Episode 115: Elizabeth T. Clement
Chief Justice of the Michigan Supreme Court
00:41:56
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Show Notes
Justice Elizabeth T. Clement, the new Chief Justice of the Michigan Supreme Court, sits down with host MC Sungaila to discuss her wide-ranging legal career, from family law to Chief Legal Counsel in the state's Executive Branch and her current role as an elected member of the state's highest court and leader of the state's court system as Chief Justice.
Relevant episode links:
Elizabeth Clement , Chief Justice McCormack – Past episode
About Elizabeth T. Clement:
Elizabeth T. Clement
Justice Elizabeth T. Clement joined the Michigan Supreme Court on November 17, 2017. Clement serves as the Court’s co-liaison to the State Court Administrative Office Department of Child Welfare Services. Clement also represents the Michigan Supreme Court on the Governor’s Juvenile Justice Task Force. In addition to her role with Child Welfare and Juvenile Justice, Clement serves as the liaison to the 199 Problem-Solving Courts in the state of Michigan and the Michigan Judicial Institute and is a member of the Michigan Judicial Council. Problem-Solving Courts include drug and sobriety, mental health, veterans, and other nontraditional courts.
Transcript
On this episode, I'm thrilled to have join us an Associate (now Chief) Justice on the Michigan Supreme Court, Elizabeth Clement, welcome.
Thanks for having me.
Thanks for joining the show and lending your story and journey to the knowledge law students will have and those who are hopefully considering going to law school. I wanted to start at the beginning, at least as far as the legal journey in terms of what inspired you to study law, go to law school and become a lawyer to begin with.
It's a fun story. My favorite teacher of all time was Mr. Ball in eighth grade. For years, he had eighth-grade students write a letter to themselves that he would mail to them when they graduated from high school. It's where do you see yourself when you're done with grade school and high school? Where are you headed to? In that letter, I wrote that I was going to be going to college, to law school, and I wanted to be a lawyer and a judge one day. The funny thing about this is I come from a family of no lawyers.
In fact, my I was the first person to go to college and graduate from my family. We had no lawyers other than my dad's best friend. I always loved hanging out with him and hearing stories. I didn't have a good sense of what being a lawyer was or even what being a judge was. It was probably from television at that point. I got that letter in the mail when I graduated from high school. A lot of things had changed, but my plans hadn't changed. I love Political Science and the government. I was still planning on going to law school. I did. Throughout my education, I had an insane curiosity to research and read. That's probably what drove me to go to law school and want to be a lawyer.
I don't know where I got the idea from either, but suddenly I had the idea quite young. I was like, “This is what I'm going to do.” The same thing, everyone is looking like, “Where'd you get that idea? There are no lawyers in the family. Where did this come from?” I don't know, maybe it was TV, novels or something. I don't know where I got that idea, but it turned out to be right. What a neat teacher. Sometimes we have such great teachers in our background who do things like that to see, “Am I on the same track? What's going on?”
I've had many great educators throughout my life, but that's one that always stays in my mind because it makes you think about your future. As a young person, you're constantly doing that, but putting it in writing and then reflecting on it later is fascinating.
It's such a great thing. Some of it, we don't realize until years later how impactful they've been in how they've helped us grow, but it's nice to have good teachers like that. Political Science, law, and the bench, which is an interesting one, that's pretty specific. It turned out to be a very good prognostication on your part. That's good.
I don't know where I came up with it, but it worked out. The interesting thing is when I went to law school, I worked in government between undergrad and law school. I went to law school and I was always anticipating going back into government law. Once I got into law school, I understood more about legal practice and what I was interested in. The thought of being a judge was gone. It didn't come back for years after I was practicing. I was planning on going back into government law until I had yet again another incredible teacher that challenged me and pushed me.
I took a Family Law class. It’s something that I had never been interested in. I fell in love with it. I love the opportunity to help people at some of the most difficult times in their lives. I am thankful that I had that class because I ended up working, getting an internship at Legal Aid and having firsthand experience with individuals working through family law issues. I went into private practice instead of going back to government law right out of law school. I did that for almost five years. One of the things I'm most grateful for is the opportunity to work with families and practice and have that day-to-day interaction with real people.
That's interesting of having a plan but being open to adjusting that plan as you find other interesting things along the way. That's one of the neat things you can go to law school, having some impression or image of what it is you want to do. That's good because that keeps you going. You need a larger vision because it can be challenging, but then, saying, “I discovered this new thing that's interesting too. I'd like to try that for a little while.”
That's important for either law students or people that are thinking about going to law school or even new lawyers to keep in mind. When I talk to young people, that's what I tell them. You don't have to know what you want to do. If you think you want to go in a direction, that's great, but stay open-minded. Find the things that you definitely don't want to do. If you take a tax class and you say, “I do not like this,” that's okay. Have that in your column of, “Things that I don't want to do,” but be open to everything else because how many lawyers do you know that have changed their career path multiple times? It's rare nowadays that you see a lawyer that does one area and has done that for 40 years.
You hear of many people who maybe practice, then they stop practicing and go into another field, or that even while they're practicing in one area, something ignites a passion in them and they change direction. Being open-minded throughout your legal career is important. You're going to law school to learn how to be a lawyer and think about things differently than you do before you enter law school. It's those tools that are going to get you to where you need to be in your career.
I hope that one of the things that people come away with from the show is the evolution of people's careers within the law, that the law is a big tent and a lot of different things to do within it or even outside it that the legal training is helpful for. Sometimes, especially in law school, you're anxious and are like, “If I go this one path, then that's the path to do. There's only one path to go, and that path is going to lead in the right direction.
If I vary from that somehow, I'm not going to succeed.” It's the opposite because you want to see what's meaningful to you. Also, as you change as a person, there might different things that are interesting at different points in time or even putting the different skills together that you've had throughout your career can lead to yet another opportunity, which wouldn't have been such a good fit unless you had all of these things, which seemed maybe disparate at the time. Still, they come together to create that opportunity.
That is especially true for my career. I practiced family law for almost five years. I did go back to government law. I worked in the legislature for a number of years and the executive branch for the governor, all of this before I was appointed and joined the Michigan Supreme Court. Now that I'm in the position that I'm in, it's all of those experiences that I had throughout my career leading up to that make me unique in what I have to offer on the court. It’s what I'm able to participate in and what I'm able to give back in my role, not just on the cases that we hear, but much more on the administrative side and what we do for the administration of justice in Michigan.
I'm glad you said that specifically because I was thinking about that, particularly for the judicial role and for the Supreme Court role. You have many different types of cases that come before you. It's good to have an experience with a range of different things when you come to the court. That's a plus. The second part you mentioned is something that Chief Justice McCormack had also pointed out in her episode, which was this important role that I don't think that people always think about certainly, even I think lawyers don't think about that a specialist Supreme Courts, State Supreme Courts have in terms of administering justice and administering the court system that being an important aspect of what Supreme Court justices do as well.
It's incredibly important, especially in the state of Michigan, where our constitution has one court of justice and the Supreme Court is responsible for all of the rules that the public and the courts have to follow. We also have a lot of other administrative duties and liaisons to our problem-solving courts like mental health, veteran, drug and alcohol courts, child welfare and juvenile justice, and our training at the Michigan Judicial Institute.
I wear these different hats and work with all of the tremendous staff that we have to support, assist and understand what the trial courts are dealing with on a day-to-day basis and making sure that we're doing whatever we can to make sure that when the public is interacting with the courts because that's where they interact with them the most. It's rare for your case to come to the Supreme Court. It's usually at the district, circuit or probate court level. Our role in making sure that that's all working in the most efficient way and the best way to serve the public is one of the things that I'm frankly the most passionate about with the job I get to do.
We call the problem-solving courts collaborative courts out here in California, but they're impactful to the individuals who go through those courts and to the ripple effect of that to the rest of the community from engaging people back in their lives and moving forward.
They're incredible. It's amazing to see the shift in the legal field in the last many years. It's one of those things that's threaded through my whole legal career. When I was in private practice, they were just getting started. When I went back and I was working in the legislature, we were working on pilot legislation to get these up and running. When I worked in the governor's office, I worked on funding for our problem-solving courts. Now being on the court for the last years as the liaison, I feel like it's touched every step of my career and seeing the impact that it has on many individuals who, without these programs, don't know where they would be.
It's such a holistic approach. Instead of treating individuals that are interacting with the justice system in this traditional way where you put them on probation and you do not understand what those underlying issues are, addressing those and the shift that we see in the judiciary to look at these things differently and to have this more wraparound approach. It's fascinating. It's one of the things that I'm the most proud of our branch of government, being able to shift and make that change in the last several decades.
I was going to ask you if you had experience, particularly with those courts prior to being on the bench because it seems like you want to bring your previous experience to the work you're doing. I'm glad you said that because I was wondering about that. That's such a good illustration of the different roles you can play as a lawyer within the legal system and how many different parts of that you touched on in different roles at the legislative role, policy and now at the court to see that implemented and to see it all the way through. It exemplifies all the different things that you can do on the lawn and where it's evolving.
Noella Sudbury, who runs Rasa Public Benefit Corporation in Utah, has a similar experience in that. She worked on policy with regard to expungement and, expungement laws in Utah. Her company helps those who want to implement those laws in getting their records expunged and getting them access to do that without a lawyer. That's another example of all the different parts you can play in one particular area of the law. It's exciting to see it come to fruition.
You never know how, when you're working on something how it can translate. Even if you're done with it, it might be several years later that all of a sudden, there's an opportunity and it presents itself. That's how I feel like it's been for me. It's amazing how many things cycle back and I'm like, “Oh.”
I didn't know this would be helpful again, but it's a helpful perspective for the next phase of this. Tell me about the Supreme Court's role. I know you talked about having an interest in becoming a judge, but in most cases, it isn't one thing specifically or directly about how it is that you decided to apply or run for the Supreme Court.
It’s another interesting story. Before I joined the court, I worked for the governor. I was the governor's chief legal counsel. I worked for him for about seven years. A portion of the work that I did was judicial appointments at all levels of the judiciary. I had been involved in several Supreme Court appointments and had worked on one prior to mine, the one that I ended up filling that vacancy. I say that I think I was lucky. It was at the right time and the right place. There was a woman on the Michigan Supreme Court that the president had nominated for the Sixth Circuit.
The governor felt strongly because there were only two women on Michigan Supreme Court at that time that he wanted to fill that position with a female. Awe had struggled to find female candidates that were interested. From my experience doing judicial appointments, there were several factors. We had women that would've been fantastic, but they were either at a point in their career where they couldn't step away, either financially or personally and/or they were trying to see that I take that on and it's not just the right time in my career. A big part of it is the way that Michigan does things. You have to run for a statewide election.
When running for Supreme Court, you have to be at a point in your career where you can't step away because of financial or personal reasons.
It's not for everyone. I think there were a lot of highly qualified women that said, “I don't know anything about that world, and I'm not interested in it,” which is understandable. I had worked for the governor for seven years. He knew my work and how I did things. I expressed to him that I was interested. I went through the regular process through the state bar getting and was lucky to receive the appointment. Why, at that time, was I interested?
I worked in state government for a long period of time, also in the legislative and executive branches. I felt that with the expansive legal issues that I had worked on, working with both sides of the aisle trying to find a compromise in appellate court where you have to find that compromise, I felt that I could do that job and do it well, which is why I put my name forward and was interested. At that time, I don't think I appreciated it, even though I had worked on a lot of statewide campaigns. I don't think I had any idea what it was like being a candidate running for statewide.
Sometimes it's good that we don't know the full extent of things when we go forward and put ourselves in play because if we knew, we might have said no.
Even in everything that I did know, I think I probably had way more knowledge than many people did and I still was like, “What is this? This is crazy.” It's a good thing that we have eight-year terms and we forget about that whole process before we have to do it again.
That's one of the interesting things on the show is that each state does things differently in terms of appointing or electing judges at different levels and having various commissions that vet in advance prior to a governor appointment or not. There are many different ways to doing it. One of the questions is exactly that, which is, are you, if it's an election situation, it's good to know that, and then are you willing to do that? It's not something that I think people who are interested in serving on the bench are interested in being a candidate in that kind of setting. It doesn't match.
If you have to run and campaign, it seems unnatural for a judicial candidate or a judge to be doing that, whether it's raising money or out there promoting yourself. It doesn't mesh well.
It doesn't seem to mesh. Certainly, someone interested in serving on the bench that way wouldn't be your first inclination to run for election for something. On the other hand, you had been through the seen candidates and gone through that review process with the governor. At least you had that background. It’s totally different when it's you in that in that candidate position.
Also, the running. I had an interesting election because I was appointed, and then I had to run the very next year. In my first year on the bench, we had some high-profile cases. I had folks that were originally supportive of my candidacy that were not pleased with what they were. What they were expecting would be my decision-making. It was a pretty rocky election. I was successful and made it through. In addition to a statewide election, I had that on top.
It's always a concern because you want that judicial independence. That's important.
It was the most important thing to me. I wouldn't even say willing, but I didn't care if I lost. The governor appointed me. I took my oath very seriously. I was going to do my job, whether it was for one year or whether I won the election, and I was going to be on for eight years. Judicial independence, to me, is the most important thing. This election process can cause conflict because I think some people may feel that they have to deliver to have that support for an election. It's not the way that the judiciary should work. That's one branch that should be outside that process.
I'm wondering if in that whole process, the challenges to judicial independence in the election, did you find a strength that you didn't know you had in going through that or you sound like you were pretty firm, like, “I'm going to do my job. This is the way to do this job wherever the chips fall.”
I think probably a combination of both. I'm reflecting now back four years. It's probably easier for me to reframe it a little bit. If I were to put myself back to that time when that was going on, I think I found strength in myself that I maybe hoped that I had but hadn't been challenged to that degree professionally. I think it was a combination of the two, but it was almost like once I said, “This is the decision I'm making in this case, and it doesn't matter what support I lose or who I upset because I'm doing this.” Once I made that decision, I was 100%t forward. It’s a good balance of the two was something that presented a challenge that was put before me and I'm thankful that I had the strength to rise to it.
We hope we will. We don't know until we're tested. It's like, “I have that. Perfect.” I hoped it would be that way, but now that you've been on the Supreme Court for a few years, what kind of tips do you have for advocates before the court, whether it's an oral argument, brief writing, or both?
I do a lot of moot court judging, helping students and events where we're talking about oral advocacy. The thing that I notice the most is that effective oral advocates are always the ones that are listening to what is being asked and answering that, especially if you are the second lawyer to go, and listening to the questions that the judges are asking, listening to what your brother or sister counsel is saying, and being responsive to that. Many attorneys get up and it's almost like they want to regurgitate their brief and they've got in their mind, like, “This is what I've got to do.” They're not able to pivot, think about things and understand that what's being asked of them is where the focus is.
The best advocates I see are those who can get up and say, “What I hear you asking is this. Where you're putting an emphasis, where you're maybe struggling or want more information is on this issue.” They hone in on that because we prep for a long time to be in court, whether in an appellate or a trial court. You have to be willing and able to pivot and adjust based on what's happening next. Having that flexibility, being prepared enough, having confidence in yourself that you've prepared and being able being able to shift is key.
That kind of flexibility comes from preparation. You have to have all of that. I remember early in my appellate career, I was like, “The part I like is the oral argument, the conversation with the court, but like, the weeks of preparation and all the pain beforehand would be nice if that wasn't part of it. You come to the realization like the fun part doesn't happen unless you've done all the preparation. You need both.
Sometimes people are concerned that they're going to concede something or is that a friendly question or not a friendly question? Especially when you're the second attorney to argue, looking at the landscape of where the concerns are that the court has already raised, they might raise opposite concerns with you when you come up to test things. At least you've listened to that and been responsive to some of those concerns. It's a good way to start. What about brief writing?
Many lawyers are like, “How many pages do I have? I'm going to fill every page.” Writing in a way where it's easy to understand. That's Number 1. Number 2) There is nothing more frustrating than reading a brief that fudges the facts or the issues. You have to be upfront and put your best case forward, but I've read briefs before where I've dug in and I've said, “That's not accurate.” If we're going back and we're digging through the record and fact-checking things because of what we're seeing in another brief.
There is nothing more frustrating than reading a brief that messes with the facts and issues.
That discredits your brief from the very first read of it. It's a balance of putting the best argument forward but make sure you're doing it in the most honest and direct way possible because you don't want to get caught up in presenting something that a jury is going to look at and start questioning. They're going to question every word that's in that brief.
That's a point in terms of credibility. Maintaining that credibility is important. You also want to be the brief that the court wants to turn to. It's easy to read because it gives me the lay of the land. That's very helpful. I also wanted to talk about this in terms of mentoring and sponsorship. There's a lot of discussion of that in law schools and even for newer lawyers. Sometimes people think two things. One) “I need to get a mentor. I can't do anything. How do I do that?” The second thing is, “What exactly does that look like? What does that mean?” I'm wondering if you had mentors in your career and what that looked like.
I had some tremendous mentors. My dad's best friend was a lawyer. He was my mentor all the way through and someone that I still talk to, even though he's retired. I have a mentor that was another family friend, a father that continued to be a mentor and someone that I regular regularly am in contact with now and someone that when I became a lawyer, treated me as his colleague, even though I was the same age as his daughter and did it in a way where it was exciting for him and for me that I was new to things, and made me want to keep coming back and having those conversations with him.
He loved having those conversations. I had a lot of male mentors. Because of being in government law, there were a lot of male lawyers. I wish that I had had more female lawyers. That's one of the things that is very important is being able to give back in that way and try to engage young female lawyers or law students to go into that area because I think we need more women in government law and for me to be able to try to serve in that way. I've had the opportunity to mentor and use what I received from others and individuals that weren't even lawyers.
That's important. It doesn't have to be lawyer to lawyer. Your mentor doesn't have to be a lawyer. Your mentor can be an author or a doctor. It's about learning skills, leadership and having somebody you trust that you can bounce things off of, whether they're a lawyer and have had those experiences or in a different field and maybe can offer you a different perspective. For young people, especially because of COVID, it's hard to figure out, “What does that look like? Who can be my mentor?”
I tell people, “Reach out. Have one conversation with someone.” I find that people are open and want, for the most part, to be able to assist and help people at the beginning of their careers. It may not be something that is a good fit, but that's okay. Having those conversations will help you identify what you're looking for in a mentor. You're going to find mentors that are your supervisors or colleagues that may even be at the same level as you, but you're learning something from them. You may be mentoring them as well in other areas. Getting outside of that, what does a typical mentor look like and being and open-minded to it because I've had mentors and have mentored in all different arrays of legal and non-legal.
In addition, your mentor does not need to be a lawyer. You can learn different things about business and operating in the career from others who are not in the law. The second point of people wanting to help is usually the case because they've also been mentored. The best way to honor that is to do the same for others and to pay it forward with other people.
I get as much out of mentoring as I receive. I love seeing young people that are passionate and curious. I feel like they're in a totally different spot than I was when I was their age. The things that they're looking at going into and the plans that they have. I find it fascinating. I get a lot out of it. I talk to others that are talking about doing mentorship or getting more involved in it. I feel like it can reinvigorate you in your career. To be able to do that and have that connection, it gets you more excited about this profession. Whether you're a practicing lawyer or not, it gets you more excited about it again. It's a benefit both ways.
Reinvigorating things and also having that connection to new people who are seeing things with fresh eyes, a new lens and bringing new things to things that can spark, some things for those who are experienced too. It's good. I was in the category of if you are a law student or a new lawyer, don't be afraid to reach out because people are generally open to helping and want to help.
Don't be afraid. Just make that call. Send that email. I promise 9 out of 10, probably more than that will take you up on it, be happy to sit down, talk to you, offer you advice and spend time with you.
That's how I met one of my friends and colleagues who was moving to the area and she sent letters to various women lawyers in the area who were doing work on behalf of women and girls she thought we might have some things in common. We're friends to this day. You never know. What kind of advice would you have for those who might be thinking about the bench, whether early as you had in your career or later in their career?
For those that are early in their career, like law students, I would urge them to try clerking. One of my biggest regrets is that I didn't clerk. I wish that I had that opportunity. I didn't because when I graduated from law school, I had had that internship with Legal Aid. I didn't want to stop interacting and helping people. I went right into private practice. In my mind, stepping away from something that I was loving much to then go research and right and have that experience, at that time, didn't make sense to me. I wish that I had.
If you're really early in your law career or are still studying law, make sure you try clerking.
Whether that's at a Supreme Court, Court of Appeals, federal bench, or the trial courts, you can learn much by interning or clerking for a trial court. I say that because it'll give you kind of that inside view of what the job is. That is key as you're working your way through your career. As a young lawyer, establishing relationships. If you're interested in being a trial court judge, you've got to have relationships in the community. You have to be part of your local bar association and give back to your community.
It can't be that you have the most cases and that you're in court all the time. You need to be part of that community, understand what that job is, and running for that job or getting an appointment or however, that process works where you are. It comes down to the community and making sure that you're giving back in as many ways as you possibly can.
I did a number of judicial years of judicial appointments for the governor. We had people from such a wide range of backgrounds. We had prosecutors, defense attorneys, professors, small firm lawyers and big firm lawyers that were sick of the big firm and wanted to step away from that and be on the bench. There's no career that perfectly sets you up to be a judge. Make sure that you're on a career path that you love, are passionate about that, you get up every day and you're excited to do because any of those paths can lead you to a judicial position.
I'm glad you said that and brought your experience from the governor's office and seeing the various applicants and appointments because that's one thing that I hope certainly for those who read across the various show. That is the message there is no one way. There's no one path. Loving what you do and being excellent at it whatever that might be is a good way on the path to the bench because you want to do your best and usually what you love you're going to do well at too.
The key is everything that you do, do it well. Obviously, there are all those other little pieces, but lawyers know how to research. They know how to find that information and how to figure that out. That's the easier part. It's getting the experience so that you're well rounded and that when you do put yourself forward that you're someone that has all of the pieces that they need.
The clerkship and the externship point are important. Even if you can't clerk, to have the experience of a digital externship during law school is helpful whether you're going to be on the bench or not. It's having that opportunity to see what's important to the judges who are making decisions and how is that process work will make you a more effective advocate too.
I have law clerks and that have had experience at the trial court level. You think it's an appellate bench, you don't necessarily need to have trial court experience as a new law clerk. The one understands basic things that you wouldn't know if you hadn't been at the trial court. Every experience that you have is going to bring something to that next experience. I would urge a clerkship, internship or externship even if you don't want to be a judge or you don't want to be a clerk. It can be such a great and rewarding experience. The relationships that you build at that stage are helpful.
Every experience that you have is going to bring something to that next experience.
The difference that you mentioned between being in an appellate externship or clerkship role before with a trial court role beforehand or not, I had an appellate externship in law school, then district for clerkship, and then an appellate clerkship. The reason I wanted to do the appellate clerkship, even though I'd had that internship, was that I thought exactly what you said, it will be different because I've had this trial court experience. What I'm going to get out of that clerkship is going to be much more, and what I can bring to it will be much more than what I did as an extern in law school. It was true. It was a different experience having the child court clerkship first. That's another consideration for those who are in law school.
I'm jealous. You had an externship and two clerkships.
It was amazing and such a great experience. To go to the point of it certain paths, sometimes people go, “You have to have a clerkship to do X. You don't have to have a clerkship to be a justice on the Supreme Court. Everything is different. It all fits together in different ways for different people. I agree with you about the value of it, if you can. I think sometimes the clerkship is hard to do financially or you're called to do something else. That internship or externship is a great in-between way of doing that, getting some experience. I know I felt the third year of law school, I was ready to do something else, and it was nice to have an externship for part of the third year.
That's a perfect time to do it.
It keeps you engaged and reinvigorated for the rest of law school. Thank you much for your insights, for participating in the show, for joining me and for sharing your insights and journey. I appreciate that. Usually, in the end, I'll ask a few lightning-round questions. The first question is, which talent would you like to have, but don't?
Anything musical. I have zero musical bones in my body, but I wish that I could play the piano, guitar or violin.
Who are some of your favorite writers?
The first one is C. S. Lewis. I feel that I reread C. S. Lewis every year. That would probably be one of my go-tos.
I'm still finding some books of his that I hadn't read and then going back and rereading others. It is wide-ranging in the topic and has beautiful phrasings.
That's why I love them.
Kids, especially after this pandemic or even out of the pandemic yet, seeing their resiliency, go through something that we never had to go through when we were growing up. I feel like such a polarizing time, whether that's politically or society in general. Seeing kids be engaged, stand up for themselves and have a voice makes me excited for the future because they are incredible. Every single day I'm impressed by the kids that I see.
That's certainly something we hope no one has to deal with again in the future, but it's amazing to see them from such a challenging time. “The future looks bright,” as they say. Given the choice of anyone in the world, who would you invite as a dinner guest or more than one guest, if you'd like? Living or not living sort of a magical dinner party.
I would like to have Justice Scalia and Justice Ginsburg, the two of them. I would love to have dinner with them and hear all about their relationship, how they've worked together on the court and their personal relationship. I find their story beautiful, fascinating and something that I wish that we could see more of.
You'd probably have to go to the opera or something to at least listen to opera during the party. Last question. What is your motto, if you have one?
“Learn to listen. Listen to learn.” It's a thing that I say to every student, whether they're in 2nd or 12th grade, college, law school, or a new lawyer. Many people haven't mastered the scale of listening, listening to what others are saying, hearing them, and learning from what they're hearing, especially in our profession, and it's not necessarily a negative thing where lawyers are we're smart and passionate, but many times we want to talk and say what we have to say.
Learn to listen and listen to learn.
We don't do enough listening and seeing where those similarities are, where we agree with others, where those differences are, and how to maybe bridge those and bring us closer. If people took the time to listen to one another, people would get along a lot better and we would find that maybe we're not far apart. We'd end up getting much happier, better results in the work that we're doing.
That's good ammunition all around in terms of listening to others about what might be underlying, what their positions are and also being empathetic to that. As an advocate in court, listening is an important skill.
It's a life skill. I have to use it whether at work or at home. I've got we've got four kids. I've got to do a lot of listening to understand them. You have to use it in every aspect of your life. If people slowed down and took the time, it promotes better civility. The key to civility is listening.
You have to have sort of a certain internal stillness to do that so that there's space for whatever someone else is saying too. There's a nice discipline to that. Thank you much. I enjoyed talking to you and knowing your insights. I'm glad you agreed to join the show and share your thoughts.
Thank you much for the invitation and for doing this project. It's wonderful to highlight all the different things that you can do in the legal or outside of the legal profession and support women continuing to show an interest in this. My daughter's a sophomore in college. Her plan is to go to law school. I know how important it is for young women to understand and hear from other people who have blazed that trail before. I appreciate you doing this.
Your daughter is one of the folks that I hope we have an impact on and influence from the show. Thank you much.