High court justice has another bike accident by Cambridge home
Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer might want to give up riding his bicycle around his home in Cambridge, Massachusetts, or at least be more careful.
Over the Memorial Day holiday weekend, the 72-year-old Breyer broke his right collarbone from a spill while riding his bike near his Cambridge, Mass., court spokeswoman Kathy Arberg said.
Breyer missed Tuesday’s court session, but that was unrelated to his mishap, she said, adding that he did make a previously scheduled appearance in speaking to a New York City historical event Tuesday night.
In 1993, Breyer, then a judge on the U.S. court of appeals based in Boston, suffered broken ribs and other injuries when he was hit by a car while riding his bike across Harvard Square in Cambridge. The former Harvard law professor was appointed to the Supreme Court the following year.
- Photo credit: Pool photo (Breyer with Britain’s Prince Charles during a recent visit to Washington)
U.S. Supreme Court closes front entrance, by 7-2 vote
The Supreme Court’s famous front entrance, at the top of its marble steps and under the words “Equal Justice Under Law,” will be closed to the public.
Starting Tuesday, visitors will no longer be able to enter the building through the front doors at the top of 44 marble steps on the plaza directly across from the U.S. Capitol. On days when there are arguments in major cases like abortion or free speech rights, the line to hear the arguments often stretches well beyond the plaza.
Instead, visitors will enter the building through ground-level side doors, going through a new screening facility that has been built as part of the Supreme Court’s modernization project.
“The entrance provides a secure, reinforced area to screen for weapons, explosives and chemical and biological hazards,” the court said in a statement by spokeswoman Kathy Arberg. Most government buildings and their surroundings have had added stepped-up security measures in recent years in a bid to thwart damage from potential terrorist attacks.
But Justice Stephen Breyer, joined by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, issued a separate statement that called the change unfortunate and unjustified.
“To my knowledge, and I have spoken to numerous jurists and architects worldwide, no other Supreme Court in the world — including those such as Israel’s that face security concerns equal to or greater than ours — has closed its main entrance to the public,” Breyer wrote.
“And the main entrances to numerous other prominent public buildings in America remain open,” he said.
U.S. Supreme Court advice for Obama
Someone experienced in making hard decisions with the imagination to understand how rulings affect the lives of Americans.
Those words of advice came from Supreme Court Justices Clarence Thomas and Stephen Breyer as President Barack Obama searches for a replacement for retiring Justice John Paul Stevens.
Testifying before Congress on the Supreme Court’s budget request, they gave their views about the type of person Obama should select, without getting into judicial philosophy. The U.S. Senate must confirm the nominee.
Congressman Jose Serrano, a Democrat from New York who chaired the House Appropriations subcommittee hearing, asked what legal or other experiences the nominee should have and whether it should be a judge or an elected official.
“I don’t think it matters as much what the experience is as long as it’s experience making decisions and hard decisions,” Thomas said. “It helps us if someone is from a different part of the country.”
On the current court, Thomas grew up in Georgia, Breyer previously lived in Massachusetts, and Stevens came from Chicago. Other justices were from New York, New Jersey and California, among other places.
Although all nine of the current Supreme Court members had previously been U.S. appeals court judges, Thomas said they had different backgrounds and perspectives.
Broken clocks, laryngitis at the Supreme Court
In a place where the time to argue some of the most important legal issues in the United States is pivotal yet limited, clocks throughout the Supreme Court building were not working on Monday — including the big one behind the bench that attorneys arguing their case and that spectators in the audience can see.
After the justices went on the bench at 10 a.m., Chief Justice John Roberts noted the problem and pointed out that attorneys are sometimes told not to look at the clock during oral arguments. “That is particularly important today,” he said.
Court spokeswoman Kathy Arberg said the problem stemmed from a “malfunction” with the court’s master clock. It apparently occurred when the clocks were to be turned back over the weekend for the end of daylight saving time.
Clocks in the building finally were fixed by the time the court heard arguments in a third case in the early afternoon.
Besides a broken clock, the arguments in the first case, a dispute over excessive fees charged to mutual fund investors, also produced another unusual development — the admission from Justice Stephen Breyer that he has laryngitis.
While asking a question, Breyer made a mistake and said the court was reversing — instead of reviewing — a federal judge’s opinion.
“I have laryngitis. I don’t speak accurately,” the hoarse-sounding Breyer told the lawyer as the courtroom erupted in laughter.
Well Mufaso, Who would you want to be there Mr. Lionel Hutz.
I’m glad he’s alright and I hope I can ride a bicycle at his age. Besides not to worry he’s a lawyer he’ll probly sue the bike manufacturer