James Madison Building, Library of Congress, Capitol Campus

After getting our rooms at the luxurious Comfort Inn in Ballston,(Professor Kobylka’s fancy name for our hotel), we headed down to the Madison building to get our ID cards and check out where we’d be spending the next week researching.

Next, we headed over to the Jefferson Library. I was happy as a lark here, I couldn’t get over the detailed architecture and the specific meaning behind each design and being surrounded by so many books.

Google image inside the Jefferson Library since we weren’t supposed to take pictures.

For example, the 8 marble pillars symbolize the characteristic features of civilized life and thought, such as religion, law, history, art, poetry, philosophy, science, commerce, and politics. We weren’t supposed to take pictures (whoops!)so I’ve included a google image so you get the full effect. It was so cool we went with Professor Kobylka to the law section and were able to look at book that he co-authored.

Before heading to dinner, we stopped in the lobby to take a picture with a statue of James Madison and I found this quote that reminded me of what we were discovering in Professor Kobylka’s class. The Supreme Court has an image of excellence and superiority as the serving justices have been deemed to have the intelligence and reasoning to make just decisions. Yet sometimes, we forget these justices are human just like us, influenced by society, their colleagues, and biases. It is important to recognize that while the Supreme Court is considered a “supreme” body they also get it wrong sometimes because, like us, they are human.

A quote that reminded me of what we were discovering in Professor Kobylka’s class.

WE THE PIZZA!

Ellie excited for this pizza!

WE THE PIZZA! If you go here, get the greek pizza it is mamma mia, chef’s kiss, 10/10 so good! This place is an automatic j- point. Let me explain. When justices are making decisions their goal is to get a majority so that they win the case. Each justice has a specific i-point (ideal point) or mode of reasoning they would like to see employed to deliver the case. Yet, justices will make alterations to their i-points so that other justices will join their opinion which is called a j-point. This place makes everyone happy (we went here twice on the trip)a total j point so make sure you go! During meal times, I loved hearing about what everyone else had found that day. One day, Natalie found a declassified handbook on the American military presence in Latin America. Matthew would always share funny things that Justice Black had commented on his drafts and memos like “unadulterated BS.” I found that while we were expected to complete independent research projects, we worked collaboratively as a class sharing not only information we found funny or intriguing but the best methods for how to sift through and document the material most efficiently.

Case file organization

Boxes of case files

Researching in the library!

Researching in the Library! Before traveling to D.C., I chose to research how the Supreme Court employed science in privacy cases. Professor Kobylka told us it would take a few days to get into a groove and understand how to look through the papers, and he was right. At first, I tried to read everything because if the justices kept it, it was important right?! As the days went on, I became more discerning with the information I took notes on and scanned. I started to realize the differences between different court materials. Correspondence between justices and memos would be crucial to look at to understand how a justice went from a i to j point or understand their views on an issue. I found the different drafts of opinions incredibly useful as changes to the drafts usually centered around the amount of science the justices were comfortable employing within privacy cases which directly related to my topic.I was also surprised to find the large amount of medical, scientific, and historical research journals and texts employed by the justices especially Blackmun to make their rulings. Every now and again I enjoyed looking at the hate mail but that was just more for kicks and gigs as it had no direct relation to my project. Here was one of  my favorites…

A hate mail find for kicks and gigs