August 28, 2022

"Princeton went coed in Alito’s sophomore year. Alice Kelikian, who became a friend of his, remembered hanging out with him around a microwave oven..."

"... that had just been installed on campus, warming up chocolate-chip cookies while talking about Italy and the philosopher John Rawls. Kelikian, who dated one of Alito’s friends, noted that Alito was always 'very respectful of me,' adding, 'A lot of male classmates were not.' Still, feminism was in the air...."

From "Justice Alito’s Crusade Against a Secular America Isn’t Over/He’s had win after win—including overturning Roe v. Wade—yet seems more and more aggrieved. What drives his anger?" by Margaret Talbot (The New Yorker). This is a very long article, and my excerpts don't represent the overall thesis justifying the article title. I'm just pointing to some things that intrigued me.
In 1973, the year after Alito graduated...

The year I graduated from college. 

.... the Supreme Court issued its Roe decision. Kelikian, now a history professor at Brandeis University, told me, “Sam was Trenton Italian and I was Chicago Armenian.” That felt to her like some sort of commonality, but they had different attitudes toward the tight-knit, convention-bound immigrant communities from which they’d emerged. She felt that she was breaking away from hers; he remained tethered to his.

Tethered! Imagine what word would be used against him if he were the one breaking away from his own ethnic group. 

Alito later told an interviewer for the National Italian American Foundation that he couldn’t relate to his peers’ view that their elders had “become affluent by taking advantage of other people—they had bad values, they were very materialistic.” Alito went on, “I thought that whole view of my parents—of the generation to which my parents belonged—was false. Perhaps it was true of some people in that generation, but certainly it wasn’t true of the people that I knew.”

That wasn't just about Italian Americans. It was the general Baby Boomer attitude in the early 70s, eager to be completely different from our woefully misguided parents. 

At his Supreme Court confirmation hearings, he described his New Jersey suburb as a stronghold of traditional values that felt safe.

Safe?  

At Princeton, he said, he saw some “very privileged people behaving irresponsibly, and I couldn’t help making a contrast between some of the worst of what I saw on the campus and the good sense and the decency of some of the people back in my own community.”...
For Alito, Yale Law School, too, was mined with countercultural bombs. In 2005, a member of Alito’s class, Diane Kaplan, told the Yale Daily News that “a lot of us were hippies, love children, political dissenters, draft dodgers.” She noted that Alito and his Princeton friends “came to class with buttoned-down collars and looking very serious.”...
Alito had come to Yale eager to study with one of his intellectual heroes, Alexander Bickel, a charismatic and prolific scholar who believed that the Warren Court had indulged in egregious activism. But Alito wasn’t placed in Bickel’s constitutional-law class. Alito’s friend Mark Dwyer, meanwhile, was assigned to the staunchly conservative scholar Robert Bork’s course, and he later told the Times that Alito had seemed jealous. In one of the worst pairings of student and professor in course-scheduling history, Alito ended up with Charles Reich, the eccentric counterculture guru who had written the best-selling manifesto “The Greening of America.”...

The New Yorker devoted an entire issue to a long excerpt of that book, thus promoting it as uniquely important.

Alito, having read the book, formally requested to switch out of the class, but he was told no. 
Reich loved flower-child sensibilities as much as Alito hated them—he saw even bell-bottoms as a form of rebellion worth validating....

"He" meaning Reich, of course. I found the bell-bottoms in the 1970 issue of The New Yorker, at page 106, linked above:

The sentence continues on the next page: "... its doctrines of honesty and responsibility. The Establishment cannot safely swallow those." I think what the text there is saying is that the bell-bottom style can be copied and coopted — that's "coöpted" for us New Yorker readers — by the establishment, but the true rebellion — that which cannot be coopted/coöpted is all the abstract stuff — liberation,  search for self, honesty — that belongs in a special way to the people Reich called "Consciousness III." So Reich wasn't "validating" the rebellion of bell-bottoms — as this new article puts it. He was dismissing the pants as what the Establishment could — ridiculous image intended — swallow. 

The new article continues:

Many students were charmed and inspired by Reich: Bill and Hillary Clinton both studied with him. (When Bill Clinton became President, one of his environmental initiatives was called the Greening of the White House.) Alito was not one of those students. In appearances and interviews, he has spoken disparagingly of Reich’s “most bizarre course.” Reich, Alito said, told his students that he “had a ticket to San Francisco in his desk and at some point during the term it was possible that there would be a note on the bulletin board that he had gone to San Francisco, and the course would then be over.” Alito recalled that, sure enough, he returned from Thanksgiving break to find just such a note. He joked... that he was “self-taught” in constitutional law....

71 comments:

JaimeRoberto said...

Anger?

RideSpaceMountain said...

"He was always very respectful of me..."

Translation: He was a nice guy I had no romantic interest in, but who was unthreatening (one of the reasons I wasn't interested...) and therefore tolerable. But being a feminist (come on...I even mention it in the article!) he is now a threat to me and his forgivable niceness back in the day has turned into the intolerable crime of affecting my vaginally-sheltered garbage philosophy.

Surely, a crime against humanity right up there with the final solution, no doubt.

Maynard said...

I do not trust psychoanalysts to psychoanalyze their patients. It's a scam.

Why should I trust a lefty writer with a political agenda?

Kate said...

"Crusade", "aggrieved", and "anger". How about "journey", "consistent", and "determination"?

The press always chooses potahto, never potayto.

tim maguire said...

Any evidence that Alito is angry? Or is that just assumed because Talbot doesn’t like his principles? As for the rest, as usual, the exact same article could be given a completely different tone simply by changing a handful of adjectives. Which is why good writers try to avoid them.

Michael K said...

Sounds like a guy I would like.

jim said...

A microwave oven in about 1972, in a college dorm kitchen? They existed but they were quite expensive then.

Curious George said...

"In 1973, the year after Alito graduated...
The same year I graduated from college."

That's an odd phrasing. Are you referring to the year listed, 1973? Or Alito's graduation year, 1972.

Gospace said...

Kelikian, who dated one of Alito’s friends, noted that Alito was always 'very respectful of me,' adding, 'A lot of male classmates were not.' Still, feminism was in the air...."

That's an odd construction. Which behavior was anti-feminist- Alito being very respectful, or the other males who weren't? Or both?

Brings up the old question that's been around since, well, appaerently since humans became human - What do women want?"

Sebastian said...

"Justice Alito’s Crusade Against a Secular America Isn’t Over/What drives his anger?"

Half a century of prog cold civil war will do it.

“I thought that whole view of my parents—of the generation to which my parents belonged—was false . .. the general Baby Boomer attitude in the early 70s, eager to be completely different from our woefully misguided parents."

It's why, despite my own youthful leftish leanings, always despised the actual baby boomers. Their cultural revolution was based on a lie.

"The New Yorker devoted an entire issue to a long excerpt of that book, thus promoting it as uniquely important.

Just to illustrate that the cold civil war has been going on for a long time, with one side fighting, the other lamenting.

Narayanan said...

while talking about Italy and the philosopher John Rawls.
==========
I wonder if similarity between Mussolini and Rawls views were remarked out?

Václav Patrik Šulik said...

Reich always seemed a little flaky to me - obvously brilliant, but eccentric. He's best known for "The New Property," which moved the concept of welfare benefits into the category of an entitlement - a right.

He clerked for Justice Hugo Black and sent him a copy of The Greening of America. The story I recall (I may be mistaken) is that when Black died, someone found this highlighted copy and used many of those passages in a eulogy to Black, not realizing those were the passages that Black hated. [Hugo Black and the Judicial Revolution by Gerald T. Dunne, my copy is in storage right now.] I think Alito is more like the Black who dissented in Griswold and not at all like the Reich who liked judges to amend the constitution in the direction of "Progressives."

From Black's dissent:

I realize that many good and able men have eloquently spoken and written, sometimes in rhapsodical strains, about the duty of this Court to keep the Constitution in tune with the times. The idea is that the Constitution must be changed from time to time, and that this Court is charged with a duty to make those changes. For myself, I must, with all deference, reject that philosophy. The Constitution makers knew the need for change, and provided for it. Amendments suggested by the people's elected representatives can be submitted to the people or their selected agents for ratification. That method of change was good for our Fathers, and, being somewhat old-fashioned, I must add it is good enough for me. And so I cannot rely on the Due Process Clause or the Ninth Amendment or any mysterious and uncertain natural law concept as a reason for striking down this state law. The Due Process Clause, with an "arbitrary and capricious" or "shocking to the conscience" formula, was liberally used by this Court to strike down economic legislation in the early decades of this century, threatening, many people thought, the tranquility and stability of the Nation. See, e.g., Lochner v. New York, 198 U. S. 45. That formula, based on subjective considerations of "natural justice," is no less dangerous when used to enforce this Court's views about personal rights than those about economic rights. I had thought that we had laid that formula, as a means for striking down state legislation, to rest once and for all in cases like West Coast Hotel Co. v. Parrish, 300 U. S. 379; Olsen v. Nebraska ex rel. Western Reference & Bond Assn., 313 U. S. 236, and many other Page 381 U. S. 523 opinions. [Footnote 2/17] See also Lochner v. New York, 198 U. S. 45, 198 U. S. 74 (Holmes, J., dissenting).

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

Only leftists are allowed to be angry. and they are lifted up and given permission to defund the police over it.

boatbuilder said...

The classic "Angry White Male" slur.

Alito sounds like a good guy seeing idiocy flourish in the institutions he once had faith in. Also like someone who went to Yale expecting education and got political advocacy instead.

Owen said...

This is what’s called The Genteel Hit Piece. The intention is no less vicious but the manners are très très. One wouldn’t want to appear uncouth.

I was particularly struck by the terrifying reference to Alito and his fellow Princetonians cruising around the classrooms and corridors ofYale Law in tell-tale uniforms: button-down shirts! C’mon man: this is the mid-seventies! The ironic preppie look has not yet arrived! Only a total nerd —or somebody dressed for a job interview— would be caught in a button-down! The next thing you’re going to tell me is, he wore penny loafers! And put pennies in the little slots!

That was the surest sign of an angry man.

Bruce Hayden said...

I didn’t know that - that Alito was in my class in college (but different colleges, a couple thousand miles apart).

Things really did change around then. We had been co-ed for a couple generations, but we went from no intervisitation and house mothers to alternating pods, 24 hour intervisitation, and a live-in girlfriend. All in the 4 years we were undergraduates.

Mike (MJB Wolf) said...

She lost me at “crusade” and yes she probably didn’t write the headline. But if the editor chooses that extremely loaded term we know the article’s zeitgeist will conform to the usual vicious antichristian attitude that suffuses mainstream DNC-Media like the New Yorker and the Times.

Mike (MJB Wolf) said...

Althouse’s longer excerpt shows the facts of Alito’s life belie the weird negative slant of the New Yorker’s title. That the author also misunderstood the bell bottom message is funny. If damn near everything in short excerpt is whack reading the whole enchilada must be a hoot.

Kai Akker said...

---Why should I trust a lefty writer with a political agenda? [Maynard]

You are right. But isn't that all you're going to get from the Althouse pet sources? It's a constant GIGO problem.

Rabel said...

"the general Baby Boomer attitude in the early 70s"

No. I don't accept that. I was there!

It was the media's interpretation and presentation of what it thought and wanted that general attitude to be and while it may have fit perfectly with the attitudes of an art school co-ed in Ann Arbor in '68 it didn't fit me or most of the people I knew.

We may have worn the clothes, but we were not hippies.

Rory said...

"It was the general Baby Boomer attitude in the early 70s, eager to be completely different from our woefully misguided parents."

Soviet disinformation feeding vanity.

RideSpaceMountain said...

@gospace

"What do women want?"

What a great question. Welp, I can definitely tell you that women want any man she doesn't find threatening to be "respectful of her".

That should be carved in fucking granite.

Dave Begley said...

Read the entire piece. Typical leftwing hit piece full of speculation, innuendo and the slippery slope fallacy. Justice Thomas and his wife Ginni got dragged in.

A major line of attack was Alito is not that funny of a guy. Too serious! Impeach!

Hey, New Yorker editors. Being a SCOTUS Justice is not a stand-up comic gig.

Pure speculation about him being angry.

Many law profs quoted including one retired professor. Why wasn’t Ann Althouse interviewed? She’s more well-known that those nobodies. And Ann would have something worthwhile to say.

Intellectually, today’s Left is simply pathetic. Weak. Sad. No wonder they are losing.

Roger Sweeny said...

Reich was a gay man who refused to admit he was gay, blaming himself and American society for his unhappiness. He finally came to terms with it in San Francisco. His autobiography The Sorcerer of Bolinas Reef is quite touching, unlike The Greening of America, which is too filled with hate.

Rob said...

I was at Yale Law when "The Greening of America" was published. It argued that Consciousness I was characterized by selfish acquisitive values, Consciousness II an organizational, corporate America mentality, and Consciousness III the counterculture. A shaggy-haired, granola-eating classmate observed that as far as he could tell, Consciousness III was merely drug-induced Consciousness I.

Roger Sweeny said...

Reich was a gay man who refused to admit he was gay, blaming himself and American society for his unhappiness. He finally came to terms with it in San Francisco, some time after the book made him a star. His autobiography, The Sorcerer of Bolinas Reef is actually quite touching, unlike The Greening of America, which is too filled with hate.

Tom T. said...

"A microwave oven in about 1972, in a college dorm kitchen?"

I had the same reaction.

Andrew said...

"What drives his anger?"

Stupid, shallow questions from intellectual lightweights?

mikee said...

"Raytheon, who bought the Amana company, introduced the first popular house model (microwave oven) in 1967, the Radar Distance Counter. It cost $ 495 (about $ 3,200 today). In 1970, about 40,000 copies were sold in the United States." From "howtodiscuss.com"

I note that a Ford Mustang in 1967 cost about $2500. Five microwave ovens for a Ford Mustang!
So microwave ovens were both a prestige item at the time, and a rarity, and costly. Of course the university would get one of the few sold, and let students warm their chocolate chip cookies with it. How else would the students know how special they were?

Be sure not to miss the elitism being rubbed in your face by the feminist icon. She was warming her cookies with a high tech microwave oven when most of us were still forced to eat ours at room temperature.

Rabel said...

A kitchen? In a college dorm? In 1972?

Ann Althouse said...

“ That's an odd phrasing. Are you referring to the year listed, 1973? Or Alito's graduation year, 1972.”

Good point. I deleted “same.”

As for microwaves, I first encountered one in the summer of 1972, at Krazy Jim’s, where I worked that summer. It was a strange device that I’d never heard about before.

That was about the same time I encountered a Betamax, which was huge and cost over $1,000. Only a rich person would have one.

These were amazing things at the time.

Roe was also amazing.

Ann Althouse said...

Re Hugo Black… yes, I’ve blogged that before:

From Woodward and Armstrong's book "The Brethren," about the Supreme Court, describing the funeral of Justice Hugo Black:

“The minister selected to deliver the eulogy went to Black’s library and found various books that Black had underlined, including The Greening of America, by Charles Reich, one of his former clerks. The minister selected some of the underlined portions to read at the funeral. During the eulogy, Brennan gently nudged Stewart. “Hugo would turn over in his grave if he heard that,” Brennan said. Only Black’s intimates knew that Black thought Reich’s book absurd, and that Black underlined the sections he *disliked*.”

Milo Minderbinder said...

In the New Yorker, everyone who disagrees is angry.

I'm afraid the left really wants to play for keeps, to roll the big dice now. They see no alternative to the right, to any alternative views really, but to burn them down. And what will the right do? Get angry? Remain angry? Yes, there will be anger now. 2023 is shaping up to be one of the angriest years in our history.

hawkeyedjb said...

In 1973 I should have graduated from college, and might have if I hadn't spent my formative university years smoking dope, drinking beer and engaging in almost every activity except study. I was a smart kid who had skipped a grade in school, and decided to let my age-group peers catch up with me. Did they ever.

Michael K said...

Blogger jim said...

A microwave oven in about 1972, in a college dorm kitchen? They existed but they were quite expensive then.


I worked in a warehouse summers in high school. I graduated in 1956. We had microwave ovens, called "Radar Range", at the time. They were big and maybe destined for commercial use.

MadTownGuy said...

Who was saying, several posts ago, that our universities were not full of apologists for socialism?

Big Mike said...

Brings up the old question that's been around since, well, appaerently since humans became human - What do women want?

And if you ever work it out, they’ll just change their minds.

Okay, your real problem is assuming that women are monolithic. Figuring out what a woman wants tells you hardly anything about what other women may want.

MadTownGuy said...

Kai Akker said...

["---Why should I trust a lefty writer with a political agenda?"] [Maynard]

"You are right. But isn't that all you're going to get from the Althouse pet sources? It's a constant GIGO problem."

She reads those sources so we don't have to.

madAsHell said...

Crusade Against a Secular America

The birth of a DNC talking point.

Dave Begley said...

Sam’s wife is from Kentucky. Clarence’s wife is from Nebraska. Not our kind of people.

rcocean said...

The difference between the Right and Left regarding the SCOTUS is night and day. The Left knows who's on the Court, and who's voting against them, and they hate them. THey picket their houses, trash them when they get nominated, constantly demonize them, and write one "hit piece" after another.

The Right meanwhile, speaks in hushed respectful terms about the Supreme COurt. THe Republican senators proudly cross the aisle and vote to confirm the most radical Leftwing judge. Most Republican base voters couldn't even tell you who the Leftwing justices are, and most (absurdly in my opinion) think they are "Big brained Constitutional Scholars" who are reading the "Sacred Text" and coming up with their opinion. Even those who are aware of their leftwing results oriented rulings have no desire to attack the leftwing judges personally.

Lets see if the leftwing hate campaign works. Maybe from now on, the conservative judges will watch their step.

Greg The Class Traitor said...

From "Justice Alito’s Crusade Against a Secular America Isn’t Over/He’s had win after win—including overturning Roe v. Wade—yet seems more and more aggrieved. What drives his anger?"

The illegitimate assault by the Left on America's Constitution should drive his anger, and drive the anger of every other decent human being.

But there are obviously noe of those at the New Yorker

n.n said...

Witch hunts, warlock trials, and demos-cracy aborted at the twilight fringe, where the "burdens" of evidence are sequestered in darkness.

Women, men, and "our Posterity" are from Earth. Feminists are from Venus. Masculinists are from Mars. Social progressives are from Uranus.

Readering said...

Talking about Italy and John Rawls.... Per his college yearbook, Alito spent the summer of '71 in Italy studying for his Wilson School senior thesis. (The entry also says he plans to go to law school and end up on the Supreme Court.) Tiger alum Rawls's monumental Theory of Justice was published in '71, so probably much talked about among Wilson School types on campus.

Robert Cook said...

"Why should I trust a lefty writer with a political agenda?"

Why should you trust a rightist writer with a political agenda?

Actually, a polemic by a writer with any acknowledged political agenda or slant can be trusted--at least on its facts--by fact-checking the polemic in question. Then it's just a matter of concluding for oneself whether the writer's conclusions can be understood or are reasonable and understandable on the basis of his or her correct statement and analysis of the facts.

Even if one does not or cannot agree with the writer's conclusions, one can at least understand how and why the writer came to his/her conclusions. One must respect an honest argument that states the facts correctly, and is argued in good faith even if one cannot agree with it. It is not true that every person or argument with which one disagrees is simply a dishonest fanatic with a dishonest argument. People can disagree and still be respectful of and agreeable to and with one another.

gspencer said...

Again with the angry white man!

Give it a frapping rest.

Robert Cook said...

"I'm afraid the left really wants to play for keeps, to roll the big dice now. They see no alternative to the right, to any alternative views really, but to burn them down."

Is the right any different?

Robert Cook said...

"Who was saying, several posts ago, that our universities were not full of apologists for socialism?"

Are they?

I attended college in the 70s and I never heard any professors advocate for socialism or discuss it any manner, really. I'm sure there were particular elective classes one might have taken, based on one's major, in which socialism was discussed or even advocated for. But it was not my experience--in the immediate aftermath of the still somewhat extant counterculture--that university was "full of apologists for socialism."

Robert Cook said...

"The illegitimate assault by the Left on America's Constitution...."

What is this "illegitimate assault" on the Constitution? What does it consist of? What are the attacks? And why, in a system in which we purportedly govern ourselves--not really true, but that's what we keep telling ourselves--is someone's disagreement with your own perspective an "assault," (an "illegitimate assault," to boot)? Doesn't such a system, if working properly, presuppose conflicting ideas and points of view on how the nation should be governed?

Jon Burack said...

I grew up amidst a lot of Italians in a factory town in Connecticut. Alito makes me nostalgic for it all again. As for the New Yorker, its cartoons used to be fun. That was a long time ago also.

Michael K said...

Is the right any different?

Cook sees no difference between the right and the Jacobin left which he adores.

The right, all 75 million of us, just want to be left alone to live our lives, raise our children and lead normal lives.

The left can't stand that and you know it.

Mike Sylwester said...

Margaret Talbot seems to be angry that our abortion laws now again are made by the state legislatures -- not by a five-member majority of the Supreme Court.

Narr said...

"Radar Range." Man, I had forgotten those things. As I have also forgotten when and where I first encountered a microwave as we understand them today . . .

It certainly wasn't in any college dorm, which I only ever visited. Probably in the staff lounge at the campus library but I couldn't say when--late 70s probably.

I was a history and polisci major from 1971 to 1976, when the Counterculture Revolution (tm) burned through the big public schools in the Southland and expired--which also is the period of Vietnamization (first our way, then theirs). Of course there was lefty romanticism and hype galore, but most people wanted to make money and have fun, whatever costume they donned.

I read Reich's book and thought it showed some insight into that generation but was otherwise just him working out his own issues; when he came out of the closet I wasn't surprised.

FWIW even at my hairiest back then I preferred button-downs if I had to also wear a tie. Still do.

Richard Aubrey said...

Jon Burack. Would that be Norwich?

Uninteresting because unthreatening. Great. How far back before feminism was that a Thing?

ken in tx said...

There was a microwave oven in the basement break room of the records office at the University of Alabama in 1967.

NotWhoIUsedtoBe said...

Yeah, wait, a microwave oven in 1972?

NotWhoIUsedtoBe said...

OK, just can't remember seeing a microwave outside of a submarine galley before 1980 or so.

The Godfather said...

Thanks to Václav Patrik Šulik way up thread for the quotation from Justice Black's dissent in Griswold v. Conn. The majority decision in that case, more than anything else, persuaded me that "living constitutionalism" (by whatever name it is called) is an awful assault on our Constitution, and Black's dissent nailed down the lid on its coffin.
I grew up in Connecticut, and by 1965 (I was 22) I was at least active enough to want to "be prepared"; so I knew that you could buy condoms and other "birth control" devices in any pharmacy; they just weren't on display. You had to go the counter and ask the pharmacist. (I never heard of a raid on a bedroom to catch the participants in flagrente with a rubber.)
Today in our local rag, an op-ed writer claimed that Alito was imposing his "religion" on us. The writer didn't even try to explain how that was so -- I guess he figured "Alito" is an Italian name, so every reader can figure what religion the Supreme Court is "imposing". "Liberals" seem to have a hard time distiguishing between NOT imposing THEIR VALUES, and letting the PEOPLE make their own decisions.

Alexisa said...

The assumption of anger as motivation is a dishonest tactic that undermines The credibility of the writer. Trolls call is the "why so angry bro?" attack. The intent is to marginalize your opinion by implying you are ruled by emotion not reason

Alexisa said...

The assumption of anger as motivation is a dishonest tactic that undermines The credibility of the writer. Trolls call this the "why so angry bro?" attack. The intent is to marginalize your opinion by implying you are ruled by emotion not reason

Alexisa said...

"Cook sees no difference between the right and the Jacobin left which he adores."

Don't stop him. Listening to Robert Cook lecture us about intelligent integrity is a Popcorn Moment.

Tina848 said...

Microwaves in Colleges in 1973? Seems rather early.

Christopher B said...

Rabel said...
A kitchen? In a college dorm? In 1972?


We had a microwave in our Iowa (home of Amana Appliances) farmhouse kitchen the whole time I was a teen ager (late 1970s) so this seems not unreasonable for a high-end educational institution.

There was a kitchen on every dorm floor when I was in college in the early 1980s. The dorm meal plan didn't provided a meal on Sunday evenings IIRC, and from discussions with people attending other schools that wasn't uncommon. Of course most everybody ordered pizza delivery or went off campus somewhere rather than cooking.

Saint Croix said...

In one of the worst pairings of student and professor in course-scheduling history, Alito ended up with Charles Reich, the eccentric counterculture guru who had written the best-selling manifesto “The Greening of America.”...The New Yorker devoted an entire issue to a long excerpt of that book, thus promoting it as uniquely important. Alito, having read the book, formally requested to switch out of the class, but he was told no. Reich loved flower-child sensibilities...

ha ha ha

When Hugo Black died, the bishop who was giving his eulogy looked in his library and found Reich's book. (Reich had clerked with Black in 1953). Black had underlined the book in multiple places. He had a habit of highlighting sections that he hated.

The bishop misunderstood the passion and assumed that Black loved Reich's book. So he gave a eulogy about Black that got his jurisprudence exactly backwards.

This was a funeral at the National Cathedral, 1,000 people in attendance, including the President, and the Supreme Court. And when the Justices heard the eulogy, they were looking at each other and going, "what the fuck?"

Greg The Class Traitor said...

Robert Cook said...
"The illegitimate assault by the Left on America's Constitution...."

What is this "illegitimate assault" on the Constitution? What does it consist of? What are the attacks? And why, in a system in which we purportedly govern ourselves--not really true, but that's what we keep telling ourselves--is someone's disagreement with your own perspective an "assault,"


1: A legitimate assault on the US Constitution is promoting the passage of an Amendment that will change it
An illegitimate assault on the US Constitution is when 5+ members of SCOTUS decide to rewrite the Constitution to their personal desires.
2: Roe, Casey, Lawrence v Texas, Windsor and Obergefell are all examples of illegitimate assaults on the US Constitution, because there's absolutely not the slightest shred of a justification for any of the rulings in the actual written US Constitution
3: There is a fundamental difference between honest disagreement, such as "what libel laws are legal under the 1st Amendment?" and dishonest disagreement, such as claiming that "the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed" means "States have the full power to regulate gun ownership on grounds of 'safety'", or claiming that the US Constitution contains a right to control your own body when it comes to abortion (which was essentially universally illegal in the US when the Constitution was ratified, and when the 14th Amendment was passed), but not when it comes to taking drugs for medical or recreational purposes (which WAS widely legal in both those time periods).

Prohibition of alcohol required a Constitutional Amendment. What was the Constitutional Amendment that enabled the Federal Gov't to have to power to create an FDA that gets to decide what drugs are legal?

In short, we could have the argument you want. but it's pointless so long as you on the Left remain so fundamentally dishonest.

Narr said...

Love the Hugo Black underlining story.

Speaking of the Supreme Court, some alumni of Rhodes College here want to remove ACB from their Hall of Fame (or whatever they call it).

As a graduate once-removed (I could have played the legacy card, if I'd had any others in my hand in '71) I'm embarrassed.

Robert Cook said...

"Cook sees no difference between the right and the Jacobin left which he adores."

I don't even know what this means. What is the "Jacobin left?"

CJ said...

I bought a microwave (MTC brand, made in Taiwan) in 1974. I remember it because it was the first year I took any college-level classes (at a two-year community college that I later transferred from). I was working full-time and going to school part-time. That machine worked for 30 years before its rotary dial control switch finally gave out. My wife noted that it was one of the last relics of my single years, and then went out and bought a sleek new Panasonic model.

Caligula said...

"Raytheon, who bought the Amana company, introduced the first popular house model (microwave oven) in 1967, the Radar Distance Counter. It cost $ 495 (about $ 3,200 today). In 1970, about 40,000 copies were sold in the United States." From "howtodiscuss.com"

I note that a Ford Mustang in 1967 cost about $2500. Five microwave ovens for a Ford Mustang!"

Well yes, they were $$$. But they're electronic, and many such things were costly then. For example, most color TVs (one always put "color" before the word "TV" then if the TV had that capability) also cost about $495. Unless it came in a fancy "fine furniture" cabinet; then it cost even more.

And don't even try to equate the price of 1967 computer hardware (even if you ignore it's pathetic capabilities) with anything from our era.

I worked in an appliance store in the late '70s, and practically all microwave buyers were buying their first one. The salespeople used to demonstrate how fast they were by cooking a single russet potato in it (~4 minutes). Of course they didn't bother to tell customers that cooking four potatoes would take longer than cooking just one (which would have been their expectation from experience with conventional ovens. Which seemed fair enough, as even an honest salesperson can't be expected to present the whole truth, but only that part of the truth that advances the sale.

They bought those russets in 50 lb bags, and customers were welcome to take their cooked potato home if they wished, but few did. So, the pay wasn't so great but employees were welcome to take home all the cooked potatoes they could eat.

Gahrie said...

Roe was also amazing.

Well... that's one way of putting it... I'd say fantastical.

I thought you preferred boring?

Greg The Class Traitor said...

Caligula said...
I worked in an appliance store in the late '70s, and practically all microwave buyers were buying their first one.

When we bought our first microwave oven, it came with a class at the store on how to successfully use a microwave oven.

I still use some of the lessons I got from that class