Posted on 03/08/2006 7:32:14 PM PST by SmithL
Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts delivered a warm homage Wednesday to Ronald Reagan, describing the former president he worked for in the 1980s as an influence on his life as well as history.
"He was a great communicator because he communicated great ideas," Roberts told a standing-room only audience at the Reagan Presidential Library.
In a 30-minute speech laced with personal anecdotes from his days as a White House lawyer, Roberts credited Reagan for his vision, his optimism, his determination and his human touch.
He quoted from a letter he wrote to Reagan two decades ago, as he was preparing to leave the White House for private practice. "The inspiration you have given me will burn brightly in my heart long after I have left the lights of the White House behind," Roberts said, reading from the April 1986 letter.
Roberts, 51, served in the Reagan White House and Justice Department as a young lawyer.
In his speech and a brief question-and-answer session, the chief justice also touched briefly on his judicial philosophy, echoing his testimony before the Senate in last year's confirmation hearings. He also conceded being a little anxious his first day on the job last year.
After the pomp and ceremony of being sworn in, he said, he immediately had to start conducting business in the formal confines of the high court.
"I was very nervous that I wouldn't do that that right, and I wouldn't call the case right and recognize the lawyers," he said.
In his first major speech since being sworn in, Roberts addressed a crowd of nearly 900 people in a cavernous hall lined with presidential portraits. He was invited by former first lady Nancy Reagan to deliver a tribute to Reagan at the hilltop library where the former president is buried.
(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...
Roberts is a great Chief Justice.
It's too bad Reagan went away like he did.
We need him right now.
Let all the people complaining about Bush right now remember that it could have been President Kerry filling the vacancies of Rehnquist and O'Connor.
Roberts is this President's Legacy.
I think you mean to say Roberts is one of the few bright spots of GW's legacy. He's got a lot of crap for a legacy as well, but I agree that Roberts seems to be a very decent and good man. Hopefully Alito pans out, too.
Anyone who hasn't been the Reagan Library should make a trip. It is a great collection, well organized, and entertainingly presented. Even school kids will enjoy it. And walking through AF1 is a piece of history unmatched even by anything in the Smithsonian. I don't know how long they will let visitors in with such limited shielding to protect the plane's seating areas. (Good docents prevent abuse, but it is an incredibly intimate brush with history.)
I left wishing I had a few hours more to linger, and will return.
Incidentally, I read a funny little bit about Roberts, I forget the publication, I was at the gym. Anyway, back when Roberts was arguing cases before the SCOTUS, he had a client with a very weak case. He presented the case and his client lost, 9-0. The client asked why he had lost 9-0, to which Roberts replied, "Because there are only 9 justices."
That sounds like a great time. I hope to visit someday whenever I finally take my wife to see California.
The plane is something I'm going to have to go see. Used to go to the Reagan Library every couple of months. Just missed seeing the plane this past summer when I went to pay my respects at the grave.
Reagan ping
If all the people surrounding Bush were as good at their jobs as John Roberts, the President would be re-elected to a third term.
Buck up. Reagan would tell you it wasn't him, it's the ideas. It's the people. It's America. We are the bright shining city on the hill:
Whatever else history may say about me when I’m gone, I hope it will record that I appealed to your best hopes, not your worst fears; to your confidence rather than your doubts. My dream is that you will travel the road ahead with liberty’s lamp guiding your steps and opportunity’s arm steadying your way. - Ronald Reagan, Republican National Convention (1992)
BTW ? George Allen has my vote and support in 2008.
I delight in the fact that John Roberts may be Chief Justice for the next 25 years - or longer.
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