He smiled and said the court had these cycles, but it would come around again. You can't give up. Justice Brennan looked fondly into the distance. That passage has always meant a great deal to me. Let alone since.
Ugly inequities continue to mar the face of our nation.
We are surely nearer the beginning than the end of the struggle. For all his passionate concern about injustice across the board, Justice Brennan was not a flinty moralist in person. Talking to him, as I frequently did during his last years on the court, I felt entirely at ease in the presence of one of the most powerful figures in the nation. He had no side, as the British say. Genuinely curious about the interests of people he talked to, he was the most naturally friendly person I have ever known.