Supreme Court Chief
Justice Roberts charms crowd

U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr.’s appearance in Missoula created quite a stir. There’s nothing like high security to shake up a little town in the Rockies.

The campus buzzed with preparation and the gathering of judges and lawyers from across the state on Sept. 13, as lines formed outside the University Theatre an hour before his lecture. A video feed to the recital hall in the Music Building was available for those who didn’t get into the theatre.

The chief justice had spent more than an hour talking with University of Montana law students and was in Missoula to deliver the annual Judge William B. Jones-Judge Edward A. Tamm Judicial Lecture. Introducing him was Bob Bennett, a nationally known Washington, D.C.-based attorney who was instrumental in establishing the lecture series.

Bennett has shown to be true to his word. When he proposed the idea to honor the two judges from Montana who distinguished themselves on the federal bench, he said he would try to get Supreme Court justices to speak. To date, the series has hosted Justices Sandra Day O’Connor, Clarence Thomas, Stephen Breyer and now Roberts.

Roberts delivered an entertaining lecture, notable for its lack of references to any specific legal case or issue. Early on, he opined to the audience, packed with men and women of the legal persuasion, “What you would find most interesting is what I can’t talk about.”

Instead Roberts looked to a favorite son of Montana, Norman Maclean, for inspiration – in writing concisely as Maclean did – and in Maclean’s book about smokejumpers and the Mann Gulch fire, “Young Men and Fire.”

Roberts said smokejumpers and lawyers have much in common; both jump bravely into situations that “more sane people would avoid.” He said both draw on “training, skill, instinct, stamina and a little bit of luck.”

He noted that Maclean’s research of the Mann Gulch fire revealed that the foreman of the smokejumpers, Wag Dodge, started a backlit fire and then hunched down in the burned area to save himself. Younger smokejumpers tried to outrun the fire and many of them died.

Roberts said Dodge may have known he couldn’t outrun the fire. He was drawing on long experience and also the knowledge that he was older and not as quick as the younger men. Dodge also knew that the fire might roar past a burned area, leaving him alive in its wake. Roberts compared that to how a lawyer assesses a case – his or her own weaknesses, as well as strength and weaknesses within the case – and decides how to proceed.

He noted “lawyering at its best is a team sport” and that lawyers often will say they “worked together on a case,” adding that, to the credit of the profession, they often say that even when they are on opposing sides.

He noted that much of what lawyers and judges do is “quite mundane” but is important because it protects the freedom Americans enjoy.

Humorous anecdotes peppered his speech, and in the end he couldn’t pass up a lawyer joke. He said a trial lawyer died and went to heaven but found it would take 18 months before he could try a case. The lawyer finally decided to “see what it’s like in the other place.” There, he was told he could start the next day. “Why?” he asked. The answer: “We have many more judges down here.” The crowd loved it. He was out of the building within seconds and the sidewalk cleared for his entourage to drive away.