BRISTOL, R.I., January 30, 2018, – “We the People” may have started out meaning white, male property owners – but the concept has steadily broadened since then, much to the benefit of the nation, said U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on a snowy Tuesday morning at Roger Williams University School of Law. “Over the course of our history, the composition of ‘We the People’ has expanded,” Ginsburg said, addressing…, Obergefell v. Hodges, , which held that the Constitution guarantees a right to same-sex marriage. “It’s another example of how society has changed and the Court is catching up,” Ginsburg said. “The great constitutional scholar Paul Freund once said 'the Court should never be influenced by the weather of the day, but inevitably they will be influenced by the climate of the era,' and that’s what happened with the gay…, Back to the Way It Was, Ginsburg’s visit to Roger Williams was preceded by a mini-controversy, as news outlets from CNN to Fox , from Newsweek to The Hill to Breitbart , suddenly picked up on her decision to visit Bristol instead of remaining in Washington. Even Cosmopolitan got into the act, with a headline blaring: “Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg Will Not Attend Trump's State of the Union. She'll be speaking at Roger…, An Odd Couple, Selya asked about the famously liberal Ginsburg's friendship with the late, conservative Justice Antonin Scalia . “I disagreed with a lot of what he said, but I was captivated by the way in which he said it," she explained. "This was a man who cared about words. Even though we were often on opposite sides, we’d go over each other’s opinions. My suggestions were: ‘Nino, you should tone this down…, The RBG Workout: How She Stays Strong . . . and You Can Too! , (Scenes from her workout, she added, are slated to appear in a biographical documentary, RBG , due out later this year.) “Many reporters want to know about the routine,” Ginsburg said with a chuckle. “Most of them fail miserably.” She smiled when asked about “Saturday Night Live” actress Kate McKinnon’s impression of her as an iron-pumping, vitamin-popping health nut, determined to outlast the…, they, would really like to have had.", ‘You Can’t Help But Be in Awe’, From students to faculty, staff to alumni, the Ginsburg visit was a hit. “I’m not one to be star struck, but this one got me,” said Deborah Johnson , Director of Diversity and Outreach, following the event. “She got me.” “She is one of my ‘she-ros,’” added alumna Nicole Verdi ’14 . “As a female and as an attorney I look up to her immensely. She’s not afraid to say things that make other people…, men, for so many years. Why is it so wild?’ Statements like that are beautiful and inspiring and I love her for that.” “Her opinions, both for the majority and dissents, are well written, they’re needed, and they’ve shaped our history,” Verdi said. “So to see her in person, in the flesh – I almost cried. You can’t help but be in awe.” Current students were no less impressed. “I was really moved by…, It Would Have Been Enough, RWU Law Dean Michael J. Yelnosky introduced Ginsburg, citing a song Jews sing during Passover –, “Dayenu, ” – that enumerates blessings, celebrating that any one of them alone “would have been enough.” “Justice Ginsburg would be worthy of acclaim because she was the first woman named to the Harvard Law Review, and she graduated at the top of her class at Columbia Law School in 1959,” Yelnosky said. “It would have been enough that while teaching she co-founded the Women’s Rights Project of the ACLU ,…, Dayenu, .” Ginsburg’s visit marks the eighth time that a sitting or retired U.S. Supreme Court justice has addressed RWU School of Law students. Justice Anthony M. Kennedy delivered the law school’s first commencement address in 1996, and law students have since heard from Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. (2008), Justice Antonin Scalia (2008), Justice Stephen G. Breyer (2011), Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr…
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In a new book, Roger Williams University graduate Mark Fallon draws on his deep experience investigating terrorist operations to present a searing indictment of the interrogation techniques used by President George W. Bush’s administration – and to offer a stark warning to President Trump’s administration about the perils and pitfalls of employing torture. Fallon, a 1978 RWU graduate who studied…, Why Torture is Wrong, Regan Arts published Fallon’s book –, Unjustifiable Means: The Inside Story of How the CIA, Pentagon and US Government Conspired to Torture, – in October. By then, the government had held up publication for 233 days, prompting the American Civil Liberties Union and the Knight First Amendment Institute to write to senators asking them to intervene. While it now has been published, the book includes entire sections that the government has blacked out for reasons Fallon considers suspect. “The book the government doesn’t want you to read…, A Faulty Foundation, The book details how government leaders ignored and overrode the expertise and advice of interrogation professionals and lawyers. “Those in power, it seemed, were hell-bent on the notion that torturing prisoners was the way to do business,” he wrote. “Somehow, the Global War, on, Terror had become the Global War, of, Terror. We had turned into the very adversary we feared.” Now, Fallon is concerned President Trump’s administration will resort to torture. As a candidate in 2016, Trump said, “Torture works. OK, folks? Believe me, it works. And waterboarding is your minor form, but we should go much stronger than waterboarding.” After becoming president, Trump said, “When ISIS is doing things that no one has…
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