WASHINGTON – “Presidents come and go, but the Supreme Court goes on forever.”
William Howard Taft said that. And he was an authority: he was the 27th president of the United States from 1909 until 1913, then served as the nation’s 10th chief justice of the Supreme Court from 1921 until 1930. He is the only person to hold both posts.
Taft, by the way, also was responsible for securing a separate, permanent building for the nation’s highest court.
But what has transpired inside that building over the decades has been the focus of an endless debate among legal scholars, politicians, journalists, voters – and even the justices themselves. Has the court been a force for change or a conservative roadblock against progress? Does the court reflect the tenor of the times or is it hopelessly out of step with the majority of Americans? Is it even proper to ask the court to mirror public opinion?
With the high court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade earlier this year, the moment seems right to trace the evolution of the Supreme Court, weigh the pressures it is facing now and assess its future. Capital News Service Washington Bureau reporters Hunter Savery and Kate Seltzer are producing a six-part podcast that intends to do just that.
Here is the first episode of the podcast, titled “Takeover.”