When you come from a background like mine, where you're entering worlds that are so different than your own, you have to be afraid.

Even though Article IV of the Constitution says that treaties are the 'supreme law of the land,' in most instances they're not even law.

When I first became a judge on the district court, I had one lawyer who came to argue before me, and he was looking off to the side as he was talking. I started asking him questions, and all of a sudden he whipped around and looked at me intently. I could see in his eyes that he had finally figured out, "This is no dummy, I'd better pay attention." It is satisfying to see that.

The President [Barack Obama] had suggested that I not watch the news during the confirmation process. I assiduously followed his advice.

I barely saw my mother, and the mom I saw was often angry and unhappy. The mother I grew up with is not the mother I know now. It's not the mother she became after my father died, and that's been the greatest prize of my life.

I am a very spiritual person. Maybe not traditionally religious in terms of Sunday Mass every week, that sort of thing.

If the issue is letting the states experiment and letting the society have more time to figure out its direction, why is taking a case now the answer?