Transcripts For CSPAN3 The 20240703 : vimarsana.com

My name is jamie bosket have the privilege of serving as president and ceo here at the Virginia Museum of history and culture. And im honored to be the first to officially welcome you to tonights program. Thank you so much for joining us this evening. We are so pleased to be copresenting this timely discussion with our friends at the John Marshall center for constitutional history and civics. Im also pleased to serve on that board. The John Marshall center. But thats not the most important reason why collaboration. These two organizations is such a natural we have shared values in a shared history after all, chief justice John Marshall, as many of you know, was the very first president of this historic society, civics and history are fundamentally linked and alike, essential for an engaged citizenry. So thrilled to present this program together, i just have to take a sidebar because just the other day i was looking at the civics study presented annually by the annenberg Public Policy center, the university of pennsylvania, and thinking about it in the context of having a robust about being in our in our government, they do this every year on constitution day. This national survey. And it wasnt pretty to say the least less than half less than half 7 of of us adults could name all three branches of government. Only one in four respondents could name a Single Branch asked to name the rights protected by the First Amendment people at a loss less than one in four 24 could name freedom of religion. This is a time for educational organizations like the mhc, like the John Marshall center, to keep everything we can, everything we can to inform and engage virginians, americans and everyone who listen, who is fortunate enough to be in this wonderful country. So were going to keep all great work and we can do that together and were thrilled to do it and thrilled to put on such an Engaging Program that hits on these very topics tonight. So thank you to all of the members of the Virginia Museum of history and culture, also to the members of the joe Marshall Center for empowering us to do this collective good work. Its my pleasure to make for tonights program to invite my fellow trustee of the joe Marshall Center forward paul harris to introduce our speakers. Thank you so much. For. Good evening. Good evening. I have the distinct privilege this evening of introducing our distinguished moderator and our distinguished panelists, two of whom are former colleagues from the department of justice and a new friend. And don verrilli, delighted to have all of them with us this evening. Ill begin by introducing our distinguished moderator, professor allison or larsen is a professor of law and director of the william and Mary Institute of the bill of law. Since joining the william and mary law faculty in 2010, professor larsen has received many awards honoring her teaching and scholarship, including the statewide outstanding faculty award in the rising star category. This is virginias highest faculty honor. She is a scholar of constitutional law and legal institutions with focus on how information dynamics affect both. Her work on facts that. Finding at the Supreme Court has been featured multiple times in the new york times. The washington and the wall street journal, and was also the subject of her testimony. The Senate Judiciary committee. In april 2002nd 2021. Professor larsen has published in the nations top law reviews and her work has been cited by four different u. S. Courts of appeals. She appeared with Stephen Colbert as a guest on the colbert report to discuss her scholarship. She also has a little fun. Her scholarship on Supreme Court amicus briefs a subject on which she has also testified before the president ial commission on Supreme Court reform. Professor larsen earned her bachelor of arts degree from william and mary and her law degree from the university virginia, where she grad graduated first in her class after law school, professor larsen clerked for judge j. Wilkinson of the u. S. Court of appeals for the Fourth Circuit and for Justice David souter of United States Supreme Court. Professor larsen, thank you for. I will introduce panelists in the order in which they serve as solicitor general paul. Paul d clement was the 43rd solicitor general of the United States. Mr. Clement is a partner at the claimant and Murphy Law Firm and distinguish lecturer and in law at the Georgetown University law center. Mr. Clement served as solicitor general from june 2005 until june 2008, before his confirmation as solicitor general. Mr. Clement served as acting solicitor general general for nearly a year and as Principal Deputy solicitor general for over three years. He has argued over 100 cases before the United States Supreme Court. Mr. Clement practice areas focused on appellate matters, constitutional litigation and strategic counseling. Represents a broad array of clients the Supreme Court and in federal and state appellate courts. Last year, he successfully argued Supreme Court cases involving significant issues of energy regulation, statute jury interpretation, state sovereign immunity and article three standing and successfully argued a trademark appeal in Fourth Circuit and the constitution and all appeal before the en banc 11th circuit. Mr. Clement, his bachelor of science degree, summa cum laude from George Town University school of foreign service, a master of philosophy degree from Darwin College at cambridge and juris doctor magna cum laude from harvard law school, where he was Supreme Court editor of the harvard law review. Following law school, mr. Clement clerked for judge laurence h of the Us Court Appeals for the d. C. Circuit and for Justice Antonin Scalia of the United States Supreme Court. After his clerkships, he went on to serve as chief counsel of the us subcommittee on the constitution on federalism and Property Rights. Please help me welcome mr. Clement. To the corporate governance. Donald beaver junior was the 46th solicitor general of the united. Mr. Verrilli is a partner in the law firm tolles and olson and the founder of its washington, dc office. Mr. Verrilli is also a lecturer law at Columbia Law School, where he teaches classes on the First Amendment and the Supreme Court. Previously, he taught Amendment Law for many years at the Georgetown University law center. Mr. Verrilli is one of the nations premier Supreme Court and appellate advocates. He served as solicitor general of United States from june 2011 to june 2016, before serving as solicitor general. Mr. Verrilli served as Deputy White House and previously as associate Deputy Attorney general in the United States department of justice. In those positions, he counsel the president obama cabinet secretaries and other senior government officials on a wide range of legal issues involving national security, economic regulation, domestic policy and the scope of executive and authority. Mr. Verrilli earned his bachelor of arts degree cum laude from the yale. From yale. Yale university and his juris doctor degree with honors from Columbia Law School where he was editor in chief of the columbia law review. Please help me welcome mr. Verrilli. And but certainly not least Noel Francisco was the 47th solicitor general of the United States. Mr. Francisco is the partner in charge of the washington, an office of the jones de law firm. Mr. Francisco served as solicitor general from 2017 to 2020. He represents clients in a broad array of civil and criminal litigation challenges to federal and state laws and regulations and government. Invest negations and enforcement actions. The matters he handles often have significant Public Policy implications, including in the areas of Global Climate change opioids, asbestos, tobacco, firearms health care, Administrative Law free speech, religious liberty and separation of powers. He earned his bachelor of arts degree in economics with honors from the university of chicago and his juris doctor with high, also from the university of chicago. After law school, mr. Francisco served as a law clerk to Justice Antonin Scalia, the United States Supreme Court. And before that he served as a law clerk to judge j. Michael on the us court of appeals for the Fourth Circuit. Later mr. Francisco served as Deputy Assistant attorney general in the office of Legal Counsel at the Us Department of justice, and prior to that as associate counsel to the president of the United States. Please help me welcome mr. Francisco. Ali over to you. All right. Thank you so much, paul. Well, yall are in for a treat tonight, have you . Have you ever seen when they do a hollywood promo and they say all star . This is an all star cast of is okay with a lot of lawyers. So you heard from paul that these are three former solicitor general of the united. So i thought wed just give you a little bit of context for why thats such a big deal and what that means. The office of the solicitor general supervise and conduct litigation on behalf of the United States in front of the us court. And they are very busy because approximately two thirds of the cases that the Supreme Court hears on the merits involve the United States. So the s. G. Thats what we say, the s. G. , the solicitor general, has been called the 10th justice and the reason for that is because that office has developed over time a reputation of fairness and a reliability. I know when i clerk there we always picked up the debris first. Thats the brief. And so i think its really important. And what were going to do tonight is talk a little bit about the history of that office. And heres some more stories along the way. I hope. So lets just start off with some some basics. Whats it whats it like to prepare for a Supreme Court r oral argument today . And then maybe we can draw some comparisons to earlier years. Im guessing its kind of hard. Whats the hardest part about it. Huh . Well, so, you know, one, its hard all the way around, but you know, the hardest part about it is, at least for me, there are cases when youre solicitor general that you have to argue where you know you are going to lose. You know, youve got it. Youve got to go in there and represent the position United States. But, you know, youre going to lose and you might well get your head beaten in and like but cant go up to the lectern thinking that way. So actually getting yourself in the position where by the time you stand up there to argue case, you actually believe that theres complete deadlock there of a case that you have to argue your right about. Thats always for me was the was probably the most challenging of it just trying to deal with that how. Do you all agree that that is certainly a big part of it . The first thing id say is that, you know, often people refer to the solicitor general as the temp justice. I have never heard a Supreme Court justice thats has become justice. But what don said is right. One of the parts of being the solicitor general is that sometime, you know, youre going to youve got a case and your position is just locked in because youre representing the government. But there are good ways to lose and bad ways to lose. And sometimes when im not, im only joking. Sometimes youre trying to guide the to a way to rule against you thats going to do the least amount of damage to the governments institutional and actually the very case i ever argued in the Supreme Court was against don and it was big separation of powers case where it was pretty clear that the court was leaning favor of my client on the bottom line position. It had to do with the president s recess appointment authority, but there were two ways that i could win that case. One was a very broad rule that would have called into question a lot of recess appointments. And the other was a very narrow rule where my client would have one, but nonetheless it wouldnt have a broad impact on the government. On the governments functioning Going Forward and i always use that as an example that i point to about a solicitor general standing up in real he doing a powerful job of pushing the court towards against him. But in a way that was the best for the government to lose in that case and done was Just Brilliant when he when he argued that basically by saying pay no attention to that issue. You know, if you want to rule against me on that, im okay with that. I would say those words. But and and and we got precisely zero votes on that issue. So and ill just add, you know, first on the on the 10th justice thing, those the nine real justices dont talk about the sc that way. One of our illustrious predecessors, the late drew days, talked about the s. G. As the 36 law clerk to justices. And i think that sort of captures the relationship and the power dynamic a little bit more accurately. But there is that kind of close relationship and its borne partially of fact that, you know, it is a coordinate branch of government thats being represented by the solicitor general. But its also more practically borne of the fact that you are a repeat player there. As you alluded to, the sgs in like two thirds of the courts cases. But you also have kind of institutional interest and youre going to be back up there maybe on the same issue. I mean, during my time in the office, i probably argued four or five cases involving sort of issues arising out of the war on terror. But i also argued four or five ish cases involving to the Campaign Finance laws. And its just a, you know, in in that context, when you go be back up there on similar issues in a couple of months. You have a different relationship with the court than you do if you are just there for a private company as their as their lawyer. And this this really gets to what both don and noel were getting at, which is, you know, preparing argument for any client is difficult. I mean, you know, next next month, im going to be arguing a about, you know, patent law thats difficult. So so always a daunting task to get to present argument to the Supreme Court. But in some ways, its an even more daunting task for the lawyers in yesterdays office, because i think they are charged with this kind of knowledge of the broader institutional interests and priorities of the executive branch and the government. And thats why this idea of sort of losing a case the right way that doesnt really translate to private practice very well. I mean, in private practice, if lose, you lose and telling a client in private practice, well, we actually picked the best way to lose this case is that its not that does not get you hired for the sequel. Okay. But in the government, thats thats a thing because you going to be up there and if you lose know like in just to take an example and kind you know from the cases i was talking about if you lose the first case, thats a challenge to the Campaign Finance laws but you lose it in a way that you can win, some subsequent ones. Thats a much better result for the government than losing sort of the first one in a way that makes you kind of hopeless Going Forward. So that really is, you know, an important part of the dynamic and it is what makes arguing cases in yesterdays office, if anything, even a little more challenging. So when you watch an oral argument today, its especially with lawyers like we have in front of us. Its conversational. If its done right. Is that always been the case or oral argument in front of the court . Change . Like whats like sort of a take us on a historical tour, paul, maybe you can start us off. Sure. And you know, i mean, i love, you know, part of the reason i was so happy to come here today