20 May 30 • 2019
jn
Series Kickoff
Toobin talks about Supreme Court
for fi
rst of Temple Israel lectures.
W
hen Hilary King became
the congregation president
of Temple Israel in West
Bloomfield, she had big ideas for the
future of the congregation. She and
her husband, Edan, wanted to use
their influence to make Temple Israel a
thought leader in the community.
“We wanted to make Temple Israel
more than just a synagogue, also a
place of learning for the community,
”
she said.
Toward this goal, the Kings are
sponsoring a speaker series at Temple
Israel called “The Many Shades of
Politics: An American Journey.
” The
series will bring speakers from all
different backgrounds and political
affiliations to Temple Israel to engage
the community in discourse about rel-
evant topics.
The series kicked off May 21 with
Jeffrey Toobin, CNN’
s senior legal ana-
lyst and writer for the New Yorker. It
also happened to be Toobin’
s birthday.
Toobin is the author of multiple
books including The Nine: Inside the
World of the Supreme Court and The
Oath: The Obama White House and
Supreme Court. His main interest,
or “obsession” as he calls it, is the
Supreme Court and how it is impacted
by and impacts the politics of its day.
He began his presentation by dis-
cussing current presiding Supreme
Court justices. He reminded the audi-
ence that the current court is com-
prised of five conservatives and four
liberals.
“The court is narrowly but clearly
divided along the same lines as the
American people,
” Toobin said.
He also spoke of the historical prec-
edent for the Supreme Court being
heavily influenced by public opinion.
In the 1960s, for example, Toobin said
the courts, despite being evenly split,
supported a very liberal agenda. He
also cited how the Nixon and Reagan
presidencies in the 1970s and 1980s
correlated with a conservative shift
in the courts and in public opinion, a
shift he credits largely to former U.S.
Attorney General Edwin Meese in
1981.
Bringing it back to a more modern
discussion, Toobin said we are expe-
riencing a similar conservative shift
today.
After his presentation, he took ques-
tions from the audience and signed his
books in the lobby.
Shelly Segall, a Temple Israel mem-
ber, said, “I thought he was great. “It
was very enlightening and relevant;
it was everything we expected and
more.
”
While most in the audience seemed
to like Toobin’
s presentation, some
weren’
t so sure about it.
“I thought it was an outdated topic,
”
said Michael Ginsburg of Southfield. “I
thought it was irrelevant to what’
s hap-
pening today, especially considering
he works for CNN. I felt like he was
just trying to be non-controversial the
whole time.
”
Despite some mixed feedback,
Hilary King was pleased with the out-
come of the kickoff event.
“I think it went really well,
” she said.
“We are reviewing names for upcom-
ing events and are excited to do it
again.
” ■
JESSIE COHEN
jews d
in
the
JESSIE COHEN JN INTERN
Jeffrey Toobin addresses a capacity crowd at Temple Israel.
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