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administration. Indeed he arranged for me to become an assistant to then Attorney General Robert Kennedy—without even asking me! It was well intentioned, and it might even have been the right choices of jobs following the clerkships, but it was his choice, not mine. He wanted me to aspire to a judgeship, perhaps even as a Justice of the Supreme Court, but I never wanted to be a judge. (Neither, it turned out, did he, since he resigned from the Supreme Court after only 3 years.)

Judge Bazelon, on the other hand, encouraged me to create my own unique career path and avoid the “cookie cutter” paths for which most elite young lawyers opt. “Don’t follow in anyone’s footsteps,” he urged me. “Your feet are too big to fit anyone else’s print. Create your own life. You are unique. Live a unique life. Take risks. Live boldly.” It was scary, but it fit my personality to a T.

Half way through my year with David Bazelon I was offered a clerkship with Justice Arthur Goldberg. I had also been offered a clerkship with Justice Hugo Black, but I strongly preferred to clerk for a new Justice whose views were not as firmly formed. I asked to see Justice Goldberg before I formally accepted his offer. I told him that I wanted him to know that I would not be able to work on Saturday or Friday night and asked him if he still wanted to extend the offer. He angrily replied, “I should withdraw the offer just because you asked me that ridiculous question. What do you think I am? How could I possibly turn down somebody because he is an orthodox Jew?” I apologized for asking the question, but told him that I had been previously been turned down by the firm of Paul Weiss, Rifkin, Wharton and Garrison. He said, “Paul Weiss turned you down because you were orthodox? I’m going to call my friend Si Rifkin. He won’t let them get away with that.” I sheepishly replied that it was Simon Rifkin who turned me down. (Years later, Arthur Goldberg was offered a partnership at Paul, Weiss and before accepting he insisted on being assured that what happened to his law clerk would never happen to another Orthodox Jew. Paul, Weiss now has many Orthodox Jews). Goldberg told me that my co-clerk was Christian and didn’t work on Sunday, so he had assistance available to him seven days a week. Me on Sunday and my co-clerk Lee McTurnan on Saturday. It worked very well, except that on one Saturday an emergency death penalty petition came to Justice Goldberg, and I was the death penalty specialist. So Justice Goldberg had his driver take him to my house in Hyattsville, MD, where he knew I would be, and we conferred on the case and he made his decision.

A few months before I started my Supreme Court clerkship, my grandmother came to town and I took her and my son Elon, who was then 2 years old, to see the Supreme Court. We got permission to go to Justice Goldberg’s chambers, but he was not there. His secretary, Fran Gilbert, invited me to take my grandmother and my son in to the Justice’s private office to look at the paintings, which were all done by his very artistic wife, Dorothy. The new decorations in his office had just been finished and his secretary told me that Goldberg was proud of how nice they looked. My son, however, had no appreciation for the new rug and proceeded to leave a large yellow stain right in front of Justice Goldberg’s desk. When the Justice finally came in I was on my hands and knees scrubbing the rug with soap, only making it worse. This time, he almost did fire me, but with my grandmother there he would have had a hard time. My grandmother did have an argument with him. She told him that she noticed that morning that I had davened (prayed) for only twenty minutes. “It takes at least a half hour,” she said. “He’s skipping. Tell him to take the full half hour.” Justice Goldberg shook his finger at me and said, “Listen to your

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