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Margaret Marshall: Bathrooms Are Focus of Segregation (Audio) · Bloomberg Intelligence

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  Speaker 1: Charlie Palotin. That's a Bloomberg Business Flash. You're listening to
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  Speaker 1: Taking stock with Kathleen Hayes and Pim Fox on Bloomberg Radio.
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  Speaker 1: The first woman to serve as Chief Justice of the
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  Speaker 1: Supreme Court of Massachusetts, the first Justice of the United
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  Speaker 1: States to issue an opinion legalizing same sex marriage, and
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  Speaker 1: tonight she will be one of the three outstanding a
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  Speaker 1: Greater Boston leaders inducted into the Academy of Distinguished Bostonians
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  Speaker 1: at the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce's annual dinner. We're
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  Speaker 1: continuing our very special live broadcast here Katheen Hayes and
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  Speaker 1: Pim Fox, and we're very pleased now to welcome to
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  Speaker 1: the show, Chief Justice Margaret H. Marshall. Thank you, Kathleen,
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  Speaker 1: and thank you Pim. So you are a South African native,
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  Speaker 1: you first made your mark as an anti apartheid activist.
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  Speaker 1: Tell us a bit about that and how you got
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  Speaker 1: from South Africa to Boston. I grew up in a small,
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  Speaker 1: tiny village in will South Africa, and my parents were
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  Speaker 1: not political activists, um and I was surrounded by a
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  Speaker 1: partyit and it's amazing how one doesn't see often what
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  Speaker 1: is happening right in front of your eyes unless it
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  Speaker 1: somehow pointed out to you. At that time, racism was pervasive.
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  Speaker 1: There were no black students allowed in my school, or
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  Speaker 1: to own property or even in the church that I
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  Speaker 1: went to. Black South Africans couldn't travel in their own country,
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  Speaker 1: and of course they couldn't vote. And then came the
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  Speaker 1: greatest change in my life. I received a scholarship to
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  Speaker 1: come as a high school exchange student to the United
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  Speaker 1: States in the early nineteen sixties. President John F. Kennedy
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  Speaker 1: was president. That certainly ages me, um, but it was
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  Speaker 1: a wonderful time, and it was here that I fell
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  Speaker 1: in love with the principles that have guided this great
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  Speaker 1: nation since its founding. Equal justice under law for all,
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  Speaker 1: equal opportunity. I was exhilarated. I went back Kathleen to
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  Speaker 1: South Africa. I finished my college studies there, but I
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  Speaker 1: had had my eyes opened in the United States, and
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  Speaker 1: I became very active in opposing a partyit By then,
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  Speaker 1: Nelson Mandela and all of his colleagues have been sentenced
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  Speaker 1: to life in prison. And again, I came from a
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  Speaker 1: non political family. UM. My father was a corporate executive
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  Speaker 1: of my mother was a stay at home mom. I
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  Speaker 1: had a very comfortable life that I just couldn't tolerate
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  Speaker 1: what I saw going on around me any longer. And
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  Speaker 1: when it became unsafe for me to continue to be
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  Speaker 1: in South Africa, I was fortunate enough to be given
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  Speaker 1: a scholarship to come and study here in Boston at Harvard.
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  Speaker 1: And that's the sort of capsule story of how I
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  Speaker 1: got here. Take us back just for a second to
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  Speaker 1: the year two thousand and three and decision, and that
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  Speaker 1: will help bring us to the issues related to current
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  Speaker 1: events surrounding North Carolina. Okay, tell us about that decision
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  Speaker 1: in two thousand and three. In two thousand and free Um,
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  Speaker 1: several same sex couples they were not being married, had
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  Speaker 1: filed a lawsuit in the Trial court in Massachusetts. A
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  Speaker 1: lawsuit had actually been filed seven years, several years before,
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  Speaker 1: asking for the court to decide under the Massachusetts Constitution
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  Speaker 1: that to deny them the protection and benefits of marriage
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  Speaker 1: with the violation of our equality provision. The Massachusetts Constitution,
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  Speaker 1: which is older than the United States Constitution, begins with
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  Speaker 1: the words all people are born free and equal, and
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  Speaker 1: in essence the plaintiffs will look into though that provision,
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  Speaker 1: in particular to say, um that they should have the
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  Speaker 1: right to be married to each other. It was the
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  Speaker 1: first time, not the first time that a court had
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  Speaker 1: considered the question. Vermont had faced the same question just
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  Speaker 1: a few years earlier, and in fact, a decade earlier,
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  Speaker 1: the Hawaii Supreme Court had ruled on a similar issue,
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  Speaker 1: but UM. In Hawaii, the the interim judgment of the
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  Speaker 1: court had been overturned by the legislature. And in Vermont,
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  Speaker 1: UM the Vermont legislature and governor had endorsed civil unions
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  Speaker 1: and UM that had put an end to that court case.
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  Speaker 1: So this was the first time that there was, as
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  Speaker 1: you know, a sort of the requests that the court decides,
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  Speaker 1: specifically about marriage for same sex couples. UM and Mike
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  Speaker 1: Carls and I on the Supreme Judicial Court, in a
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  Speaker 1: split decision fortively, the seven justices who sit on boncoll
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  Speaker 1: at the time decided that the Massachusetts Constitution did, in fact,
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  Speaker 1: um enable same sex couples to be married. Well, of
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  Speaker 1: course that certainly open the door. You can you you
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  Speaker 1: paved the way. You were a trailblazer with that. When
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  Speaker 1: you look at North Carolina. The latest news is the
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  Speaker 1: US Justice Department is suing North Carolina over its law
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  Speaker 1: regulat in the bathroom choices of transgender people. They call
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  Speaker 1: the violation of the Federal Civil Rights Act. They're seeking injunction,
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  Speaker 1: where if you were the justice weighing in on that
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  Speaker 1: or advising either side. How would you be breaking down
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  Speaker 1: the issues here, Kathleen, You know it's difficult. UM. I
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  Speaker 1: don't know how to decide because you have to read
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  Speaker 1: all the beliefs. But I would say this, there was
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  Speaker 1: some um suggestion along the way that gender the not
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  Speaker 1: include sexual orientation and all transgender people. I think that
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  Speaker 1: has largely been put to rest by the United States
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  Speaker 1: Supreme Court Justice Kennedy in his decisions involving same sex couples.
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  Speaker 1: I don't think any reasonable argument can be made anymore
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  Speaker 1: that somehow the Equal Protection claus and or Title seven,
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  Speaker 1: whichever way they're doing it, that's the non discriminate federal
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  Speaker 1: non discrimination provision. It does not cover transgender people. And
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  Speaker 1: I think what I find strange here is and Attorney
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  Speaker 1: General United States Attorney General Lebretta Lynch made this point yesterday,
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  Speaker 1: but I had made it before, which is it is
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  Speaker 1: very reminiscent of the public accommodation sites that were fought
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  Speaker 1: when they're when various places excluded Black Americans from going
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  Speaker 1: into motels, or from swimming and swimming pools, or from
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  Speaker 1: going into toilets. UM. I often wonder, and it perplexes
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  Speaker 1: me what it is in our nation that often makes
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  Speaker 1: toilets and access to toilets where one is fighting about,
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  Speaker 1: you know, basic equality rights. It seems to me that
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  Speaker 1: um raally, I don't I don't know of any any
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  Speaker 1: study anywhere with anybody encountering difficulties in using public bathrooms
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  Speaker 1: or bathrooms and in places of employment. Don't forget the
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  Speaker 1: places of employment as well. And yet we've seen focused
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  Speaker 1: on that when we are somehow trying to segregate people
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  Speaker 1: just because of who they are, uh, you know, and
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  Speaker 1: that is so conquerry to our long tradition in the
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  Speaker 1: United States. We we do it slowly. I mean, to
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  Speaker 1: give full meaning to equal justice under law for all
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  Speaker 1: has taken us, you know, a couple of centuries, but
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  Speaker 1: it is clearly we've always moved in one direction. Ultimately,
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  Speaker 1: we as a society, we ultimately do not tolerate treating
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  Speaker 1: anybody because of their national origin, their Japanese heritage in
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  Speaker 1: the World War two, whatever it is, differently in asking
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  Speaker 1: them to be treated differently. And I think to me,
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  Speaker 1: when I listened to the discussions, and I haven't reviewed
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  Speaker 1: obviously either of the complaints, but it seems to me
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  Speaker 1: that we are HARKing back to a past that we
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  Speaker 1: often wish we had put behind us rather than moving forward.
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  Speaker 1: Just to learn a little bit more about your thinking,
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  Speaker 1: Chief Justice. Um the apparent deadlock in Washington over President
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  Speaker 1: Obama's nomination to fill the vacancy on the Supreme Court.
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  Speaker 1: Merck Garland. Yes, what do you make of that process
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  Speaker 1: or or a non process? And I'm only gonna give
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  Speaker 1: you about the seconds. It saddens me. Having a vibrant
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  Speaker 1: judicially is the foundation of what has, among other things,
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  Speaker 1: made ours a great, great nation. Uh, And I think
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  Speaker 1: it does not serve any purpose. And by the way,
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  Speaker 1: particularly businesses and entities who are trying to follow the
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  Speaker 1: law in the United States, to have a Supreme Court
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  Speaker 1: with only eight justices and they may not be able
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  Speaker 1: to agree on fundamental questions. And so I think that
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  Speaker 1: it doesn't reflect well. The Senate should the Senate Judiciary
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  Speaker 1: Committee should at least move forward in my judgment, and
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  Speaker 1: the matter brought to the Senate floor, so that we
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  Speaker 1: can have all free branches of government functioning well, which
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  Speaker 1: is really what our democracy is all about. Well, thank
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  Speaker 1: you very much for sharing your thoughts with us. Chief
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  Speaker 1: Justice Margaret H. Martial former Chief Justice of Supreme Court
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  Speaker 1: of Massachusetts now Senior Council Chot Hall and Stewart. We
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  Speaker 1: are broadcasting live from the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center
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  Speaker 1: before tonight's Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce two sixteen Annual
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  Speaker 1: Meeting