Two-time Supreme Court clerk learned from his ‘heroes’
By stephen McAllister, L’88
8 KU LAW MAGAZINE
supreme Court Archives
I
will never forget my first week as a law clerk at the Supreme Court of the United States. It was the first week of July 1989. On my first day, the Court was announcing its final decision from the 1988 term, a Missouri case involving state abortion laws and one in which many people thought the Supreme Court might overrule Roe v. Wade. Justice White led me and the other clerk who started that day to the area on one side of the courtroom where the law clerks sit. He deposited us there and went to put on his robe and take the bench with his colleagues. We had little idea what we were doing that day, but the atmosphere was electric and it did not take a lawyer to sense the excitement and anticipation permeating the courtroom. When the Court announced its opinion, it became clear that Roe would not to be overruled, though Justice Blackmun read dramatically from his dissenting opinion and predicted the ultimate demise of Roe. The next day it was as if the Court had been forgotten by the world. The past term was effectively over, with no more arguments or opinions until October, and the justices were exiting not only the building but the city and even the country. We settled into a summer routine of reviewing petitions for a writ of certiorari, dealing with requests for stays of execution in capital cases, and preparing a few bench memoranda to assist Justice White with merits cases to be argued in the fall. I remember my first Saturday at the Court because of someone I met that day. We always worked in the building on Saturdays because Justice White did. Seeking a snack, I started down the stairs
Top: KU Law Professor Steve McAllister with Justice Byron White, for whom he clerked from 1989-1991 Left: McAllister with Justice Clarence Thomas, for whom he clerked during the 1991-92 term
near Justice White’s chambers. Someone else was coming up, and he stopped to ask my name, whether I was a new law clerk and for whom I was clerking. After I responded to his questions, this Southern gentleman held out his hand to shake and, with a smile, declared, “I am Lewis Powell, and it is a pleasure to meet you.” I knew it was Justice Powell all along,
but the fact that he made no assumptions and behaved so modestly was very endearing. I have to admit that I was a bit awestruck to be meeting someone whose name I had seen on so many opinions in my constitutional law class. During the next two-plus years, I met all of the justices and interacted with them in ways both substantive