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We were really very happy to get into the Supreme Court. We have thought of doing it for years. Unfortunately for us, every other time we have been to DC either the Court was not in session or we had too many commitments. We had to wait in line each day for almost two hours, in very cold weather, but it was worth it. We are happy to be able to say that we saw the Justices in person: the mannerisms and voices of Stephens, O'Connor, Scalia, Souter, Kennedy, Ginsburg, and Breyer (in order of seniority) are now real things to us. Unfortunately Chief Justice Rhenquist was not there. And Clarence Thomas, another Justice, never says a word, so we don't know his voice in person.

The cases argued were interesting — as they must be if they reach the Supreme Court. Our first day we heard arguments about setting Congressional districts in Mississippi and about what farmers are allowed to do to wetlands under the environmental protection laws. For both of these cases we were only in the court room part of the time the lawyers made their case and we didn't come close to understanding all of the issues. Our second day we missed an argument about the constitutionality of cross burning by the Ku Klux Klan and then did hear one about whether $145 Million is excessive punitive damages. On this last case, one of the lawyers was Professor Lawrence Tribe from Harvard, very famous to us. So that was a bit exciting, to see another celebrity. Actually, his back was turned to us the whole time as he was facing the bench.

To get into the court you must be associated with a case, make a reservation (we didn't know that before we came), or wait in line. If you get into line early enough you get a numbered "ticket" that increases but does not guarantee your getting in. We are shown happily holding our tickets; they didn't do us any good. But we did get in. The waiting in line was made more fun by the very cold weather.

We don't own a helicopter and we didn't knock-off a photo taken by somebody else. So this picture of a model of the Supreme Court building will have to do to show you what the whole place is like. In the first photo we are standing on the street-side steps shown at the lower left of this photo. The model is part of a mini-museum that occupies the central hallway of the ground floor of the Supreme Court.

Even if you have a helicopter you aren't allowed to take pictures inside the Supreme Court chambers. So this picture, of a model in the mini-museum mentioned above, will have to do. On two separate days we came in and sat in three separate places. Our first seats, which we had for about twenty minutes, were what theatre owners call "partially obstructed". They were behind and to the left of the column on the left. We could see three out of nine justices - and by craning, the back of one lawyer. The same day, in a second seating, sat on the left rear, but with a clear view. We were very happy to be in court that time and equally sorry to leave. The next day we waited even longer but were rewarded with even better seats: Second row, center. We had direct views of all the justices and (the backs) of all of the lawyers.