Sunday, September 22, 2024 

The following is an excerpt from the book “The Truths We Hold” by Kamala Harris.

Whenever I travel to a country for the first time, I try to visit the highest court in the land. They are monuments of a certain kind, built not just to house a courtroom but to send a message. In New Delhi, for example, the Supreme Court of India is designed to symbolize the balancing scales of justice. In Jerusalem, Israel’s iconic Supreme Court building combines straight lines — which represent the rigid nature of the law — with curved walls and glass that represent the fluid nature of justice. These are buildings that speak.

The same can be said of the United States Supreme Court Building, which, to my mind, is the most beautiful of them all. Its architecture recalls ancient Greece and the earliest days of democracy, as though you are standing in front of a modern-day Parthenon. It is grand and commanding while also dignified and restrained. As you walk up the steps toward an extraordinary entryway of Corinthian columns, you can see our nation’s founding hopes in its architecture. It is there that the words EQUAL JUSTICE UNDER LAW are engraved in stone. And it was the promise that brought me to the Supreme Court Building on March 26, 2013.

I arrived and was escorted to my seat in the courtroom. Because the Supreme Court justices don’t allow photography or video inside, this is a place that most of the country never sees. I certainly hadn’t before that day. I gazed around in awe: the stunning pink marble; the vivid red draping and intricate ceiling; the imposing bench with its nine empty chairs. I kept thinking about all the history that had been made inside these walls.

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