Slate interviews Chief Judge William Pryor

Remember when Judge Pryor joked about Slate journalist Mark Joseph Stern at a recent Federalist Society convention?

Well, after that speech, Stern called up Judge Pryor and asked to interview him.

To Judge Pryor's credit, he agreed.  

Here's the interesting interview.  

Some of the back and forth:

In the last couple of years, justices of the Supreme Court who are affiliated with the Federalist Society have made appearances at Federalist Society conventions and delivered speeches that are often received rapturously, with standing ovations. And on the left, the view is often: Well, these people are just applauding a fellow member of their club who is going to help them achieve all their goals; they’re celebrating the elevation of this person to power because they think it’ll help them with their own personal causes. What do you make of the impression created by justices attending these conferences and getting this rapturous reception?

Any group is going to have role models, individuals who a lot of members admire. My guess is that if you went to an American Constitution Society meeting and Justice Breyer or Justice Ginsburg had been introduced, there would be rapturous applause there as well. I think that’s OK. Justice Kennedy would frequently speak at the summer meeting of the American Bar Association following a Supreme Court term and would get that kind of reception there, as well. In our legal culture, there are a lot of organizations of lawyers and law professors and judges where a lot of the leadership and members have role models within the legal culture. What’s different is that a lot of legal conservatives didn’t have that kind of organization and didn’t have those kinds of role models until recently.

One difference is that six justices of the Supreme Court today have some affiliation with the Federalist Society. And especially if you’re a casual observer of the news, and you turn on the TV and see four of them at this convention getting celebrated, you might think: Well, this is just a pack of partisans who are going on the road to receive their due.

When the six justices get a lot of applause and admiration and appreciation from an audience of the Federalist Society because the members admire them, and in a very broad sense, share a philosophy about the judicial role with them—I don’t think that’s unusual at all when you compare it to the ABA or the American Law Institute. I really think the only difference is that it’s now a conservative legal organization that’s a new entrant.

A group called DonorsTrust, which provides lots of dark money to conservative causes, recently gave the Federalist Society $3.7 million. I’m curious what you would say to someone who’s skeptical of the Federalist Society, who sees these figures and says: Well, this is just another way to launder conservative policies through the judiciary. This is another way of building a base of power in the courts that will allow Republicans to impose their ideas from the bench. When the same dark money group that’s giving funds to the Federalist Society is also giving a ton of money to Republicans, it might raise some eyebrows. 

My understanding is the kind of donors you’re talking about tend to be foundations. And I would say if you have a concern about it, you ought to look at what the Federalist Society actually does with the money. And what it does is it sponsors programs that can only fairly be termed as educational. It’s focused on debates and discussions about contemporary legal issues on many topics. And Federalist Society programs have a wide variety of speakers. The panel discussions are very balanced to have a diversity of viewpoints. I’ve had many panel discussion events where I participated and had my biggest disagreement with a so-called conservative on the panel. If the idea is that this money is being used to promote a single agenda, a single idea, it seems to me it’s phenomenally unsuccessful because the programs are just not designed that way.

If you enjoyed that article, you should check out my podcast interview of Judge Pryor from last year, which was a lot of fun.