and i recall just as brier's dissent from the bench. to me it was one of these paradigm shifts that you see in the court pick history, where if you were there, as i was, when cowper versus aaron was decided, and when the court was trying to work out all of the sequels to brown versus board -- to see the seattle and louisville cases come along, and to see them dealt with as they were, first of all, was astonishing. second, it told me in a way that nothing else has that we are really in a new age with the roberts court, a very new age in which cultural change, it seems to me, will be a hallmark of what the court does for the next 20 years or so -- major cultural change is on the agenda for the court. >> i think the seattle and louisville cases were the more interested set of cases. having argued affirmative action cases for the university of michigan, i follow those closely. i have a different reaction than lyle to what it told us. there were important cases. the court system here important cases. i think the majority opinion, in many way

let me talk about our wonderful presenter, justice stephen brier. he is the first to say yes because he is interested in helping people be educated about how the court functions. he opened his chambers to us and when you see this clipqjcu thati have for you, you will see that very naturally, justice breyer has spent a long time as a professor because he helps educate people in a personal way about how the court operates. let's take a look. >> we decide just the federal questions, those statutes, books, and what the prosecution of the united states means in cases where people disagree about it. we have a trial. there are appeals. when you finally get to the final appeal, maybe there are 80,000 cases, 100,000 cases in the u.s. that have questions of federal law. what does this word mean? does it mean this or that? what does the word liberty in the 14th amendment mean? how does it apply to someone who once and assisted suicide? that is a case we had. does he have a constitutional right to it or not? it could be an important case, or the meaning of one

the supreme court, justice brier writing the opinion decided that was a material breach of the leaseshe lessees had a right to rely on the law as it existed at the time the leases were issued and, therefore, the lessees recovered all of their expenses. so this is an important matter, and i would encourage the committee to consider that when making changes for the oil pollution act liability damages. >> and i should note to all witnesses, of course, your full statements will be made part of the record. if you have -- following the questions of the panel, if there are additional things you feel you should have been added, we'll keep the record open for that. >> thank you. >> professor tom gal ga is the current president of colby sawyer college in london, new hampshire, a neighbor of sorts. i've been many times to kobe sawyer and new london, of course, a beautiful community. prior to joining kobe sawyer college he served as dean of the law school at university of tennessee. as i recall you taught admiralty law. is that correct? >> correct. professor, please go ahead, sir. >> chairman lea