business. >> i have a lithograph of him as well in my office. something i am pleased to have that i acquired not long after leaving chambers. randy? >> well, it was a great pleasure working for justice marshall. and it's made a big impact -- working for him as made a big impact on my career. i didn't know at the time i was going to be a legal academic. i turned out to be a legal academic. and one of the subjects that i write approximate is race relations law. what would have been better preparation than working for justice marshall known before he got on the bench as mr. civil rights? and over the course of the year, one of the great benefits of working for him was he knew, it seemed, everyone. he had many stories. and he was very generous with

his time and very generous with his recollections. and i would just ask him lots of questions. and it turns out that much of what he shared with me became of use in my professional life as an academic and is still very much of use. >> i see you have been joined by mrs. marshall. welcome. elena, i will come back to you, if i may. tell us about a memorable opinion by justice. and whether you worked on it. >> i will give you two, actually. one will not be surprising and one may be more surprising to folks. and both were the year that i clerked for justice marshall. we used to call him judge, we used to call him t.m.

we actually never called him justice marshall. here's the one that maybe won't be so surprising. this was one that really brought on the knuckle head appalachian. it was a case cotter mass. it was about a white 10-year-old, 12-year-old girl in kurl -- rural kansas i believe she lived more than 15 miles away from the nearest school. there was a bus service, but they made you pay. and they weren't give a waiver even for indigent students. so the result was that this girl didn't get to school. there was a challenge brought to you fee schedule, you know, to the idea of a state charging fees for the school bus, which was absolutely necessary for her to get to school.

it was a constitutional challenge brought under the equal protection clause. and we walked into his office and i laid out, you know, the arguments, and i said to him, you know, judge, i just think that it's going to be hard for -- i think her name was sarita cotter mass to win. he looked at me and said why? i said, well, indigentsy is not a suspect class. education is not a fundamental right. so that means ration on basis supplies, and the state has a ration on basis here. and he looked at me as though i must have lost my mind. you know, because, you know, his basic idea of what he was there to do was sort of to ensure that, you know, people like sarita got to school every modern. and as long as he was going to be on this court, he was going

to vote to make that happen. we dissented in that case. the justice dissented. it was i think a 6-3 or a 7-2 opinion. most of the court decided the court just as i basically laid it out to him. and just marshall wrote a dissent. and the reason i say i was called knuckle head quite a lot with this case is because of all the cases that i worked on, it was the mean he was most passionate about. you know, the idea of i think what -- what moved him more than anything was trying to get rid of these entrenched inequalities in american life. this one didn't involve race, but it was all the same to him. and i would bring in a draft of a dissent, and he would say stronger. and i would bring in another. and he would say stronger. i would bring in -- it went on

for that quite a while until he felt like i got the right level of passion and disgust in this dissenting opinion. and obviously he communicated some of his own. you know, he took out his blue pencil and marked it up quite a lot. so that was one. and that's the one that i think won't surprise you. but the one that i think will surprise you was also that term. it was a case called torres. and it was a group of hispanic employees had brought an employment discrimination suit. and they had lost. and they filed an appeal. and the secretary to the lawyer handling the appeal left out one of their names on the notice of appeal that went up to the court. and the question was whether leaving out that name was going mean that the court had no jurisdiction to hear the appeal of this one employee of the

group. the case came to us. and all the clerks thought this was an easy case, the answer should be, it's just a secretarial mishap and you are going to deprive this man of his claim? what a crazy thing. and in fact, justice brennan thought it was that crazy. and justice brennan dissented from that case. but justice marshall ended up writing the opinion for court in that case saying that yes, in fact, the court did -- that this leaving out the name made all the difference and the court didn't have jurisdiction to take the appeal. this is what he said to us. he said, i spent my whole life litigating cases and you can't expect anybody to bend the rules for you. the only thing you can expect is that they apply the rule straight. and, indeed, indeed people -- people who litigated like i

litigated, their salvation was this the rules. i mean, if he had a chance for success, it was because of the rules, and because people decided to take those rules seriously. so that this -- the rule of law, and playing by the rules was, to him, one of the most important principles in the justice system. and sometimes it worked against you when they put in the wrong name. but in the end, especially for people who were disliked who were disadvantaged, they needed the rules, so you better make sure that you have created a system where the rules are there. i don't think he convinced a single one of us, honestly, but it was -- it was a powerful lesson for me, actually, as much or more so as listening to him

talk about sarita casser mass and the bus and the importance of education and the importance of erat kating inequality. this too was a powerful lesson about the importance of rules and of law in our society, and even when sometimes it doesn't cut your way. >> do you want to comment

. . . . prosecutor's work of preemptry challenges was immune from question saying they had been based on race and the court said, well, preemptory challenge is just immune from question. if prosecutor something using preemptory challenge for trial reason, any reason whatever so ever, that's okay. well, two things about batson versus kentucky, first of all, it was triggered by the justice's use of descent of denial from sociauri, but the

judge issued descent after descent to alert the bar there were couple justices, him particular, into the issue and secondly to try to educate and persuade his colleagues and over the course of year he succeed in persuading other justices to come along with him and he triggered a reassessment of sweeney versus alabama and the course agreed to reverse swain versus alabama but then the justice wasn't satisfied with that and wrote a concurring within which he said i agree with the court but court isn't

going far enough, it should get rid of preemptory challenges all together, it's that pushing of the envelope that brings a smile to my face and makes me think that's the justice through the marshall that i revere. since you mentioned two sorts of opinions, i'll mention one other. it's not just one opinion, it's a series. so, justice marshall came to the conclusion that capital punishment is in all circumstances in violation of constitutional standards so he descented in all capital punishment cases in which somebody was sentenced to death. and that stand too is a stand that makes me salute him. >> let ask you to elaborate about that because justice

marshall and justice brennan reiterated that as you said in every case that came along. as opposed to senator view that want once something is settled you dissented or reiterated the dissent once that's it. do you think this is because it was justice marshall, because it was capitol punishment or philosophical juris prudence. >> i think it was because justice marshall was a pruden the person with a long career and represented people who faced capitol punishment and represented people who were executed where they ought not to have been executed. he's a person who represented people who were put to death though in fact they were

factually incentury. -- factually innocent. that had something to do with the fehr vent passion he saw this particular issue. there were several issues he was deeply impassioned but none more so than the question of the government taking someone's life. >> i think it also reflects a deeper view that he had, after all he, was the lawyer that got plessy reversed in brown and he would say to us this is a living constitution and when it matters we ought to not feel impeded from reassessing, if you look at the speech on the bi centennial of the constitution he said the glory of the constitution is its amendability, it was refreshed in 1868, it took long a time but that eventually the court got it

right. so absolutely capitol punishment based on his own experience as a criminal defense lawyer is something he cared deeply about but there's also philosophical view what he regarded as a wrong decision. >> i'm not sure everyone's fully away that the justice spent by far the better part -- larger part of his career trying criminal cases, defending rape and murder he charges time after time in very unsafe venues for him. >> i remember once he said to us, he said, well, when a jury brought back descendants from life in imprisonment that's when he absolutely the guy was innocent. [ laughter ]

>> yeah, he told a lot of stories in his life. not sure it was true when you were working with him but his practice when i was with bill bryce and karen hasting williams was to come back from lunch and sit in the nothing -- nogah yrks de easy chair and just start talking and telling stories, there was some repetition but he had a huge repertoire. there was a lot. and those stories were unforgettable, was he doing that when you were there. >> he did. he didn't so much come into the clerk's office but we'd go into his office when we would talk

about what was on the court schedule many more than are now on the court schedule about 140. >> 160 when i was there. >> okay. and we'd talk about the cases and at some point we'd be finished and he would segue into what was sort of story time in justice marshall's chambers. and it was quite the most unforgettable experience. my one regret of the year was that not one of us was smart enough to write them all down. because i'm sure i've forgotten 95% of them. and i'll tell you, doug, i don't think he ever repeated one. or at least -- you know -- it was remarkable how many stories he had and how he kind of remembered which he had been through before. but a lot of them i couldn't begin to capture, a lot of it, i

mean, he was the really the greatest storyteller i've ever come across. and, you know, it was a real kind of make you laugh, make you weep because a lot of the stories he told were pretty rough, pretty hard, they were stories about his boy hood about what it was like to crisscross the jim crow south as a trial lawyer often fearing you physical danger from mobs, from the police. they were terrible stories a lot of them. he also was a great comic story teller and great comic generally. he was so darn funny in his

facial expression and intonation and sometimes you would be laughing going why am i laughing, this is a horrible story. but it's an unforgettable experience, both the content of the stories he had to tell and just listening to a master story teller tell them. >> i will expand on that, the stuff that sticked in my mind is the physical courage of being a criminal defense attorney in mississippi, alabama, western florida, and the physical risk he took. he told the story about almost getting lynched once himself. told the story about clients who were lynched and talked about being tuck in the backseat of a

supporter's car and drive in the middle of the night to another home just to say safe. all the while he's telling jokes about this. i remember one time he said how can you tell there's an easy way to tell if the question has been coerced, ask the question, how big was the cop. he tells the story joke being a member of the legal team about who will if you haven't read "devil in the grove" is what captures what it is to have these "to kill a mockingbird" moment as a defense

attorney in the 50s. >> the story i remember most is the story about his experience in tennessee. after world war ii, there was black veterans defending themselves, resorted to arms, they were charged with various crimes, he went, defended them. , got most of them off, the local police were angry with him, he's leaving the courthouse with another attorney z alexander and so justice marshall is driving and the local police pull him over and hustle him into their car and the police tell z alexander

looby to stop but he keeps following and following and justice marshall thought he was a goner for sure, thought the police would turn him over to ku klux klan and then cold feet because alexander looby was following so they go back to town and charge justice martial with driving -- marshall with driving under the influence and they go to the local magistrate, the police say this man was driving under the influence. magistrate said i can tell right away, he tells justice marshall, breathe into my face. so justice marshall acts it out, he says ha, and the man doesn't flinch, he says this man has not touched a drop of whiskey, you know, release him. justice moishlg -- marshall

gets in the car, drives off, gets where he is going, calls the naacp and said i had not touched whiskey before but now i'm about to get drunk. again it's a horrible stostory, it's also a true story, there's a very nice book about this particular event but he would always punctuate it with his own brand of humor. >> i will contribute a couple. the stories you say are what would you say harsh, hard, but not in the language necessarily or even the events. but one was in, i think it was a rape trial

in florida, black defend ant and black plaintiff. the jury went to deliberate, and the prosecutor came to justice marshall and said see the bailiff lighting a cigar, yeah, what about him, i bet you five dollars the jury comes in within two minutes of time he finishes that cigar. said what's at this go to do with how long it takes to smoke a cigar. well, the jury would like to have a cigar too. that's the kind of story. >> yeah. >> stays with you. everyone was about, i think it's in one of the books, might be

lawrence fishbourne's play, i'm not sure, came out of the courthouse, i think in texas, about an hour's drive from dallas where he was staying, and so, he was driving there in the morning, being driven there, picked up by highway patrol along the way. escorted all the way to the courthouse. when he came out at the end of the day there was also a police car there and followed him to some place halfway back to dallas and then dropped off. when this happened the second day and he got to the courthouse, he went back to talk to the driver of the race car. said, what is going on? i mean, you know, describe just what i described and the sheriff's deputy said to him, sheriff said you're not to get killed in this county. so. [ laughter ] so. what was your first impression when you first met the justice?

>> well, my first conversation with the justice actually came before i met him. at that time he was -- he picked clerks without interviewing them. he had some former clerk who's did his clerkship selection he called me the summer after law school, the call came into the lawyer view office they had to run and find me and get me and i came back and found a phone and finally got him on the phone. and he said, so, you want a job. and i said, i'd love a job. and he said what's that, you

already have a job? and i was like, oh, my gosh, he didn't hear me. all right. so, you know, no, i'd really -- i just said i'd love a job, and into, i wanted this job, and i don't have a job. i don't know, if you already have a job. [ laughter ] this went on three or four times it's like, i figured it out, he took pity on me. i'm not sure which happened first. the only other thing i remember about that conversation before he hung up the phone he said i hope you like writing dissents and we did write our share that year >> let me tell you, i was in the office when he played that. [ laughter ] so what

about your first impression. >> similar phone call, he said to me, you still want the job, i said yes, he said you got it, get ready to write dissents and then he got off the phone i was studying for the bar and it all happened in maybe 35 seconds and there's a quality of somebody just pulled a prank on me, i had no idea if it really happened and spent the next hour to figure out where you go in washington to confirm thoroughgood marshall just made you a job offer. >> i had a similar telephone call. i remember the first time i met justice marshall,

i heard about thurgood marshall all my life because my father went to see marshall argue rice versus elmore, it was one of the last white primary cases. and throughout my childhood i heard my father talk about the importance of that case for him. now my dad didn't really know what the legal issue, the big legal -- was a state action issue but he pay attention to that's the thing my father talked about over and over and over again was that the judges in the courtroom called thurgood marshall,

mr. marshall. and the reason why that was so significant, is that because of jim crow etiquette, black men were not referred to as mister. up were a black physician you might be called dr. so and so or a black minister might be called reverend so and so, but typical did not get the honor of mister. it kwasniewski a sign of how distinguish it -- it was a sign how distinguished thurgood marshall was that the judges and other lawyers called him mr. marshall. i heard about that all the time growing up. with that backdrop, of course, it was a tremendous thrill >> was it part of why you became a lawyer? >> in part, i'm sure. my of father just -- again, it was i'm sure it influenced my brother. i have a older brother who is a

lawyer. but we heard about -- we heard about that argument. -- a hundred times. >> i don't know if it is one of the books but there is a story about the justice needed when he was practicing, in his early 50s, he needed a writ of some sort and needed to see the chief justice and chief justice was not to be found. but he knocked on a door and the hotel was a hotel in connecticut where big conventions often are, k street in connecticut, anyway, big hotel there, knocks on the door there -- mayflower, someone had given him a tip. he he went in and there was

chief justice playing poker with president truman and two other men, i don't know who they were. he went over to chief justice and opened his paper, must have had a affidavit because the chief justice looked up and said mr. marshall, is all this true, he said, yes, sir. sign the paper. left. never noticed it was the president in the room. [ laughter ] never said anything, or if he noticed he didn't say anything to him >> those were the day. >> learned about that afterwards. [ laughter ] >> little bit more informal the way they did business back then. [ laughter ] >> i remember him telling that story with this coda with the chief justice saying if you got the guts to open that door i got the guts to sign. >> much better. thank you. >> any first impression when he finally met him?

randy? >> he was -- he was a large man and very imposing. i think nowadays sometimes you know, the views you get is of sort of a avuncular, completely welcoming. he was a tough boss, intimidating, he definitely laid down how he wanted things done. and you knew how he wanted things done and you paid attention. so i mean, from the get go with me, any of this, i was very attentive to him.

and over time, i suppose, the intimidation went away. but i always found him opposing. >> i think it was a combination of his physical stature, manner and just knowing of him as an historical figure, essentially, so intimidintimidating, or at l overwhelming at first. >> as intimidating as he was i think how accessible in the sense you really understood as a clerk what he was thinking about cases, historical events he was recounting, certainly didn't hide the ball. he in the roughest language would tell who the heroes were, the villains were, the advocacy we just seen,

he would share views about colleagues. he read us allow the letter he was about to read, send to the chief justice on the occasion of the annual holiday party. i have a copy of this, essentially the following, dear chief, as usual i will not attend the annual christmas party, i still believe in the separation of church and state. so he was letting us into the tent, as imposing as he was, i appreciate as well that he gave us access on his take on just about everything. >> he cared a lot about what he thought about things, he listened to us, asked questions, there was a real dialogue between the clerks and justice. gosh, did he know who was boss. so, sometimes you would get this treatment of, he would point over to hips wall where there

was -- there was commission, he would say can you look at that wall whose name is on that commission. some would say you have to do xy or z, like, you have to, in that case i told you before, you have to vote for mr. torres, and he would say there's only two things that i have to do, stay black and die. [ laughter ] he didn't repeat stories but that expression he repeated a lot. >> he had another one that went along with that. so i remember once arguing with him about a case, and he said thank you very much. sort of put his hand up. i said, well, mister -- let me try again. i did this a couple times. finally i said justice marshall,

let me just say, two years ago you said this -- and if you go the way that you want to go that you're propoing to go it will be completely contradicting what you said two years ago. he looks at me and said says do i have to be a damn fool all my life. [ laughter ] >> before i forget. i want to say about the stories, as many as there were, i never heard one in which he was the hero. >> yeah you had to look it up to find out. >> he was not self grandizing in my way. he very much wanted to pass on to us and ultimately well beyond us, a

real sense of what it was like for him. many years later he did sit with lon williams and tell these stories and talk about a lot of things he hadn't talked about about for public indication before. i thought the only jarring thing was the sub title of the book, thurgood marshall, american revolutionaries. revolutions revolutionaries didn't follow the rules and he had no affections for revolutionaries, none. >> randy, you have thought s about this generally. >> it was complex. on the one hand, he was mr. civil rights. and over a long period of time,

through extraordinary work, amazing diligence, amazing persistence, along with extraordinary skill created the ground work for the civil rights revolution. at the same time he was -- he viewed the world very much through a lawyer's lens. and his way of doing things was to attack through the courts what you didn't like. have those things invalidated. after they were invalidated, then move. he was not a fan of direct action. and there was tension, i think, it's -- you know, documented, there was real tension between him and the students who were, you know, the people who engaged in sit-ins. it was real tension between him and martin luther king jr.. there was tension.

he respected them. and they, with good reason, respected him. and to move the world in the way that the champions of the civil rights movement move the world you needed all sorts of people. you needed division of labor, you needed people who saw things in different ways, and pushed in different ways. but yeah, he had, you know, it was a complex relationship with some of the other members of the champions of racial justice. >> reminds me -- division of labor among the clerks, remember that. >> what was it. >> bill bryce took all of the criminal and criminal procedure cases. >> served him well. >> yeah.

karen took all of the civil rights and related cases and i got what was left. [ laughter ] and so that was, you know, international case and securities and labor and there was, i mean, there was never a moment in which -- never a matter on which we had any disagreement. or had to work out exactly what wanted to say because we were completely on the same wave length. he was, in that respect, a conservative person. he wasn't trying to upset the securities laws. you know. or make waves just to make waves. >> the way he did it with us he made it very clear early on that we were to be looking over one another's shoulders, so he told us early on if i'm mad with one of you i'm mad with all of you.

and so we would look over one another's work. and we were particularly conscious of his -- and he was completely intolerate of lateness. you cannot be late about anything. one minute was too late. and so sort of had a collective punishment. one other thing i remember about the year had to do also around captain capital punishment on the night of execution we had one clerk that would have to stick around for anything lake breaking. when everything had been done the person who had to stick

around had to call up at his home so i did it a punch about because i volunteered to stick around, i wasn't married, nobody was looking for me, but on those evenings, when i'd call the house, i would pray that mrs. marshall -- [ laughter ] i'd be praying that mrs. marshall would answer, it made a big difference, the big difference it made was this, if mrs. marshall answered the phone, the justice would come on and he would be very civil. he'd be very nice, very polite. very civil. if she did not answer the phone and you got to 4i78 first, it could be a very tough conversation >> i remember about the capital cases that his charge to us was

not merely to execute categorically he said comb the cases to see if we can get it reversed. was not a extract point. he wanted to save a life. the phone calls came with the question, have you dug into this. is there something specific that we can say. >> this >> this one of my most vivid memories, and for many reasons that capital punishment were playing a more significant role in the court more than today, and firstoff, there were more execution, and so a week, that there would be usually several executions a week at that time. there were fewer procedural bars, and so a lot of what we are doing now, a few people come up on death row, and there is no

way to hear the merits of the claims, because since that time congress has put into place a whole lot of rules that mean that many, many, many more claims are procedurally barred than then, and the third thing is that the death penalty law at that time was much less well developed, so you didn't have, and a lot more open spaces in terms of what was allow and what was not allowed, and so there was quite a lot of the executions, where there was a very serious issue that remained open and that you could get to. randy talked about dissents from denial in one area of law, but i remember there wasn't just the typical, like, thing that he and justice brennan do about how did it go again? just the one-liner, and i forget how it went -- >> consistent with my view. >> but we spent -- we drafted so many dissents from denial in death penalty cases that year. i'd be surprised if we didn't do 25 of them, 30 of them in a year. >> i must have been there or i was completely oblivious or

there in the happy interim when there were no cases in '74 or '75. does that sound about right? >> yeah. >> okay. well, thank goodness. chilton, where are you? how much time do we have, if any? >> time for one more question -- >> that is fine. but instead of a question, why don't you tell us what your favorite recollection of the year and not just in chambers, but of the year that you spent here. >> somebody else can start. >> this is outside of the chambers memory. holiday time late one day, he told us that he was going to take us out to lunch the following day at a seafood restaurant, and we get into a car, and we go to a seafood restaurant, and he is leading the way, and as thurgood marshall walked into the packed dining room, you could see people begin to realize who walked in. slowly one by one, and then tell us what your favorite reck ligs of the cheer,

>> somebody else can start. >> this is outside of the chambers memory. holiday time late one day, he told us that he was going to take us out to lunch the following day at a seafood restaurant, and we get into a car, and we go to a seafood restaurant, and he is leading the way, and as thurgood marshall walked into the packed dining room, you could see people begin to realize who walked in. slowly one by one, and then everybody they just got up and stood for him, and stood for him for maybe 60 seconds. and you know, he nodded and everyone sat down, but it is a moment that allowd you the see him the way that the world saw him, and reminded you that this is not the ordinary supreme court justice, but clerking for a living legend. and elevator operators and

others, but then to puts a side what we are talking about in the conference room and story time and forget about the individual cases, but this is the magnitude of the man, and what he has meant to our country. and i think that we all saw it again after he passed away and the clerks had the enormous honor of serving as the honor guard and we all took the shift in the middle of tonight even as people were streaming through and there were people overtly emotional and bringing in copies of "brown v. board of ed" and leaving it there, and the enormous space that he had occupied in our 20th century. so my story really is just having that window of an opportunity to look at him through other's eyes. >> i guess that i would echo that and say that probably the most enduring snapshot that i have of that year is on the very

last day that i worked for him. because on that day i mentioned earlier of my father. my father came to the court that day. and the justice was very nice to my dad. my dad talked about "rice versus elmore" and seeing him. they had a very nice talk and these two people whom i revere the memory of that is a deep memory with me. >> i also remember when my parents came to the court, and he was nicer to me that day than he was before or since, and it was the only day that i knew that he liked me. [ laughter ] >> well, thank you, all, for being here for this hour and the tribute to the justice and i hope many more in the future for

others to carry this forward for as long as we can. >> well, it was a privilege for us. [ applause ] my name is jim o'hara, and i'm a member of the board and the executive committee of the supreme court historical society, and the society is deeply honored to be the host of tonight's national heritage lecture. a few observations before the evening is over. first, justice kagan, judge ginsberg, judge englemeyer and i my name is jim o'hara, and i'm a member of the board and the executive committee of the supreme court historical society, and the society is deeply honored to be the host of tonight's national heritage lecture. a few observations before the evening is over. first, justice kagan, judge ginsberg, judge englemeyer and i thank you for your stories about

justice thurgood. this is a warm evening, and i am honored to have been a part of it. the national heritage lecture is sponsored each year by the supreme court historical society, the white house historical society and the united states capital historical society. since 1991 when justice anthony kennedy delivered a rousing talk on president roosevelt's 1937 court packing plan, the three organizations have rotated hosting duties each year. this evening's national heritage lecture is of course a celebration of justice thurgood

marshall's 50 years after his ascention to the supreme court. the society and all of us here are deeply honored to be joined this evening by his wife, cecilia marshall, his sons, thurgood marshall jr. and john marshall, his daughter in law, jean marshall, and his grandson edward patrick marshall. thank you so much for being here and honoring us with your presence. [ applause ] i thank all of you for coming, and please join us in the receptions in the east and west conference room which are directly to the right as you are leaving the courtroom tonight. tonight, we will be serving two recipes from justice and mrs. marshall that are featured in

the society's most recent publication "table for two." we are serving justice marshall's maryland crab soup, and mrs. marshall's mango bread. copies of "tables for nine" are available at the society's gift shop along with many other books and many other gifts. the giftshop is on the ground floor of the court, and it will remain open throughout the reception tonight. ladies and gentlemen, the 2018 national heritage lecture is now adjourned. [ applause ]