"One of the issues that [Thurgood] Marshall enjoyed arguing with his clerks was the question of what was obscene."

Write Bob Woodward and Scott Armstrong in "The Brethren":

He loved to take conservative positions with them, maintaining that anything hard-core could be and should be totally banned. What was so important about it? First Amendment principles are not at stake in this case, he would bellow. Dirty pictures are.

What about his liberal opinion for the Court in Stanley? his clerks would ask.

He had meant only to protect people’s privacy in their own homes, he would claim with a grin. Publishers, distributors, sellers could be stopped.

But, a clerk once pointed out, “You said that the right to privacy must go further than the home.” “No,” Marshall retorted. He had never said that.

Yes, the clerk insisted.

No, never, Marshall was sure. “Show me.”

The clerk brought the bound opinions.

Marshall read the relevant section. 

“That’s not my opinion, that’s the opinion of [a clerk from the prior term],” he declared. Opening the volume flat, he tore the page out. “There. It’s not there now, is it?”

What Thurgood Marshall said to Clarence Thomas.

"I had to do in my time what I had to do. You have to do in your time what you have to do."

And, on society's cynics:

"What monument is built for all that negativity? You are negative sometimes in order to make something better. You criticize it in a way to improve it. There are things wrong in this country that have to be improved, but you don't just keep nagging and nagging and nagging. But at some point it's got to stop. At some point too much is too much."

IN THE COMMENTS: Eric Muller said:

If I were Clarence Thomas, this is what I would tell myself Thurgood Marshall really believed about me too.