Jerry Goldman, The Oyez Project

By Chris Karr in Miscellaneous on Jul 4, 2005 8:51PM

With the recent announcement of the retirement of Associate Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, political observers and enthusiasts have been bracing themselves for a highly charged appointment battle and the first change in the Supreme Court in eleven years.

Jerry Goldman is a member of the political science faculty at Northwestern University. In his role as a teacher and researcher, Professor Goldman created one of the largest multimedia databases in the world – The Oyez Project. Oyez is a website where individuals can browse and find multimedia resources about the Supreme Court – including images, audio, and a virtual reality tour of the Supreme Court. As the confirmation fight heats up, Goldman’s Oyez project will become invaluable to pundits and observers alike.

Professor Goldman sat down with the Chicagoist to discuss how he created the Oyez Project, tell us what baseball has to do with the Supreme Court, and share his thoughts on the state of the hot dog in the Chicagoland area.

Chicagoist: How long have you been with Northwestern?

Goldman: I've lived in Evanston since 1975. I work at Northwestern University where I’ve been a member of the faculty since before I arrived. My appointment began in September 1975 – I took a leave for several months to finish up some work I was doing in Washington. And I arrived here on December 15, 1975. It’ll be thirty years this December.

Chicagoist: What were you doing in Washington?

Goldman: I was working for the Federal Judicial Center, which is the research and training arm of the federal court system. I was in the research division there – I worked on a couple of interesting projects that allowed me to apply my academic understanding to real-life situations for courts and litigants. It was a really good environment – I did that for two and a half years.

It was an interesting time to be in Washington because the Watergate matter unfolded, and it was literally before my eyes. My office was across the street diagonally from the White House – across from Pennsylvania Avenue at a place called the Dolly Madison House – at the corner of H Street and Lafayette Square. I could open my window and see the crowds standing outside of the White House, stopping traffic on Pennsylvania Avenue on August 8 – that would be 1974 – when Nixon resigned, yelling “Jail to the Chief!”

Those were exciting times, then I came out here to try out life as an academic.

Chicagoist: Were you surprised about the recent Deep Throat revelation?

Goldman: Yeah. Well, surprised? I was surprised that it happened before Deep Throat died. I always suspected that Deep Throat would hold on to this secret. Only after Deep Throat’s death would Woodward or Bernstein reveal that truth. I suspect that because Mark Felt’s family thought that everyone else was cashing in on Deep Throat, Deep Throat should cash in on Deep Throat. It’s ironic that the cost of college tuition is forcing this enfeebled and demented old man to face up to the fact that he did a brave thing when he was second in command at the FBI. So, yeah, it brought back old memories and I’m glad that the news broke.

Chicagoist: Can you tell us about The Oyez Project?

Goldman: “Oyez! Oyez! Oyez!” are the words spoken by the Marshall of the Court before the arrival of the justices into the courtroom. (“Oyez” is pronounced “O-yay”. –ed.) And “oyez” has that symbolic value because our legal traditions stem from the common law tradition of Great Britian and for a while French was spoken in English courts and that’s where we get “Oyez”.

The Oyez Project is a vast multimedia database accessible to the public with every bit of information that we can muster in relation to the Court, the justices, and the work they do. The principal collection is an archive that we’re creating of every public event recorded in the Supreme Court from October 1955 to the present day. It’s about ten thousand hours of audio that we’ll add to the collection and our aim is to make it searchable, annotatable, and digestable for scholars, students, interested citizens, people who want to learn English, people wanting to make hip-hop out of Supreme Court audio – anything and everything. It’s got some other whistles and bells including a tour of the Supreme Court and summaries of every case decided. We have great plans for integrating other bits of information, but the heart of it is its audio collection.

Chicagoist: Can you tell us about "Oyez Baseball"?

Goldman: Oyez Baseball is an effort to compare justices of the Supreme Court with major league personalities. The reason for doing this is that most people don't know the Supreme Court and my collaborator - Paul Manna - and I thought that if we could find a way to provide links between thing citizens and students don't know with what they do know that they might hold on to the information that the don't know better than they do now. Now, there's some good evidence - some good social survey data - that says the vast majority of Americans can name the Three Stooges, but can't give you the name of three Supreme Court justices. We want to change that. There are a hundred and eight Supreme Court justices and we've matched them up in a quiz - available from the Oyez Project - that will test your baseball knowledge and hope that you see the link between the justice and the player that we've identified as his closest match.

Based on the plaudits that we received from Oyez Baseball, we've also created "Presidential Baseball". Same concept, but presidents matched with baseball players.

Chicagoist: Rumor has it that you’re a big Cubs fan.

Goldman: I wouldn’t say that I’m a crazy Cubs fan, but I’ve been going to Wrigley for twenty years or so. I started going back in 1983 when a couple of my favorite undergraduates insisted that I invest in some time at Wrigley. I started doing that and it felt good, so I’ve gone to about twenty consecutive opening days. I went long on tickets this year, so I hope the Cubs get some good pitching or it’ll be a long year.

Chicagoist: How are the hot dogs at Wrigley Field?

Goldman: I think that the regular hot dog that is sold by the hot dog vendors sucks. I think that... There aren’t words that characterize the bad food experience I’ve had there. Now it’s okay to get the grill dogs or the Hebrew National dogs with onions and the works – that’s an okay experience. I think I’m going to have to pay another visit to the Cell because I think the food there is much better. But I’m not a fan of Wrigley Field hot dogs. Actually, I’m not a fan of anything that’s sold at Wrigley Field because it’s overpriced and poor quality. Though a cold beer on a hot day is good at almost any price point. Three dollars for bottled water? No, I draw the line. I bring my own water.

Chicagoist: What's the best hot dog in Chicago?

Goldman: Let’s see... Gold Coast Dogs does a pretty good job. Flukies... Umm, don’t put Flukies on the list. I just don’t like their fries – their fries fail. Good dog, but the rest of it doesn’t work for me. Superdawg at Devon and Milwaukee – that’s another good experience. A well-packaged dog. You’re really not going to find that anywhere else. It’s exceptional. Comes in a little kit, with tasty fries and a really good dog, a pickle and a sour tomato.