James rosen, we are talking to you on publication day. Congratulations on your new biography of Antonin Scalia, scalia rise to greatness. He was putting on a show, but it was a great show. Why did you choose that quote, and how does it embody Antonin Scalia i . I chose that quote from Antonin Scalias youngest child, the fourth of his four daughters, make cilia, because meg scalia, she said that because he was largerthanlife, to all of us. And then you see in the epigraph, my conservation to this was to ask, he was cognizant that it was largerthanlife. And she said oh yes, he was putting on a show, but it was a great show. Throughout the book, his nickname which conjures up a bold fighter in the rain, despite that he was wellliked. How did he pull off both of these ideas . Scalia had an amazing mind and a crackling wit, and great personal affability. I like to say he was the kid from queens. He grew up on the streets of queens, so he combined and earthy county america chart with an ivy league intellect. And at times he was capable of grandeur, he would shame week shamefully, your piano and start belting out this was carols or showtunes. But at the same time of selfdeprecation and it was a very winning combination. Even when he was nominated to the Supreme Court in 1986, there were certain other circumstances such as the elevation of William Rehnquist and what that would mean. He was elevated 980. The perfection of that boat bothered him, and you can hear him complaining about it as late as 2005. Lets make it a hundred. Why did it bother him . The whole story begins with a previously unpublished account from john bolton, who was a young Reagan Justice department eight at the time, who had to inform scalia of the vote, which are quite special beings because he was a social animal and out on the rubber chicken circuit. John bolton had to find a telephone to tracking him down and deliver the news. And he said congratulations, you have been confirmed, 980. And the battle to get request confirmed from associate justice to chief justice had been successful and arduous that 98 980 was looking good to everyone on the conversation process. On the other line he said something there was silence. Still he asked who didnt vote . Well it was Barry Goldwater and a senator from utah. But isnt this great, you got confirmed. You got confirmed. There was silence and then be. You told me that we couldnt get these two republican nominees yet, at this point bolton told me he got a little irritated and he said concentrating, you know, you have just been confirmed 980, goldwater had gone home sick on the night of the vote, and the utah senator was donating his kidney to his daughter. And finally scalia says thats right, thank you. This is part of how we talked about that he suffers losses he carries us with him. Talk about that later. And when i came back to washington as a reporter in 1999, the first thing i did was right to justice Antonin Scalia and request an interview on fox news. In 1999, fox news was not as wellknown as it would later become. It was not the industry leader. We got confused for but i went out and said that i was offended fox news, he said that he was a fan, but he said that he will does not make himself a spectacle. And i wrote back and i said thank you. But what else could it have been but a spectacle when a sitting Supreme Court justice had gone to the 1980s, which is when i first became aware of him, participating in a pbs program called the constitution, delicate balance where he sits with figures like gerald ford and dan rather and so on to discuss hypothetical situations and how he would deal with them with cameras present and fully with them. And he wrote back and this is where to receive from Antonin Scalia, Supreme Court stationary, i was 30 at the time. You are right. I probably should not have done the constitution and delicate balance despite the fact that i was a friend of the president of cbs news. But we had to off the record of changes, one where we drank wine at his favorite italian restaurant, and he insisted that i eat off his plate. So im shoveling vegetables on his plate, he took me back to his office in his car, and his clerks attested that could be a dicey situation, which i witnessed. And the contents of those ledges will remain off the record as they were intended. But the amusing correspondence that went on for two years and which points at various points he said things to me like you really know how to hurt a fellow. That will be in volume two. Scalia rise to greatness, 19361986, tells the story of his first 15 50 years. Hopefully 50 years from now we will tell the stories of his Supreme Court tenure. How long have you been working on it . Not counting all of the time spent up to now, five years. I just want to stick with that idea of your request. All of those years at the lower court and the high court, he would never allow cspan cameras into his speeches and sometimes organizers of events was say yes and then we would get the word you cannot cover Antonin Scalias speech, but was that all about . What was that all about . If you look at the archives you will see numerous interactions between scalia and his students that whereby cspan. He was not uniform. But he was asked many times by his lifelong friend, no stranger to the fears of his channel about antipathy his antipathy to cameras in the courts. Where the courts were considered and concerned and where the Supreme Court was concerned, scalia felt that while some small segment of the American People would watch gaveltogavel proceedings of the Supreme Court, despite their intrinsic dullness for nonlawyers, most would not. And if there would be a soundbite that would distort the meaning of what they do and reduce it to the most sensational news headline and such. That was the basis for his opposition to cameras in the court. He did not get to get into it at times with embers of the press and famously injected or have confiscated i think typical orders of some reporters or student reporters at one of his events, which will be covered in. 2. An interviewee for this book Justice Scalia very well and said that Justice Scalia knew he had gone too far medication. One last question about structure. Throughout the book you make reference with what feels like a rebuttal to prior biographies, particularly one in one in particular. Why did you do that yet, . I consider this the first accurate portrayal of Antonin Scalia a imprint because it is the first admiring biography of him. They were to existing biographies about Justice Scalia that were published during his lifetime, what of them he cooperated extensively with, the other was one that came out two years later with which he did not cooperate at all, despite the extensive cooperation granted to the first, her book like professor murphys, turned out at the end to be contemptuous of scalias jurisprudence and his philosophy and his conduct on the bench. At almost every face and chapter of his life he is given short shrift or interpreted in the most mendacious light. This benefits from an anonymous wealth of personal documentary sources that were previously unavailable. In giving an accurate account of scalias life up to the age of 50, occasionally it addresses how the previous biographers treated various key phases and events and episodes in scalias life and shows how often they were inaccurate. Lets get into his life. He was born in 1936, what is important to know about his early life . He was born in Trenton New Jersey but moved when he was five to queens new york. And if that is one detail right there that the previous cop biographers both got wrong. This books make book makes use of a secret oral history that he conducted in chambers at the Supreme Court in 1992, while sitting on the court, that was only recently unsealed and he makes it clear he moved when he was five. The previous biographers had it differently. He loves queens, he played all kinds of sports in the streets, stickball, basketball. His parents, his father was an italian immigrant who came here with 400 in his pocket and not speaking english from sicily in 1920. He wound up becoming a professor of romance like witches at a college for 30 years. Scalias mother was the daughter of italian immigrants born in new york city. She was also an Elementary School teacher. There were devout catholics. This book is really the first to explore the depths and devotion of his catholic faith and how it influenced him as he rose to the court. From his immersion in catholicism, he was top in his class at jesuitrun institutions, especially at a rare jesuit military kit college. With his two lips at the hand of his teacher parents, and particularly his father, who is a romance like witches professor who had an innate distrust of translation, and any kind of effort to mess with the text of something, scalia emerged with a reference for text and the miller immutability of certain sacred text. And i think he carried that with him into his practice of law. He was a prevatican ii catholic. What does that mean in terms of how he practiced his faith and his beliefs vatican ii was a series of changes that was enacted by the vatican seen by many traditionalists as liberalizing the church unduly, and Antonin Scalia up like another of my subjects, william f buckley, were both devout catholics. Both of them preferred the highlight in mass, which was sort of ancient and original form of the ceremony. Vatican ii discourage that. One of scalias daughters tells the story in the book, that when they lived in chicago and it was sunday in the early 80s, they were having adventures because to professor scully at that time, he would drive half hours through anything in order to deliver his nine children to a highlight and mask as opposed to any old mass. He have a relationship with opus dei . He did not with himself, but some of his nearest friends and one person who i interviewed who does not show in volume one but will be in volume two, was an opus dei priest who described himself to me as if scalias spiritual advisor when he was a justice on the court. And with whom scalia retreats periodically. Scalias catholicism is central to his identity, and he himself in that secret oral history conducted in 1992 dismissed the idea that his training at the hand of the jesuits shaped decisively his jurisprudential philosophy of text to listen. One of his biographers believed that, and i think that previous accounts have not taken sufficient account of his catholic faith. But he resisted the idea that he was crafting his faith onto his judicial decisions and opinions. It famously said there is no such thing as a catholic hamburger. He said the closest way, the closest thing to a catholic hamburger we have is a hamburger that is perfect they may. We talk about one of those disappointments, such as his application to princeton where he was not accepted. Why did that sting him so much echo . Scalia had demonstrated in academic record that was truly superlative in every respect. And was active in activities, he had a theatrical streak, he performed in that beth and other place and acted alongside Eileen Brennan who went on to fame in private benjamin and other movies, it was kind of a shock to him not to be admitted to princeton. He later said it was one of the few times in his life where he felt the presence of prejudice against his italianamerican roots. It felt that in the interview with the Princeton Alumni they sort of communicative to him and in her mind that he was that the princeton sort. He said that in the oral history and he said that what was met by not the princeton sort, not w asp enough, not the right ethnic background. He came overcame that and went to Harvard Law School and goes to harvard for his proud parents in queens, it was quite something. s second choice was georgetown under the jesuits and with socratic method. You write was a different school, then. And he learned that he should approach all his earthly endeavors from the perspective of devout catholic system. Can you tell me more about that . If you look at the cure books from his time in georgetown, jack yearbooks from his time in georgetown, its wildly different than it is from today. There were marchers in the ropes by catholic priests and clergy and the faculty that the students witnessed at the very beginning of the semester and so on. Scalia ate all of that up. He was grateful for the jesuit influence the rest of his i think he was dismayed that the nature of jesuit practice changed over time and became in his view less rigorous. More committed to what might be considered liberal ideologies. He was valedictorian and you said that he was considered appropriate priesthood after he graduated but instead chose law school at harvard. There you write it was the end incubator of his originalism. Lets talk about originalism with Antonin Scalia a. What does that mean for him. As judge scalia on the d. C. Circuit court of a p a, one robot run below the Supreme Court, launched a revolution in how judges pursue their business. What is the Central Business of a charge . They interpret constitutional provision judge . They interpret constitutional provision and argue over the law, whether between the government in a corporation or individuals and turned to the courts and say what does the law mean from their different perspectives scalias approach to what we would call statutory interpretation, the Central Business of the judge is to interpret a law means, was originalism. It was a revolution when he came along, because until he came along, then prepared prevailed what liberals called the living constitution, the idea that the constitution is a living, breathing document that expands as needed. And as interpreted by judges and justices. To accommodate modern phenomenon that the Founding Fathers never could have envisioned suggestive their weapons or the internet. Scalia stood up for all that. Apart from that. He looked for things that were extraneous, the original tent behind the law, not just the text. What did they meet, what did they say in their debates on the house floor, what did they commit in their putting the committee reports. Scalia said all that is extraneous. If you want to note the original intent of the Founding Fathers, have a president who signed a law into law, take a look at the text. That is the intent. To find the original meeting of a law, which is what a judge is supposed to do, scalia said look at the text. If the text is vague, lets look at tradition and practice. Today, very few lawyers when they are arguing cases before the Supreme Court or submitting their briefs, begin with some discussion of legislative history and what the intent of the legislature was. They begin, as he urged, with a consideration of the text in original meaning. To the point where even Supreme Court justices, who had great friendships with Antonin Scalia up just like with Bader Ginsburg at ruth gator bait ruth Bader Ginsburg had, it influenced the way judges worked and courts worked, in every way of american life. That alone makes scalia one of the most important americans of the last 100 years. Two sides of the same coin. You can dance in the head of a pin with this. There are many views on this. My view on this is that where the constitution and its divisions were concerned, and ditto for statute passed a year ago, 10 years ago, 50 years ago, scalias approach was the same. He wanted to know what the original meeting was. What was it understood to mean at the time, that is the original meeting meeting. The first resort is the text. I say that textualism is what he used. He was introduced to maureen mccarthy, and proposed 90 days after they met. They had not spent a whole lot of time together because he was coming for finals as a harvard law students student. Maureen is a central character in this book, scalia rise to greatness. The former secretary of labor, their son, said to me, their oldest son and noted attorney in his own right, said to meet you are writing a book about my father. And he said there are a lot of Supreme Court justices who made a mark. But i cannot think of too many other people i could point to who did what my mom did, meaning Maureen Scalia, as that justice himself like to say, he raised this these kids with little help from me. And he said that i tended to handle the constitution, she handled everything else. It was an extraordinary burden, they raised nine children. It was not a nonentity, not in nonfigure, he was a very handson dad. He was home for dinner every night as he made clear to me. But he, it was Maureen Scalia who really raised the kids day today and knew their teachers were and make sure they associated with the right kids, and looked after their clothes, and asks gilly career vices, as we track his progress, we see that his work inevitably requires more absences from home traveling to conferences, speaking on this panel and what have you, and just in the year 1976, when the kids ranging in age from eight to less than a year old to 25 years of age, he would be overweight for 60 away for 60 days at a time. These are the hardest days for Maureen Scalia. But she really deserves a biography in her own right, she is an American Hero with how she writes that family. What was the essence of their elation ship, what brought them together . One of their daughters stated that marine scalia was as smart as or dare