SCOTUSblog on camera: Orin Kerr Part three

The importance and quality of Supreme Court oral argument; the influence on the Court of academe and legal blogging; and how advocacy and teaching affect each other.

In this five-part interview, Orin Kerr, Fred C. Stevenson Research Professor of Law at the George Washington Unversity Law School in Washington, DC, discusses his background inmechanical engineering and in law; clerking for Supreme Court Justice Anthony M. Kennedy and Judge Leonard I. Garth of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit; working in theComputer Crime and Intellectual Property Section of the U.S. Department of Justice; and teaching law. A scholar of criminal procedure and computer crime law, Professor Kerr talks abouthow the Supreme Court considers cases, understands legal principle and contends with changing technology; the importance of predictability in law; the institutional position of the Court;and the role of politics in understanding the Court and its membership.

One thing that I didnt appreciate until I was a law clerk was the extent to which the Justices are generalistsYou just sort of imagine that they have, you know. clear agendas and a senseof, Im going from here to here to here. Thats not generally the case. Thats not the norm. The norm is that theyre generalist Justices.