President Richard Nixon's carefully chosen Supreme Court Chief Justice Warren Burger was, of course, a no-nonsense, strict constructionist who could be trusted to stick to his guns.
Which is precisely what two Washington Post reporters discovered one tense night in 1971, during the run-up to the U.S. Supreme Court's final Pentagon Papers ruling on whether the Post and The New York Times could legally publish the government's secret Pentagon Papers history of its tragic Vietnam War mistakes. (Reader alert: This isn't another tired Pentagon Papers tale, nor a reviewer riff on "The Post" movie, so don't stop reading!)
The Post's legendary editor Ben Bradlee was worried Nixon's Justice Department might sneakily submit a new legal motion directly to the chief justice at his home. So he dispatched Post reporters Martin Weil and Spencer Rich (who were later my Post colleagues) to check it out. When the reporters rang Burger's doorbell, the chief justice himself opened the door. His Hollywood-perfect snow-white hair made him ideal for the role of chief justice; he even was wearing a robe (alas, not his black Supreme Court robe, just a bathrobe). And he was brandishing one more accessory: a gun.
Reporter Weil described it all in his memo to his anxiously awaiting editors:
Author: Martin Schram | Opinion 
Updated: 1 hour ago 
Published 1 hour ago 