The Weekly Podcast: Roe v. Wade: Justice Harry Blackmun's Legacy

Lectures in History

C-SPAN

History, Politics, News

4.1 • 696 Ratings

🗓️ 12 June 2022

⏱️ 17 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Lectures in History is taking a break this week -- try the latest episode of the Weekly, which provides its own history lesson - on Supreme Court Associate Justice Harry Blackmun and the opinion he wrote...for Roe v. Wade. It seems that Roe v. Wade is always in the news, always a part of the political debate. It's been that way for nearly 50 years since the Supreme Court decided the landmark abortion case. Justice Harry Blackmun wrote the opinion legalizing abortion. In this episode of C-SPAN's "The Weekly" we look back at Justice Blackmun -- what he said about his legacy being forever associated with that famous opinion.... and the big prediction he flat out got wrong. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:30.2	Early in my years here, I came on board in June 1970, and row against wade was decided in january
0:41.3	1973 it um is a case that is uh controversial that is constantly constantly under scrutiny.
0:56.9	And there is a question, I suppose, whether it ever will cease to be under scrutiny.
1:07.0	That was Supreme Court Justice Harry Blackmun, with a statement about the landmark abortion case,
1:12.4	actually more like it, an understatement that probably all sides of the abortion debate can
1:16.9	agree on. It's from an oral history he taped in 1995, four years before he died. In this episode
1:23.9	of C-SPans the Weekly, against the backdrop of Roe v. Wade once again under intense scrutiny, we look back at Justice Blackman, his own words and the opinion he wrote that remains the focus of endless news and intense politics 50 years later.
1:38.8	On April 14, 1970, Republican President Richard Nixon nominated Harry Blackman, a 61-year-old Court of Appeals judge from Minnesota, through the Supreme Court.
1:48.8	In this clip from his 1995 oral history, Justice Blackman remembers the day news came out about his nomination.
1:55.7	One historical note, you'll hear him mention his membership in the Cosmos Club in Washington, D.C.
2:01.3	When Blackmun was a member, only men were allowed in.
2:04.7	It wasn't until 1988 that the Cosmos Club dropped its 110-year-old men-only policy
2:10.2	and admitted its first women members.
2:14.2	I had stated the Cosmos Club when I was down there, and the media never found out where I was, although the FBI did.
2:24.9	But...
2:25.7	Were you a member of the Cosmos Club at that point?
	...

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