Nina Totenberg on Marty Ginsburg

My former boss, NPR’s Nina Totenberg, has written a short and sweet story about Marty and Ruth Bader Ginsburg:

On the last day of the Supreme Court term, less than 24 hours after her husband had died, an ashen-faced Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg announced her opinion for the court in one of the term’s major cases. She was on the bench, she told colleagues, because “Marty would have wanted it this way.”

This piece is not just the work of a reporter, but also of a friend.  Nina has been close with the Ginsburgs dating back over three decades to Justice Ginsburg’s days as a pioneering lawyer for gender equality at the ACLU.

“The Story” w/ Dick Gordon Interview

I just got back from Doe v. Reed.  A really great bout to end this term’s oral arguments.  I’ll have my ABA Journal piece up later today.

In the meantime, check out my interview on American Public Media’s “The Story” with Dick Gordon.  The segment begins at 31:00.  If you’d rather go terrestrial, click here to find airtimes for “The Story” on your local NPR affiliate.

Finally, Justice Kennedy made me eat my words with his opinion in in Salazar v. Buono. No time to do an opinion analysis on it right now, other than to note how fractured the majority coalition was:

KENNEDY, J., announced the judgment of the Court and delivered an opinion, in which ROBERTS, C. J., joined, and in which ALITO, J., joined in part. ROBERTS, C. J., filed a concurring opinion. ALITO, J., filed an opinion concurring in part and concurring in the judgment. SCALIA, J., filed an opinion concurring in the judgment, in which THOMAS, J., joined. STEVENS, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which GINSBURG and SOTOMAYOR, JJ., joined. BREYER, J., filed a dissenting opinion.

For more on Buono, check out Josh Blackman’s instant analysis.

Samantar v. Yousuf

Had I had any gas left in the tank after Monday/yesterday’s 26-hour vigil, I’d have gotten back in line for this morning’s case, Samantar v. Yousuf.  But after I submitted my ABA Journal piece on McDonald last night, my body and mind shouted “no más.”

Samantar does look to be a very interesting case that sadly flew under the radar this term.  In lieu of F1@1F coverage, check out the following links:

• “A California Reckoning in a Case of Abuses Abroad,” NYT 1/30/10
• “At 74, Fairfax resident, a former Solamali prime minister, may face war-crimes lawsuit,” WaPo 3/2/10
• “Can Torture Victims Sue Their Tormenters?” NPR 3/3/10 – Nina Totenberg’s preview from today’s Morning Edition

As I publish this post, the respondent’s counsel should be fielding the justices’ questions.  Once the SCOTUS press corps starts publishing their oral argument write-ups, I’ll link to them here.