In the balance of my professional life, I've had the privilege of the working as a practicing lawyer and teacher.

I began my legal career working for Byron White, the last Coloradan to serve on the Supreme Court, and the only justice to lead the N.F.L. in rushing. He was one of the smartest and most courageous men I've ever known.

Though the critics are loud and the temptations to join them may be many, mark me down too as a believer that the traditional account of the judicial role Justice Scalia defended will endure.

When Justice White retired, he gave me the chance to work for Justice Kennedy, as well. Justice Kennedy was incredibly welcoming and gracious, and like Justice White, he taught me so much. I am forever grateful. And if you've ever met Judge David Sentelle, you'll know just how lucky I was to land a clerkship with him right out of school.

In every age there has been a stream of popular opinion that has carried all before it, and given a family character, as it were, to the century.

Giving kids whatever they ask for is disastrous parenting. There's no sense of something earned. I'm sorry, but when you're 12, you don't need a new cell phone every few months just because a new one comes out.

I work a lot in the summers. My family goes to Maine, where we have a little house. My wife's a writer, too, and we can write for six hours a day and then play with the kids.

When I was three years old I was taken with my family to a little town in Western Minnesota, where I lived a more or less vapid and ordinary life until I was ten.