Home -> Law Blog Directory -> Legal News Blogs -> Lawbeat

OR PHONE (866) 635-1838 for Bankruptcy Help, (866) 635-6190 for Divorce,
(866) 635-2689 for Personal Injury or (866) 635-9402 for Criminal Defense

Find a Local Lawyer

Bankruptcy (866) 635-1838
Divorce (866) 635-6190
Personal Injury (866) 635-2689
Criminal Defense (866) 635-9402

Legal News

: Lawbeat

SCOTUS reporting on the road (again?)

By Mark Obbie

ADVERTISEMENTS

It's good to see Adam Liptak getting out of the house more. Today's front-pager, datelined Pleasant Grove City, Utah, strikes a more reportorial tone than the scholarly approach that Liptak's iconic predecessor, Linda Greenhouse, typically took to previews of Supreme Court cases. Rather than rely strictly on the briefs, the lawyers of record, and experts, Liptak visits the litigants and sees the case from the ground -- in this case, from a city park where members of Summum, an oddball little religion (my words, not Liptak's), want to donate a monument inscribed with their "Seven Aphorisms." Liptak writes that the case, to be argued on Wednesday, "could produce the most important free speech decision of the term." It also produces some un-Greenhousian copy, such as:

“They’ve put a basically Judeo-Christian religious text in the park, which we think is great, because people should be exposed to it,” [Summum leader Ron] Temu said. “But our principles should be exposed as well.”Su Menu, the church’s president, agreed. “If you look at them side by side,” Ms. Menu said of the two monuments, “they really are saying similar things.”The Third Commandment: “Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain.”The Third Aphorism: “Nothing rests; everything moves; everything vibrates.”Michael W. Daniels, the mayor here, is not the vibrating sort.

Or like this, the story's ending:

[Church lawyer Brian] Barnard has represented the Summum church for many years. “They’re odd,” he said of his clients, with an affectionate smile. “They’re strange. They’re different.”Bernie Aua, the church’s vice president, said the court case should not turn on how his religion was viewed.“We have this thing called the Constitution,” Mr. Aua said. “The fact is, it’s a public park. And public parks are public.”

I like it. And so will readers. This sort of thing animates the legal arguments. Perhaps it doesn't also elevate them to their rightful intellectual place, but so what? We're trying to interest all readers in the cases, and show what's really at stake. I think this sort of reporting and writing does that. Liptak is certainly not the inventor of this model. Many SCOTUS and legal-affairs writers have used it to powerful effect. And I am not saying that the traditional, briefs-bound way is bad. It certainly has its place, and no reporter -- not even the energetic Liptak -- will be able to give the Pleasant Grove City treatment to every case, or even every important case. But it's refreshing when he does in the paper of record.

Full post as published by Lawbeat on November 11, 2008 (boomark / email).