Thurgood Marshall: The Man

We're. Iraq. Iraq. Iraq. Iraq. Iraq. Iraq Iraq. If you hadn't been a negro you don't understand that I agree to that. They think that you're just sensitive about something. Well let's find out what you sensed about when not if. We can find a place to sleep. Sure you're incensed but I think a man's home is his castle and goodness knows it was Mrs. Keller the dead Gnome is the middle of it. Nobody snooping around in my bedroom. I don't have a gun but my big what about women's rights.

We have progressed from the stage of keeping them barefoot and pregnant. We have a skate that states but I think there's a lot we have to go you know. Everybody came the same by God we're free again. Free free. I'm Carl Roland. Oh those are the words of one of the most powerful persons in America Justice Thurgood Marshall of the United States Supreme Court. And you just heard portions of the only television interview granted by Marshall during his 20 years on this court. For more than half a century. Thurgood Marshall has stood before this Vange arguing on behalf of millions of ordinary Americans and he has sat behind that bench. Listening to the cries of others for justice.

We are going to take a rare look inside the Supreme Court and inside the mind of Thurgood Marshall the man. We want to bring court. Cases. Judge Marshall Parker the social and legal

history of our time. I kind of wonder about the idea of the Supreme Court justice. Granting interviews and getting involved. In politics and that's precisely what he did the thing that is wonderful about this country is that we are not monolithic. The All Blacks don't think the same way Justice Marshall does just as all whites don't think the same way to Brad. If you're not satisfied with the intent to law then he ought to get off and run for Congress. You haven't thought of making love. What's all this fuss about. After 20 years of silence a Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall broke tradition and spoke harshly of the original Constitution. And about racism in America today. Have you been shaken by the criticism. I do.

I live. In Israel because I expect. A war when I speak I don't care what. You know you want out to Mao and Clarence Pendleton of the Civil Rights Commission said that you were not. Acting as a proper justice when you said the Constitution was flawed at the beginning. Did that bother you to have a black man criticizing you. Were my dad I was terribly that great a black snake in the word snake in a boat every day. But Justice Marshall's friends praise and defend including Supreme Court Justice William Brennan. And I think Thurgood goes too far. Which is not to say I do the same thing with.

Where you were you know I think seeing him speak out. Oh I certainly whatever I've been trying so. Long to persuade him to do he can tell for much more than a new restaurant and no one better able to ruin it than if I had to talk about it I say the it that Thurgood Marshall is able to talk about is the same thing that gave him a basis for speaking out against injustice without candor that shocked many Americans. Marshall's former colleague Wiley Brennan told me what makes this justice different. If someone said to you sum up for me what you think their good marshal has taken to the Supreme Court what are his contributions to that institution. What would you say. I would say a feeling and an

understanding of the effect of segregation and discrimination. He's lived in a part of it and a part of his life. It's one thing to read about it. It's another thing to experience it. I remember as a teenager in Baltimore you you couldn't. There were no rest facilities downtown from the grove. And. I. Had a nerd's and I started thinking well I could go with no place to go. So I jumped on the challenge got to go home. And I was offered my stuff and I was right into the home for miles. And I climbed up the steps to the front steps to educate in the. Broad daylight that afternoon and it all went right on the going is. So little more than inconvenience. And I remember it. Perhaps Thurgood Marshall was destined to become a champion of civil rights. He

was born in a cauldron of conflict. Just walking away from the cotton plantations and sharecropper far urban areas in the north often finding themselves in Georgia and Ohio in 19 or 19 but nineteen oh wait was the fateful Thurgood Marshall was born in Baltimore Maryland on July 2nd. Son of a school teacher and a steward at a no blacks no Jews country club. A month after his birth the nation was shaken by ghastly rioting in Springfield Illinois. Accusation of rape led to too many deaths and great destruction that had inspired the founding of the the organization through which Marshall was to become an American legend.

Thurgood Marshall went to college at all black Lincoln University in Pennsylvania but only after his mother pawned her wedding ring to help pay tuition and never got it. Well you were as I understand it a pretty dentistry student. Route. My parents and grandparents. One of my brother 9 not to worry. And they wanted us to take up a profession and that looked like a good one. And I was on it until I messed up in college and. Did pre-medical because I mean you messed up. And I didn't get along. So that's when you decided to go to. Yeah well I made so much more money by going and then Mr.. Marshall went to Howard University Law School where he finished first in his class. He rushed into his first civil rights triumph in 1935 when he

forced the University of Maryland to admit a black law student. Donnel Mary. Well number one they wouldn't let me in because I was a nigger and also a lawyer so I decided I'd make him take. And so when I got out and passed the bar I proceeded to make him pay for. Was this sweet revenge wonderful. Joe I didn't know a. White law firms didn't hire Negroes in those days. So Thurgood Marshall went to work for the NWA Sepi where he became the nation's premier civil rights lawyer. In those days. You're out a young lawyer fighting these cases what kind of money for your. Eyes. What was it now twenty four hundred. Yeah. That was in the 30s. And then 38 it was raised to two hundred twenty

six. And I remember when I came. Long. Term my wife and I was very kind away with this phrase and I mentioned. And she said $200 as it is and I do I don't appreciate it but. How much is that and we. Treat her well. Thurgood Marshall's justice on a shoestring stirred up emotions throughout the nation as he and his colleagues tore down the longstanding racial restrictions in Texas fighting for the right to vote in South Carolina and elsewhere proving that Jim Crow schools were inherently unconstitutional. In Alabama trying to get a black woman offering Lucy passed a door blocked by Gov.

George Wallace Marshall one I'm astounded. Twenty nine of 32 cases that he argued before the Supreme Court in a national environment that his former secretary Alice Stovall recalls as hostile. She tells of an incident in Norman Oklahoma and I asked him was it alright for me to use the laser he says oh yeah baby this is a federal court. And I went to the ladies room and I was washing my hands and two young ladies came in. Like. They were white and much shorter than I was and I looked up at me and one said. I don't know she says if you go with those. Lawyers arguing the case she says if you're black she says you're not supposed to be NEA and if you're white you're a communist. And I looked at her and I says Well Mr Marshall told me that this was a federal building from top to bottom and I could be anywhere I chose in this particular building and they just book that in the Dallas school case

we were before Judge t Whitfield Davis who was certainly an opponent to racial integration. And on one occasion I noticed that he kept glancing out the courthouse one that finally the judge got up walked over to the one and then he beckoned all the lawyers to come over and he said you see a tree out there. So if you notice there are some white men and there some black birch. And you will notice that those black words were not even on the same Liam as the right words and vice versa. And that was his argument as justification for him for segregation. Experiences like these seem to spur martial onward. They lit a fire in his belly that still hasn't gone out. If you hadn't been an egg roll you don't understand that I agree to that. They think that you're just sensitive about something. Well let's find out what you're sensitive about when. We can find a place to sleep. Actually incensed they think that segregation is just a

little. Inconvenience. Segregation is a worsening of apartheid is the example of it. Were you ever says a cold danger as you went these cases. For example in Mississippi where a. Friend of mine as

an undertaker would bring one of his big Cadillacs. 30. 30 rifles in the back seat. Three people and. I did say that. There were murders and bombings of home churches. But Thurgood Marshall came riding into harm's way to the rescue whenever and wherever a local for. What. Represented them from the beginning of the case and I take the same position. Which is everyone. Those children don't have a constitutional education which the Supreme Court said must be on a desegregation case while the Brennan who fouled the celebrated lawsuit to desegregate the public schools of Little

Rock remembers the perilous days of tangling with file an Arkansas law segregation. Yes these were dangerous times. Everything was segregated in the south so you couldn't stay in hotels you couldn't eat in restaurants frequently would stay at the home of Mrs. they debate in Little Rock. And we shared the front bedroom and there were 20 beds in and we used to joke with each other we both had signs Matewan said Why Brandon had to sit there and I walked in but the name Thurgood Marshall on the bed nearest the window which was most likely to be bombed and I had to go out and come back in 15 minutes later and there'd be a complete switch. We used to play games like that we would try to keep up a sense of humor and yet these were dangerous times because as you know Mrs. Bates home was subject to being bombed attacked and shot him. Very sad. Thurgood Marshall had a close brush with death in 1946 when he went to Columbia Tennessee to defend two black men who were charged

with crimes in connection with race riots the mob for all of the ME. Cross the river. And then the mob is a very interesting. State trooper and city police and they said they had a warrant. And I think the guy's a dry county marshal near the banks of the river ordering other blacks to go into town as Marshall neared the river he saw people waiting for the party. Party you mean Lynch. Well yes but the other black lawyers refused to go into Columbia and the mob leaders decided there could be no hanging that day. Instead they charged Thurgood Marshall with drunk driving. Then there was this little magistrate a very

good moves and he said what he said. And he turned to me and they said look he says I'm a teetotaler. Never had a drink in my life. If you want to take my test I have tried as it were this. Is a blow your brother must know Brad will never drink for Britney Rob lives with the craziest man I mean the guy that was in the original car with me to beat him dead in the house before months and play rough. He was about the only lawyer that we had. Which meant if you had a problem in Oklahoma Texas Louisiana or any other place. Thurgood had to come to your rescue and air transportation was near as efficient as it is now. And then a time steady enough to catch a train and come all the way from New

York to Oklahoma to litigate. Fast. You would see people would come and the blacks would be some of them in the overalls and come by the court. And he would stop and chat with them and tell them that. Their prayers and they will. Eventually win it and things will be fine. And. You might say that they worshipped and. Despite the sense of Oh Marshall inspired in those. Many of his most important successes were never entered into our nation's history. Us. Following the special hearing before the Supreme Court in September of 1958 on the Little Rock case that's where the court came back the next day with an opinion. And Dr. Martin Luther King had absolutely nothing to do with the literati case except to the extent that he did go out to Little

Rock and attended the graduation furnished Green who was the first student to graduate. Right when Thurgood and I left the Supreme Court we got a taxi to go back to our hotel the cab driver looked around over his shoulder and he said Isn't it great what Dr. King did today. Well we thought we'd been away from the news when we said or what happened. Oh he got that court to let those black kids stay in Central High School where they would turn to me and said Wow. Did you hear that. Did you hear what Dr. King did today and I said gee that's amazing. We just chuckled over it. But that's a that's a typical manner of over people getting credit for something that they're watching. But Marshall Supreme Court records bails out his victories in black and white. Including one of the most dramatic Supreme Court cases of this century. Brown versus Board of Education. On May 18 1954 page headlines

across the nation plainly unanimous verdict. High Court banned school segregation. Did you really entertain some doubts that you could win that case someday. That's. Right. One day I would have bet. All the tea in China that it would be in heaven. Would it have been the magic of or a warning that might have gotten that decision. I think so. I don't think there's anything to that. Alice Stovall gave us an idea of how Marshall and his NWC celebrated their Supreme Court victories. So you're in for a treat. I'm cooking today. And his favorite meal at that time was something he called crab soup. And he would make this huge pot. Tell us how many hours he had worked over it so that this show that we liked was that it was good then that he decided some of them and then

wanted to play cards they would go to the. On the dime and they would hear laughter from him. That's if Levy was with me you know. After Brown versus Board of Education however Marshall did not celebrate. There wasn't a great deal of excitement because he said a lot of work to do with it. The schools were going to be just segregated the next couple years and. Not realizing that it would go on. But he knew that the job really had not been finished. Marshall was correct. Brown versus Board of Education did not signal to racial segregation and by. More than 30 years later he still sees a problem. You know everybody came the same. My

God we're free again. Free free. Yes the government clerk ever told me that it did in every state member city in the country. And then never been any place in this country. Where he had put his hand up in front of his face to know that he was in a room. I agree with General we still haven't. I still know where in certain places I know I know the clubs here in this town invited by me. I don't have an honorary membership at any club any place under any where all the other justices do. Ordinarily He's a very patient man and he knows that with a subject like Earth One has to be patient and he has been. But I think his. Manifest

and increasing impatience with. The failures of those who could do more. I don't know the last president that came out for ending segregation every place. I think a very good president to say people are all people take the skin off there's no difference and they'd be good. One of. The grand I not only free. From social and economic oppression. And this nation for all its hopes and all its. Free

until all of it is free to buttress his call for action. Kennedy nominated Thurgood Marshall to the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals. This was like waving a black flag in front of senators like James Eastland of Mississippi and Strom Thurmond of South Carolina. They tried to stall the nomination to death. I've been much much delayed and in fact I'm sure it will not again and I've been given over here and then it will not again without action being taken by the United States Senate and Thurgood Marshall appointment. When it doesn't come for a vote any way on my judgment the Senate will confirm him overwhelmingly. The Senate did confirm Marshall but only after a long emotional filibuster do you think it's right for various groups of Americans to try to deny the confirmation. Of someone appointed to this court on the basis of their being too liberal are too conservative.

I think the. Protest is a plan of the American way of life and. The right to petition to Congress is in the Constitution. So I think any individual any group has a Pacific duty. Now they're right going to duty to Brazil and to Congress their views. On any matters before the Senate Committee held hearings. Well 11 months before they got around to confront him and me but I still think they had that duty. I reminded Justice Marshall that former congresswoman Barbara Jordan and former secretary of transportation William Coleman had helped to block Judge Robert Bork from a seat on the Supreme Court and that they were criticized as being part of a lynch mob. They researched the whole problem and they presented their reasons to take it or leave it. I

never heard of a lynch mob putting it up to somebody else. The lynch mob takes it upon themselves to do so. I just think it's an unfair statement. Anybody as Thurgood Marshall sat on the court of appeals. He had no idea that President Lyndon Johnson was planning and plotting the course of the rest of his life. Former Johnson aide Jack Valenti tells how Johnson conspired to make Marshall the first black justice of the Supreme Court. He was determined that he was going to put a black on the Supreme Court at the same time that he was trying to pass this monumental Voting Rights Act of 65. And I remember that in talking to me about it and he determined they had to get somebody. A black who was going to sure Vive the gauntlet of congressional intervention hearings for confirmation. And he wanted to so certify it be

absolutely no question at all. This man would be confirmed and even lauded. Now you mean the southern opposition to a black person on the Supreme Court. But do you still mean that. But Jack while you are good marshal Why did he pick a man who was a red flag to the southern senators. I think that was one of the reasons Caro he thought Thurgood Marshall was a brilliant lawyer whose credentials as a as a courtroom lawyer were unsurpassed. And when he determined that he had to outfit Thurgood Marshall and army him with the kind of baffle plate that no opposition could penetrate and remember he said that by God I'm going to take third good and I'm going to make him solicitor general. And then when somebody says well he doesn't have a lot of experience with Supreme Court he said By God that some bitch would have prosecuted more cases before the Supreme Court and he wrote you know America. So how is anybody going to turn him down.

Well I'm sure. That there's no possible reason that I could have cannot adequately represent his government which is that. This is all about. There was a bruising Senate battle over Marshall's nomination to become solicitor general. The man who would speak for the government before the Supreme Court but martial was confirmed and sworn in by a former member of the clay. Justice Hugo Black who had become one of the most esteemed members of the nation's highest tribe you qualifications. You are the people of this nation. Justice Johnson planned it that Justice Marshall has a record as the West was peerless and that was his great I'm

a plague and that all the bullets fired at him. Yes didn't penetrate. He always said though that I'm not going to just bring come out and tell you that it's not there. Were you surprised when most ride president Mr. Johnson never mentioned the word negro as he became the first president to nominate a negro for the Supreme Court. But his sense of pride in the historic occasion came through as he made you know. I believe it's the right thing to do the right time to do it the right man the right place. And I trust that to his nomination. I. Promptly considered by the Senate this time the stall lasted more than two months. But Marshall was confirmed to the highest court in the land. There are still a lot of people who are going to court. Only because he's a black man. That's quite wrong. You know that quite wrong. He would not have been appointed. Had he not been

and proved to be one for the. Country. They would not have been what is the proper relationship between. The Justice Department and the Supreme Court. They solicitor general is the governor let's welcome them in those costs. He speaks for the government has been true up until. The past. Decade. Now it's a race only for the president and not the rest of the government. Let's talk about Attorney General Meese who has led a campaign against judicial activism and cries for a stricter interpretation of what they framers meant.

The people who listened to those statements should bear in mind that they have to the political arena not for the judicial arena. And are you saying that you justices don't pay any attention to those states. I don't. Do you think me says given proper honor to the separation of powers I don't think he understands. What do you personally think of him as an attorney general. No comment. Do you and other members of the court discuss him in private. No Carb. Double. Have you had the feeling that somebody is trying to undermine and destroy the things you achieved as a private lawyer for the NWA Sepi and asked a lesser general. And what you've done on the court. Or why not the same Didn't you know it's a good

constitution to try to. I think there's certain movements that the Department of Justice and Meghan which could be interpreted as trying to undermine the Supreme Court itself which is of course impossible. They can't separate the political from the legal. They write political speeches and put two or briefs on does this rankled members of the court when they get what you call a political speech with a label brief phone. Well when I do I don't read it. How do you feel. What do you think about on days when you realize what great power you will. You don't think of it. And so far as I'm concerned when something has got to be done I do it and go on to the

next job. Like the question here consulate Esther's represent a most important case my answers always been the next one. Do you ever say to yourself there are limits beyond which I can't go I must restrain myself because. It's not judicial restraint. It's just frustration. Do you take an oath to hand that justice. You in your mind have to take any prejudice you have a predilection and push it back out of your mind until after you decide the case and then go back. You've been averaging 15 cents per turn. Shouldn't we call you the great dissenter the great and happy justice who I'm going to have it on. I enjoy it. And that I love. All right

I think would be horrible. On one side I would want. To write some of those. I'm sure you got to be a little disappointed maybe even angry. Do you ever wish you were pulling teeth and filling teeth and doing anything. But. When once you begin to enjoy. And the. More you wonder. What would happen if you had been in the. Let's talk a little bit about. Some of the individuals who have. Made history interpret in this Constitution for two years on the court while he still has two or three Was he the great leader that we have. I've never run across in my life. It was like a war but. Is it true that you were

or have been a particular thorn in the side of Warren Burger. No I'm sure I might be in a group that he glanced. Outside of the actual core decisions and change as a burger is a very likeable guy. What about Rehnquist you think he's going to be a. Really good Chief Justice I think he's going to be one of the. Number one heart set on doing one thing or the other. Yes he knows exactly what he wants to do. And that's very important as a chief justice. No Justice Blackmun has said publicly that being on the Supreme Court quote is a rotten way to earn a living and quote Blackman said it so weary place and there is no humor there.

Do you come by my office and. Lots of laughs at your own. I know one time Justice Harlan. And the judges were ornery would love. In an argument and get bread for coffee. And during the coffee break I said. And he came over to me and he said. It's you know I have great trouble with the English language. This is Harlan you're seeing. And he said Give me some choice language. So I said No problem. So I gave him some language when we got back down round the table. The chief justice started out at war and blowing about. Five or six curse words in a row. Nobody had died. And she just said you never post anything on Justin Moore. Could you did that.

Oh sure it's good to stick some in when things get real tense. It's Easy It's Easy. You mean the way things are going to be turning and knowing that nobody is listening. And there's nobody in the room real life anybody. And you think that that's better for the country that the court operates that way. I sure hope so. Well it certainly had some heated discussions and sometimes. They're not understandable. We're all gentlemen and a lady that's been there been some stories that your great. Quips tour and needle are especially on issues like pornography. Other stories for you that came from the time when we travel. And I would interpret things to him from the dirty movies. I'm explaining. That musta been a furnace.

Is it true that you looked at one of the dirtiest of those movies and said Justice Blackmun did you learn anything from that when I didn't do the stories for. The romance had nothing else to do. And the word play about the talk we've heard that there was a jewish. Now there is a black female seat on the court. Do you think this is kind of a stablish principle. I don't consider myself black because I'm sitting in his blog and he was not black. He was a good white Texan right. It's rhymes with

blood so I don't consider those a black seat in any way. Had there been any special handicaps are disadvantages to your being black in terms of your service on the court. Oh I don't think so except to do it by News of the day. And as long as I'm there they know that if anybody does anything wrong I'm going to mention it loudly. There are some people who've said in who've written that the media the academic and other observers of the court have taken your opinions lightly they are have not given them the credit they may argue and I think this is partly because you are black or I would say that. But I do. I guess anybody because somebody else is about it. I have yet to see any story that I would have

done differently. I mean that I would have done it the way it was. Indeed sometimes I read a story in the paper about the opinion that I handed down the day before. And when I read that I go back and read the opinion it seemed like it's a different opinion. What about the relationship the social relationship. Between the nine justices on this court do you. We have our own lunch room dining room. We eat lunch together usually And with each other's homes. The wives are all in a little group where they meet once or twice. I think it's once a month or so I don't know. I. Do know that there are regular meetings and they're very closely related and there's a real feeling between a real sense of comradeship

the justices and the wives. Sure isn't the Supreme Court just another American political institution. Well I don't know of any instance in recent years and I guess recent is I don't know of any incident in this century where politics is anything to do with the school or anything to do with. Well if political outlook and political law's loyalties don't make a difference how is it that you and say Justice Rehnquist could be so far apart in your interpretations of the Constitution. We're all different. There are times when we're all you know politics has nothing to do all good. Less century did mingle with the members of Congress and standards. I don't know when I have ever

talked to a congressman or senator or anything other than a dime a day. Do you deliberately try not to go to a social occasion. I don't go to any social occasions except. When ordered to the White House. How do you view the Constitution. I think is the greatest body of laws ever and I write to me and to many people is stronger about it. In this late date you find it works. And when they dig down into it I don't know of any better job that could have been done. I think it's the greatest thing we've ever had. I have studied it considerably along with constitutions of other countries and compared it with British that has no

constitution. And I think we just got a great body of laws. And if you read it with an understanding that it is hardly anything to cover. I mean just unbelievable that a constitution written in the horse and buggy days will cover race isn't one of the problems the fact that some people say stop looking at this as a living Constitution. Let's look at it and interpret it in terms of the original intent of the framers. Well I was somebody who raised that point would ask What did the framers name in the Constitution that would apply to rockets. Tell me what is in the Constitution applies to derogate. Then I'd understand. So it's just court's job to do because the framers didn't say a thing

about school busing or television writing table jargon adding they did what they barely had one. So so you're saying that that the Constitution has to meet the different framework of society if you look for. What do you think about when you realize that you've spent all of your adult life using those provisions to broaden the horizons of freedom for America's underclass its minorities et cetera. It seemed to me that our job. Was to put in the lore of this country what the Founding Fathers refused to put in the Constitution. The trouble with the Constitution was that the whole purpose of the Constitution was to free the American.

He wanted to be free. And the same time the Constitution says that we're going to free all of the white people in this country. They said that any black person who escaped slavery would be by the Constitution put back into slavery. I was given one man's freedom and put another man a slave that had to be corrected. It's still not completely correct but we were you know. You know we got a big argument that just goes on forever in this country about strict constructionist justices and activist justices. And you're you're counted among the activist justices. Do you think this is an argument that Americans are hurting. Right now what they're saying is that you're among those who don't just

interpret the Constitution that you're legislating. That is when I don't know. If I rule with absolute straight arrow on constitutional law. I don't I'm a congressman making law. Confirmed I had visited in the region the majority opinion any minority opinion. We strictly construe the guns to. Strictly. How do we get this perception of who is activist and who's legislating and who strictly no one cares I decided one way and with record flood aid. And this next year it went the way they reversed it. I mean the one year they were one year.

Does the public have a right to be a little upset in an easy way and the court does a flip flop in one year. You'll get it. Well there are some people who would like to own things like Wade versus Rove the boys in this world. Thank god my not be to goodness Englands best thing you got to remember Lyndon Johnson had to say I may not be very good but only when you get or use a little surprise recently when you got a majority to go along with the idea that you can't execute people who committed a crime if they're deemed to be and saying well I sure hope that we would catch up with history. I mean they didn't execute insane people back in the 15 and 16 hundreds.

It seems to me we have at least get a clue that what you've been fighting this battle against capital punishment since long before you were on this court or with what have you now concluded that there's no likelihood of your ever winning a hold to the time trial had they does every likelihood the whole government and all the other countries are doing it. Everybody's getting rid of it and I think it's just a matter of time. We would fall in line. Well there are there are people who really have passionate feelings about crimes of violence and some say they want retribution but others really believe it is a deterrent to these crimes. Do you think it's a deterrent. Every day the prison population is increasing. So I don't know whether deterrent is your number the story in England when they made a pickpocket in a capital offense to be hung and went a whole day in the first pickpocket people

were picking pockets in the crowd. That deterrent thing I don't know what I think is if he ever got on that. I don't know of a single prisoner who when he committed the crime thought he was going to get caught. His old theory is he's smarter than the next guy. Not that if he gets caught he will be on top. So why now when he gets in a day of day law that stepped in and did target at all. Are you disturbed by recent efforts to curb and limit the powers of the press. I've always been there except in times I get worried about the press when they publish it on did. It on me or something like that I begin to wonder then about AM extreme press sound for. You. Do you see a day when there be no such thing as real privacy in this society. Couple more decision led the judge will decide on a case and we will have any

privacy. Well I'm going to raise my voice against wrong as I've got breath in that Big Brother in the bedroom. You keep Big Brother but I think a man's home is his castle and goodness knows his bedroom is the middle of it. But he's snooping around in my bedroom. I don't have a gun but I might be tempted. You're you're standing in a woman's right to abortion so that you think a woman's body is her castle. No question about it and I don't think I don't need to. I mean the doctor's advice and I don't think it's up to the woman. But I mean the woman sed. Well. We have progressed from the stage of keeping the bad footing Braman. We have a skate that stays.

But I think there's a lot further laundered we have to go one presidential aspirant Pat Robertson says that the rulings of this court are not necessarily the law of the land and that he would not be bound to up hold decisions that he thinks are contrary to the Constitution. Well then he should start reading Article 6 of the God's truth which says that this court does it again. He just had to read I'm a lot of articles out he's ready. You say that you believe in the court. Now what does that mean does that mean that you believe that anybody who sits on that court is going to be influenced by the other eight members and a lot of ways or what. I don't think anybody is on reasonably influenced by anybody else. They might say so but I don't believe it. But I believe they'll listen to me and we

listen each other and we do it repeatedly and regularly and I think we have absolute and complete mutual respect for each other. And I see you have nothing to be done for. Or in the future. Well. Having said that. Should I and other Americans feel fairly secure that the Supreme Court is not about to let freedom of speech privacy and freedom of religion get washed away or eroded to any degree. I don't see any problem no danger of the new. I believe that a man trained in Luling a lawyer his major job is to represent his country and do whatever he can most effectively. What will be the judgment of history regarding Thurgood Marshall the man.

Has he been effective in representing the people of his country. Would you sum up his contributions to America. As you see them and have thought about them. Let's change the history. Change the name just change the history books and you think so. President Johnson was a quite proud of his appointment Thurgood Marshall indeed in retirement he countered that appointment as one of the two or three greatest accomplishments of his administration. Remember he. Can tell you from personal experience what it was like to ride for mine over miles and couldn't get a sandwich and the rest of the other word the knowledge of that sort of thing and the kosher was that you had to do would have been very valuable to the poor.

When someone mentions Thurgood Marshall's name what qualities do you think I think of intellectual ability or commitment. Loyalty personal support would you say he's changed the nation. Oh absolutely. He has certainly helped change a nation. There are some people who said to me since you granted me those interviews heavy. Why did Justice Marshall do this is this his swan song is he saying good bye. I'm going to quit it did not turn. Which is life life. What would you say then that genuine justice is not foreseeable as far down the road as we all know. Why do you come in to do. Well. I think you can call it anything but it when it comes I I just hope I'm here somewhere down the road someone will have ask a journalist like me

what was Thurgood Marshall like what would you like the answer to be. He did the best he could with Woody. That's it. OK and beat. Him looking. And.