You may have heard last week’s conversation on the Supreme Court.
Well, there’s something about the Supreme Court that gets listeners’ attention. I received a lot of follow-up questions – so many, that I wished I had immediate access to another constitutional scholar.
Turns out, I did.
I already had recorded the second half of the conversation you’ll hear today with Robert Tsai. Tsai is Professor of Law at American University and a prize-winning essayist in constitutional law and history. Previously, he clerked for two federal judges and worked civil rights lawyer in Georgia. He has written three books, the most recent of which is Practical Equality: Forging Justice in a Divided Nation.
When we consider remedies to the various inequalities that define these times – from voting restrictions and oppressive measures against migrants to the rights of sexual minorities, victims of police action, and even racism in the criminal justice system – existing laws to address equality are often incomplete.
But in exploring the Constitution and reexamining important historical cases, Tsai explains how legal ideas that aren’t necessarily about equality at all — ensuring fair play, acting reasonably, avoiding cruelty, and protecting free speech — have been used to overcome inequality in the past and can serve as potent alternative tools to promote equality today.
Simply, Tsai offers a distinct view and outlines the possible innovative legal measures to overcome injustice.
But with all the comments from last week’s podcast, I asked Robert for a favor – would he be willing to do a quick update call where I could ask him some of the Supreme Court follow-ups I got from listeners. He agreed, so here it is.
For show notes & my newsletter, go to chrisriback.com
Jules Witcover, author of "The American Vice Presidency: From Irrelevance to Power"
Sam Wang, Founder of Princeton Election Consortium
Nate Silver, FiveThirtyEight
Chuck McCutcheon and David Mark, authors of "Dog Whistles, Walk-Backs and Washington Handshakes"
John Avlon, Editor in Chief of The Daily Beast, author of "Wingnuts"
John Dean, author of The Nixon Defense
Alex Lundry
Noam Bramson, Mayor of New Rochelle
Willy Jay on the Supreme Court term
Carroll Doherty, Pew Research Center
David Wasserman, Cook Political Report
Doug Schoen, Democratic pollster
Philip Howard, author of "The Rule of Nobody"
Ken Vogel, author of Big Money
Joe Lockhart, former White House Press Secretary
Nate Cohn, The Upshot/New York Times
Mike McCurry, former White House press secretary
Michael D. Shear, White House Correspondent at the New York Times
Jonathan Alter, executive producer of Alpha House
Jon Ralston, Ralston Reports
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