the supreme court could give relief and it does not save mandamus. the statute did say mandamus. here is the statute, it says that weaken issue the writ and make the president give you the piece of paper. the constitution does not say that we can do that. and so we do not have the power to do it. and the statute is unconstitutional. we have this great principle, in the supreme court, that says whether a statute is constitutional or night. we have agreed action and that action is, we said it was unconstitutional. and jefferson cannot do anything about it. because he won. and it is so technical that only four lawyers understand it and the only way the country understands it is that the supreme court has the power to declare a law unconstitutional. and it did not go unnoticed at the time. they have a copy of the letter that jefferson wrote to his lawyer referring to this case. he was literally sputtering. do not pay attention to this case. john marshall to scrap this power. it was a terrible thing. but he could not do anything because he won. >> do you remember what the vote was? >>

>> well, now, i don't want to go into great detail. >> a writ of mandamus -- i issue a writ of mandamus as a judge. that is an order to an official and tells that official, "you do this. i'm sending you this writ. you do it." ok? it tells him to do something. and in the case of marbury versus madison, what madison -- what marbury wanted was a writ, a piece of paper signed by the court, issued to madison, saying, "mr. madison, you hand over that commission to marbury." >> you don't know what happened to marbury? >> i don't, actually. i think he could have brought another suit, maybe in some other court, but i think history tells us he didn't. maybe he gave up. >> do you remember, when you were growing up, where you went to learn all this? >> i learned it -- i learned that -- >> no, i mean the whole process of understanding the law itself. >> oh, understanding the law? before law school when i was growing up, i was at lowell high school in san francisco, and they did have 12th grade civics. >> did you really debate jerry brown back in those days? >> yes, we did. we did. he was at st. igna