Not long ago, Justice Jackson described a Kafkaesque nightmare within the Supreme Court. I have also lived through my own share of the surreal.
A common recurring nightmare is the one where you walk into a classroom unprepared. I’ve often dreamed of the opposite: showing up on the first day as a professor and realizing I had nothing ready to teach. In an older dream, I even found myself faking a lecture on Pierson v. Post.
Last night I woke to a fresh take on that theme, this time set inside the Supreme Court itself. In the dream, I was serving as co-counsel in a case that was about to be argued. The courtroom looked familiar, yet the area designated for advocates was noticeably smaller. Chief Justice Roberts called the case. Our lead attorney glanced at me and admitted, “I can’t do it.” He stepped aside. Panic surged because I hadn’t prepared for oral argument at all. But someone had to approach the podium, so it fell to me. I walked to the lectern and began with, “Mr. Chief Justice, and may it please the Court.” My mind then went completely blank. I couldn’t recall anything—not the name of the case, not our client’s name. I simply stood there in silence, a rarity in my experience.
In that moment, Justice Thomas, as is customary, launched the first question. I had absolutely no idea what he was asking, though it felt like a softball designed to help me out.
Then I pivoted and looked toward the lead counsel to see if he could interject, but he shook his head no.
Eventually I murmured, “We will rely on the submissions in our brief,” and I sat down. Given the circumstances, it turned out to be a pretty decent save. I was oddly proud that my dream-brain had conjured up that improvisation on the fly. The Chief Justice offered a curt, “Thank you.” I don’t recall the Respondent making an argument, and I didn’t deliver a rebuttal.
After the argument concluded, I walked toward the cafeteria, dreading the flood of hostile messages I would receive, so I didn’t even check my phone. Several people at the Court tried to cheer me up, telling me I had performed well by stepping in at the last moment. Yet I remained mortified.
So yes, the Supreme Court is always on my mind, even when I’m dreaming.
I combed through old posts about dreams connected to the law. There were many: times when Justice Kagan yelled at me, when Judge Posner yelled at me, when SCOTUS supposedly issued a cease-and-desist order against me, when Justice Kagan sang her hand-down of a Shelby County dissent, when the Solicitor General received an award from the Chief Justice, when Justice Thomas attended one of my book talks, when I showed Justice Breyer galleys of my book, and more.
