Lessons from a Life in the Practice of Law with Hon. Alan K. Simpson

Welcome to another episode of Iowa Law Pod. My very special guest today is retired senator Alan K. Simpson, who much prefers to be called Al. His lifetime achievements would fill a book or two, so I'll just give a brief summary for this introduction. He grew up in Cody in the 1930s.

He attended the University of Wyoming for his undergraduate degree and received his law degree there in 1958. Al began practicing law with his father in the late 50s in Cody. His practice included working as the town attorney. He was a Wyoming State Senator from 1965 through 1977. In 1978, he was elected to the US Senate where he served three terms before returning to the practice of law in Cody.

Al is still active in politics and maintains his law practice in his nineties. He's a remarkable man. Today, you'll have a chance to hear some lessons and stories from his law career, which has spanned over six decades. Today's episode was recorded in the Simpson home in Cody, Wyoming, where Al and his wife, Ann, had me as their guest. It was a wonderful experience for me, and I was made to feel very much at home.

I was even treated to lunch that included sandwiches made with delicious homemade bread. So rather than try and edit this into a studio session, you'll hear Ann in the background checking on us, preparing lunch in the kitchen, some phone calls, and other background noises, all of which are just part of the daily going ons at the Simpson House. Al is one of the most genuine and interesting and funny people I've ever met, and I hope you enjoy listening to this podcast as much as I enjoyed recording. Senator Simpson, thank you so much for being a guest on the show today. I'm looking forward to talking to you.

Well, I admire what you're doing. You can chronicle the reminiscences of an old fart in the law.

Perfect. That's the goal.

So, when I finished my CLE, and I'm sure you're gonna give me a couple points here, I would have been practicing law for sixty five years in Wyoming, which is a long time. And so I was attracted to the law by a grandfather and a father, and and they were tough characters. My grandfather, William L Simpson, who is the name of William L Simpson, the Judge here, he he was he lived in Meteetsee. He was a cripple. He had polio when he was a kid, and he was called Broken Ass Bill, which was not really something he would cherish, and he was hostile and ringy, and he drank a lot of booze, and he lost their home three or four times in poker games and so on. He was involved with the Ten Sleep murder case.

He was a special prosecutor. He knew Butch Cassidy. And he got ringing with the with the banker in Meteetsee. He he was a Democrat. And he said, you know, you bounced my checks over.

And Hayes was the banker. He said, you know, we don't really like Democrats in Park County and and, you know, you might move on. And he said, you know, don't do that again if you do something bad happen to you. Well, so he did it again and so my grandfather went into the bank and with a .45 just shot his ear off. So then he moved to Cody.

When they left Meteetsee, that's when my father came over here from Meteetsee. He went to the first grade Meteetsee. And then my grandfather in the summer of twenty anyway, he was a tough tough guy. He and he was he was a self taught guy, and he had a this penchant for for sensitivity to his crippling aspects. And so anyway, in the August of twenty three, he had lost a case for a guy and the guy came up behind him and hit him in the back of the head.

JK: Wow. AS: And damn near knocked his eye out as some said they did. So he went right down to the home of Doctor Francis Lane who lived with her woman companion. Everybody knew that, and they were long time friends. And she's and he said, I I wanna I'm gonna take your gun.

I want I want your gun your gun, Francis, who was a great friend of my grandmother. She said he said, no. You can't have it. You've been you've been drinking. And he said, well, I know where it is.

And he took it and he took it back downtown, and he got in a scuffle with this guy and and shot him. Wow. And so the guy died over in in Powell, and the brand new prosecuting attorney here was Ernest J. Goffert. You could pick up that.

And he was charged in with first degree murder, my grandfather. And and there's a gap in in Pop's itinerary because he was at Harvard Law School. He had been he'd some he'd met somebody at Valley Ranch when he was a a little cabin boy. He said, you know, if you come to Harvard, we'll have a brass band and we'll meet you at the station. And they had a kazoo, you know, and all that stuff.

Anyway, so Dad dropped out of Harvard. He said he had to. He said one of his tests was a 37 and he said that they didn't have to go any lower.

That's pretty low.

Yeah. So he he came back to help his his father as did many other lawyers around Wyoming who because Bill Simpson was very well regarded. He was a tough cookie. So when they took the case over to Basin and then the jury came in eight to four for acquittal and the Judge Okay. I have people who want us from the air.

Can okay, honey. Okay. Ann S: Now who is what is this for? What? I'm asking Justin.

This is for a podcast.

A podcast.

Mhmm. And it's for lawyers to get education credit.

Ann S: Okay. AS: Credit, Anne. Mhmm. Anyway so the judge dismissed the case. You don't just dismiss the case on the murder.

And he said, they're never gonna convict Billy Simpson of anything in this state. The guy guy came up, you know, who names are in the record of what Andrew Lyon and other people came up to help Bill Simpson beat the rap that the guy abused him and he responded. So anyway, then he went then he left and went to Jackson after that and he died over there and and he was still the living example and he started a thing. My dad ran for the US Senate in '40 and my grandfather said he started a thing called Democrats for Simpson which didn't really work out and dad got hammered flat. He died a month later of a broken heart of a grandfather.

So we went over to Jackson and Dad closed up the practice and I watched him do that and so it was an attractive thing. And then I went to law school and boy was I hazardous. I think it was Harry Truman said the world is run by C students.

I like that.

And I I like that because I studied hard with guys who were brilliant. You know, Sunday afternoon and they got all As. And then I got a D. And the dean was a tough old boy. He was always scratching his head talking, you know, like off the side of his mouth.

He said, Alan, I think that you ought to look at a different line of work. I said, look. I studied with these guys. They get As and I get a D. What the hell was that?

Well, I said, I'll tell you what, I'm gonna get a law degree if I have to go to Panhandle A and M to get it. So it won't bother me. He said, I don't believe I would talk like that Allen. I don't remember you are talking to the dean. And I said, well, think I am talking to the dean.

And I think I got a B in the second year and the rest of them, well, C's. I was just hanging by my thumbs. There was a guy named George Rudolph. He was he was a brilliant tax lawyer. I didn't know I never could figure out my Social Security number and and he came in at the senior year where I where if I and if I'd had a D or a C plus or C minus I'm done.

And he said, I'm just looking at the grades, he had a squint, looked at the out in the sun most of the time and he said, Simpson, I just looked at your paper, he said, I think I'm gonna have to give you a C. And I said, a C? I said, Terrific. He looked at the other members of the class and he said, it was a very strange response. I said, well, it was.

And so there were five of us and there were 18 in our class and five of them were cum laude and the other the other bottom feeders were Mike Svealer who was the one dear friend and myself and, you know, about it, but we we did find out about the bar exam later and we did better than they did. We we cabbished it. We found out where it was, the mimeograph sheets or something. I can't remember. So we proved up.

So anyway, I just practiced along, came back with Dad. All of us passed the the bar, eighteen of us. And we we I started practice with Dad, Simpson and Simpson. And and then there was a wonderful brilliant lawyer over at Husky who was the counsel for Husky Oil Company. Charles G. Kepler, you'll find his name in the records down there.

He's a he was a very gracious benefactor. And he he he came to me one night. He said, I I think we ought to start with maybe have a law practice. You your Dad's running for stuff all the time. He said, and I noticed that your light is on at night when I go home.

I said, yeah. It is. I'm trying to figure out how to draft a warranty deed. And he said, well, why don't we join up? And he he graduated magna cum laude from Laramie, served in the Army, wounded in battle in combat in Germany, and then took a Doctor of Laws at Michigan with Magna Cum Laude.

JK: Wow. AS: Doctor of Law, that's a big one. So it was like practicing with a law professor. I'd go to Kepler's office and say, What the shit is this? He said, Alan, that's the doctrine of Rodloy.

I said, I've never heard of it. He said, Nobody else has either. And so we practiced law for about eighteen years and did a lot of wonderful stuff and Dad went on to the US Senate and governor. And so then I got out of the Senate and and here came Bill Simpson and Mike Byrd who had tried some heavy lawsuits, gas explosions, and stuff like that and gotten some big judgments in Wyoming in the federal court or the state. So they said, why don't you come into the firm?

I said, well, my skills are not honed after eighteen years of beating the brains out in the US Senate but and you couldn't practice law when you were in that. And so I joined the firm and and do limited work, but keep up my CLE so that so that they'll pay me.

I like that.

And I loved it too. And so the boys came in and the firm Kep didn't come in. He he just said I've done and outspent life. He died at the age of 90. He was terribly confused and he was kind of off range and they found him in a car, know, in a ditch.

He just he he was lost and disoriented. Wonderful guy. So anyway, there were lots of cases in there. There was lots of stuff but you can you can identify that I have trampled upon your prerogatives.

No worries. But I was curious what Cody was like when you were a small child and whether you lived in town or kinda lived in a rural setting.

Well, Cody was a town of about two or 3,000 two 2,500 people. I was born in '31 and and then the the war came when I was 10 and we all charted the course of the World War on our on our wall in our bedroom and tossed darts at Adolf Hitler and Mussolini and Tojo. I ran into a guy just my age long after that. I said, you were in the war my my age? Who who did you throw darts at?

He said, Churchill, Roosevelt, Stalin. Anyway, I just finished a service of an obituary, a a eulogy of Norman Manela who was a congressman from San Jose who I met at the boy scout camp. He was behind barbed wire, church lights aimed inside, soldiers with rifles, barbed wire, and our scout leader took us out there and said, these are boy scouts. These are American citizens. You know, what the hell?

And so he was very enlightened and so we then we served together in congress as I say. It was it was a tough bull to to do that a week ago. And but he died and enough of that. But we served together on the board of regents of the Smithsonian and we we worked on the reparations, you know, where the they were giving $10,000 to each incarcerated Japanese American and some of them refused it but at least Reagan signed it and it was a that was a tough one. You know, my colleague in the Senate said, you know, who's next?

Blacks, Indians, Native Americans? Who do we who do we who's who's the grieved ones? I said, well, that may be but but I was there and you weren't there. And if you'd seen where they lived in a tar paper shack a mess hall, and taking a crap right next to the guy with a no partition, you know, it's a different game. You ought to go out there, you know.

It's it's quite a memorial. It's a museum. And they were gonna break ground next next month on a Simpson Manela Library in Compton Center. JK: That's fantastic. AS: Raised the money.

Anyway, it was it was a vigorous practice and I was city attorney for about thirteen years. I was on the fire department, the volunteer fire department. We all did that stuff and did a pro bono work and but but it was you know, you just you just left your house in in on a day like this and you never came back until you heard the car honk or something or your mother would call BB guns and God Almighty rabbits and arrowhead hunting all over this evee on this hill. So it was then Dad was practicing along and we we saw that he enjoyed it. And anyway, I got in with him and then there were some cases that they were very fascinating.

That's what you want to get to, isn't it?

Oh, I'd like to hear a little more first about just I'm assuming that being city attorney at that time was an incredibly broad amount of job duties and handle almost a little bit of everything?

Well, yeah. It was, you know, the JPs were laymen. There was no JK: right. AS: And then one of the JPs, a very revered man, was the former sheriff of the of the county, the high sheriff we called him. And I was in the case with Oliver Stedman who you look him up and I put on my case about somebody who struck somebody else with a shovel when they were trying to ruin their irrigation ditch or they're tore their weir out, you know.

Those are lovely things and and the the JP, the Judge said, I think I'm gonna find Mister Stedman's client guilty just as you presented that case. And Mister Simpson and Oliver said, Judge, would it be okay if we put on our case? And the Judge said, I think that would be very good and Oliver looks over at me like I said, well, Oliver and, you know, then there were and then there was a town meetings on fluoride, you know, some activist people got together and said the fluoride is poisoning bears in the park, makes your brain deteriorate and we have it in our Cody water supply. You're the city attorney, what do you got? I said, I'm not the city physician.

And God, you know, it comes and you have to go to those meetings, you know, look wise, you know. JK: Right. AS: And then I remember there was a issue came up and about five people came in to bitch to the council and they said we're gonna take that over under advisement. And next time there were about 25 people and and they and we're gonna take that under advisement again. Last time there were about 200 people showed up and one of the councilmen said, Where is the city attorney.

Do we have to make a decision with all these people here? I said, Yes. It's called democracy. And I think you should because next time there will be 400 people out here. And then they went into secret session in the basement of the Mayflower figuring out to get rid of me.

Wow. Didn’t like what you were saying.

No. And he said, You put the heat on you on the Al, you know, shit. Why do you do that? I said, Well, time. There's time.

And then of course there those sensitive things I always had, you know, because when you're practicing law in a little town, you know everything. And one time there was this little girl, she was about 10 or 11, and her sister was about 11. And I noticed some bruises on her that were not caused by falling down in her sandbox. Somehow I got her aside and her parents came for some burden. I said, what happened to you, dear?

She said, Daddy did that. JK: Wow. AS: Well, I said, that's good to know, and we don't want anybody to know, dude. No. He told me never to say anything.

Well, I knew where he worked. I pulled him in and I said, you son of a bitch. I'm gonna pull the chain on you. You're gonna you're gonna be picking shit with the chickens. I know what you're doing.

Well, I was abused when I was a kid. I said, I don't give a shit. I've heard that one before. And so he's still here and and his wife. And I asked about the girls, and they're 45.

JK: Oh, wow. AS: And they're living they're they're wonderful gals, and they're 45 or 50. So I I was kind of a judge and jury. And and then there was a there was a Spanish teacher that they apparently, some of the chosen ones decided to scare him one night. So he was out walking down by somewhere, and they took a beer bottle and headed for him, you know, with a broken beer bottle.

You spic that you spic son of a bitch. We're gonna cut your nuts out or whatever with a salad fork or whatever. And they were all members of the community. They were the sons of doctors and not lawyers, but they were just a bunch of, you know, hotshots. So I I said, you know, you have to testify exactly what they said to you.

He said, like, it was so vile so foul. I said, I don't give a shit how how foul it was because I'm gonna have all their parents there because they're all there to see about sweet old Jimmy, and he was gonna go to West Point, you know, and all this shit. And so I had all these parents, and they were all smiling. And I said, can you describe you know, I didn't have to lead him anywhere, but I said, you I wanna know if you're under oath. You what what did what did they say to you?

Who said that? Well, this one said that. That one said that. Well, you filthy spic. And this and his parents were just there all squished down.

I said, isn't that interesting? Are are you parents aware of how your little darlings handled this guy? Oh, boy. Shit. Then they were after me for a bit.

JK: That's unreal. AS: But those were fun things, you know. And you can make enemies that way. But then one night, one day, there was a a black gentleman. He went to the he went to the Budge Drive In.

He was a he was a surveyor or something in the summer. There weren't a lot of people out here. And he had a beer and he the gal came out in her shorts with her boobs hanging out, you know, over her underwear, what were they called, hooters they called. JK: Right. AS: I believe I've seen those.

I was just disgusted when I saw this on that. But, anyway, he said, you're looking you're a very attractive young lady. She went home and told her parents that a nigger had said something crude to her. So before before I could try that one or see what they were charging him with, I got him into the the office. I said, you know, what'd you what'd you do?

He said, Jesus, this is terrible. I'm a graduate of, I don't know, Michigan State. They had a beer and I this gal, and she was provocative, and I said, you're looking very attractive. And I said, well, it it won't go well for you here even if you get a, you know, whatever method. But I said, I got a deal for you.

Get your ass out of town. Here's a hundred bucks and hit the road because this is not exactly this is not compassion time, you know, with a young white gal out there. So I did do all those lovely things. I was and it didn't bother me at all. Ian says brave Afre, that was another.

They charged this guy with Afre. I said, what shit's AFRE? I haven't tried that? Well, AFRE is a disgusting, alarming situation that is alarming to the peace of the people who were in the area something. They've been offended.

Well, I said, what did this guy do? Well, he he'd been to the rodeo and he'd had a few drinks and then he got out to Cassy's Supper Club and he he'd seen the he saw it chewed the ear off of the the one of the of this livestock. So he got down and and pulled this guy down and started to chew his ear off. I said, well, that is Afre  . We can't have that.

That's for sure. We know what it is. When we see it, it's offensive to other people who are standing around watching crude behavior. You ever hear of it? JK: I've never heard

of it, but I like that. Look it up. Afraid. So

so I did a lot of that and then weaved and then there were there were a lot of cases. There was an old gentleman from Basin. His name was C. A. Zerring.

He was 95 and we all went over to Mason at the Eagles Club over at in Mason. The way that the Eagles Club has has fallen apart from the building and collapsed so there's not much of an Eagle's club over there. But there were about a 50 of us in there and he got a wonderful wit, I'll never forget it, and he said, Well, I said, I'll tell you I'm 95, I'm so practical on, but I want to tell you when I was young I lost a lot of cases I should have won. Then I got older and won a lot of cases I should have lost. But he said, my lord, justice was served.

I like that. God. I never forgot that. And so that was his summary. Then there was a very famous lawyer from Wyoming, Thurgood Marshall.

JK: Certainly. AS: Not Thurgood Marshall. Thurmond Arnold. JK: Okay. AS: You can look him up.

His firm is still in Washington, Arnold and Porter. Okay. And he had a wicked sense of humor and we were, you know, I'm young and I'm listening to these old guys. He got he got up and with this wonderful whip and said that somebody said he'd gone in a trial with the Pullman Company at the same numbers the Pullman Company so they wouldn't change the numbers so he he'd call the Pullman Company and say don't ride in the Pullman cars. They've collapsed.

A lot of times the brakes fail on the Pullman's cars and you can be thrown together and you can probably lose your belay. And they called him and they said you can't do that. He said well change the goddamn phone number then. And then one guy called and said, I'm I tell you what, Mister Arnold, you're gonna we're gonna destroy your wife's reputation for credit. He said, that's what I've been trying to do for all my life.

So he he was a there's a whole books of him. He was a a trust buster under Roosevelt. And then, you know, but then you learn from the new ones and and and you you had I had a judge that was very compassionate, you know, and he didn't know what I was doing. And you'd go to Court and somebody would file a motion. You didn't you had to look it up, you know, you didn't know leminie would do.

We didn't know what those were. And so he'd listen and I was city attorney and and have these older guys picking on me motions, the motion. And the Judge said to one of them, the old senior of the he said, may I just come into chambers, Mister Simpson and Mister Fitz Stevens and Mister Stedman? What is it that you're trying to elicit from this brand new lawyer in our midst? Well, we're just thought we'd teach him a few tricks.

And Spangler said, well, I tell you, why don't you write a book and spare me all this shit? You should write a book on how to tease junior lawyers with motions that are arcane and have no bearing on anything just so you can get old Simpson tied in knot. Well, God, that was the best thing that ever happened, you know? How many Judges do that, you know?

That's wonderful.

And so he died of cancer. I wrote him a beautiful letter. I said you changed my life. Anyway, so when Kep came in and Dad, you know, was gonna run for governor. And so Kep and I, we just went on and there were some were some amazing Jerry Spence is a very dear friend of mine.

There is no way to explain his profanity because it's not obscenity. It's profanity. There's a difference. JK: Absolutely. AS: And so he he which I just talked to him the other day, he's gonna leave a lot of his stuff to the university.

JK: Wonderful. AS: How you doing, Jerry? Alright. Can't walk. So when he was a he was a young attorney over in Fremont County, there was a guy, this was one of those cases you never forget, and my dad was practicing then and he knew a dear old friend who'd been in the legislature with him over in Fremont County who was faced with the horror of moose moose deprivation in his feedlots.

Not the feedlot, but hay. You may not be aware that a moose will urinate or defecate in a haystack and no one will ever eat it

I did not know that.

Of the cow of the quadruped. So he was just and he just and they would they'd bring firecrackers out and run them off. So he called the game and fish and he said, why don't you show up on the hill outside of Dubois there on my ranch about 03:00 on the afternoon on Friday and and see something you've never seenefore b. The guys came and the and he pulled out a 30 06 bolt action to kill four of these folks from long range. He said, I've done pretty well.

Well, he said, you son of bitch. Yeah. This is this is this you're you're you're gonna go to you're going to the clink. So Spence handled it as a young attorney and I was with Dad. He was senior and and of course the JP turned it all over.

He says, we're gonna find you guilty for whatever. Then it went to the district court and the district Judge was Nicholas, one of the Nicholas

Okay.

The father. And he he he didn't waste any time on that. That's just one destruction of Wild Life . I went to the Supreme Court and the ancient one of all time was the Chief Justice. His name was Bloom, Fred Bloom.

Lots of his cases. He asked Kemp and I to brief the case of the castle doctrine that you could protect the person from the castle. Sure. And that there surely was a way to protect your livelihood with your cattle operation. And God all Kep and I prepared that thing and the old man went down and argued it and an old bloom came in, it's right there on the book, right, and the fence just cracked a brick.

He said, how did you do that? It's a castle doctrine, you know, protecting a man's castle. He did this. That's what he he his cows eat the hay, and then he sells his cows. Anyway, Jerry and I were caught over that, but then Jerry and I tried cases together.

Oh, wow. We never lost any. We did about six and he'd join me on, so I'd pull him in and and then there was cases in the county or outside the county. He'd say, I think I'm how much am I paying you for my assistance? I said, I don't know.

We figured that out. But and so one day, the defense guy from Casper who just didn't like Spence at all. He said, Judge, I renew the request that we have a recess here. It's been a rather combative time and I just jabbed Jerry. And the Judge said, I'll decide when we have a recess.

Just sit down, please. And Spence turned to me and said, Add thousand bucks to my fee . Very nice. For for that little tip. Anyway, we had those were cases.

He could put a human being 18 years old together in front of a jury for on a wrongful death that would make the jury just cry. And, man, I tell you. So one time I came home to Ann and I said I said, this guy, Spence, is driving me crazy. He just sweet talks these little old ladies that he picks out of the majority and gives him a bunch of horse shit and then romances and on and and on. And I finished his description, and Ann said, Well, like you do.

And I said, I don't want to hear that at all. And so anyway, those were fun times and then they were tragic times and but he could he was he was he was and and then he we did some shticks together before the bar convention.

That had to be riot.

Were you one of those that were there Simpson and Spence went at each other?

I have not been part of that, but I'd love to see it.

He cut he did the one about the woman that spilled hot coffee on her crotch Sure. At McDonald's. And I said, Jerry, how tough was that to prove that that hot coffee is not good for genitalia or anything else or anything. He said, you you smart ass. The pain is the pain.

And then the statistics of this and then and he was his eyes were twinkling and there was ttheree fun ones too. And he said I said, you know, Jerry, I just was amazed at your the growth and the depth of your knowledge on these statistics. And and, you know, if you if if you torture statistics long enough, eventually they'll confess. And he went, oh god. He said, I have to write that down.

Jesus. He would write it all down. So people were tired of us. We were just full of shit, which was a lot of fun.

Absolutely.

But anyway, he walked into a serious forum that I was involved in that had nothing to do with law practice. He walked right forward to the the stage in the middle of the proceedings and kissed me on the top of the head. And to the people there I said, it was Mister Spence. He was just in town for a while and he was showing fealty and gratitude for my services.

That's priceless.

Anyway, there was one that got all tangled up because I was reading about Oedipus and psychology. There was a man, he's still living. He killed a woman in the kitchen of a of a facility in Wyoming. I don’t wanna get too close because he's out there, and he's been released. And he was he was all American of everything here in Cody High, and his parents were, you know, higher ups, and and he just turned and with a butcher knife just sliced right through her heart and then the impact of it all, she broke an ankle as she fell to the floor.

JK: Oh, that's horrible. AS: Horrible. So they asked me to represent him. JK: Oh, wow. AS: And I got a senior guy out of Cheyenne, George Guy and Walt Phelan.

They we were and it was tried in Wheatland for a week. And but I went to the jail in Wheatland. I lived in Wheatland for a week at an old motel and he was a super athlete and the sheriff was right outside the door and he put me in the cell with him. I said, well, pal, what what happened here? Well, you know, he had been he had been one of the people from this University of Wyoming that had been asked to go up and and find the debris and the body parts of United Airlines plane that hit, and it it twisted his life.

A lot. It it changed it, and he had guys in law school who who you would know and I would know. Now if you feel comfortable there, you can lean back before you fall asleep. JK: Oh, I'm good. I'm not falling asleep. AS: So he said, you know, Al, she was the personification of evil. She was she had horns. She was she was the devil incarnate even to with a tail. I said, well, that's and who were you in that role? He said, he was Jesus.

And I said, well, that's interesting. So I spent about an hour with him and I said, you know, if you weren't Jesus or you're not Jesus, what have you done in this situation? Oh, he said, if I'm not Jesus, I've killed an old lady.

That's frightening. That's truly frightening.

And so I went from there to prove that he was insane at the time of the commission of the offense, which is tough to do. But anyway, he then was he went into therapy out of state, and then they called me six or eight years later, Mister Simpson, you represented Mister so and so. And he's being released to the public. Well, I said, and we'd like to have you there. The psychiatrist were there and me.

I said, no. I'll be there. And, you know, it was, you know, a lot of mumbo jumbo shit, you know, from the shrinks and, yeah, I've been through all of those, you know, this and this and this. And I said at the end, I said, well, said and he was in there. I said, what's to assure that you never do this again?

Oh, Simpson, you have ruined 650 hours of therapy. You you created a monstrous, you know, on their name of me. I said, seems like an important point. This is you know?

And and then they released him into the public and he had a roommate who never knew a thing about his background, but they kept that from that. JK: That's unreal. AS: But then he married again. He'd never been married before. And he married, and one morning he got up and chopped her into pieces and tacked her on the wall of the bedroom.

That's surreal.

And went back into prison for the rest of his life. But he can't come to Wyoming because he has no relatives here, but he's out there.

That is not comforting at all.

And he'd come home and study, you know, he related how his mother had a birthday party for him and nobody came, never forgot that. And he had a he went fishing with his dad and he was clumsy and he dropped the rod and the reel in the lake and his father just abused the shit out of him. So he had these things that were just clawing at him, you know, plus the disaster of body parts up on the mountains and people who knew him saw the changes in him, but in those days you couldn't identify. Anyway, that was when Ann finally said, you know, just quit reading about the shrinks and this Oedipus and the mother complex and just get back to the family, I said, you know. It was just monstrous stuff.

So those are those are draining things and you don't wanna you don't like to do murder trials. I didn't do another one. I wouldn't participate in it, I didn't, you know. And there are certain things you wanna do in the practice of law and you just think I'm not gonna do that. And anyway, there were some I had a note of well, mentioned the Afrie and that that other case with with the with the shooting of the moose was called the Abcross case and it's in the it's in the it's in the record.

And then I was big in divorce because the the law of the land was that Nevada was six weeks and Wyoming was sixty days and the grounds were of intolerable indignities and every other state in the union was a year. JK: That's a big difference. AS: And so people would come to Park County and, you know, we'd do a no fault divorce for $250, know, kind of a mill down there. JK: Right. AS: I mean, it was $500 if there was complexity involved, and I did hundreds of divorces.

JK: Oh, wow. AS: And learned so much. That's how I've lived with this beautiful woman for sixty eight years. But they would come out here and you could see their addresses, you know, Kemet Square, you know, part of the DuPont or Delaware or the Miracle Mile out of Philadelphia near the Barnes Collection, these addresses, and they'd come and they'd stay for, you know, sixty days and then we had this beautiful, wonderful relationship with the attorneys in the East. We've done all this in the Chancery Court.

It's all done. It's property settlement custody agreement. And I think you can just take get your case there in Cody in in sight that the Chancery Court of counts.

Wow. So the work was already done.

So then we'd say, you've been very helpful and you've helped us through the laws of Wyoming and all this stuff. And so just send us your your bill. And Kep and I'd say, we just we just send you our hours. We've kept our hours carefully and we had because we knew they were charged $300 an hour. Oh, wow.

We were charging $35. JK: That's unbelievable. AS: So, we'd say, just we'll just send our hours and you just pay whatever you think is fair.

So $35 an hour was going rate for a Park?

The one I'll never forget and because there were a lot of them that I would forget. This gal was about 19 years old, no children, and somehow the Judge and it was default. And somehow the Judge, without breakfast or something, said, do you have anything further to say or does your client have anything more to say? Well, I I didn't know what she's gonna do. She said, yeah, Judge.

You know, I'll just tell you. I just hate that son of a bitch. He's just as robbing son of a bitch. That's what he is more. Well, so the Judge says thank you.

The divorce is granted. And I'm walking down the street right by that little I know right where it was where she stopped me, right by the Cody Legacy Museum. And she said, Mister Simpson? I said, yes. I can't even remember her name.

She said, I still love that son of a bitch. And I said, well, I'm sure that that's true. And then she was crying and I didn't have a straw hat on. I don't remember what it was . I was looking very dapper.

And she said, you know something, Mister Simpson? When you ever pretend that you unloved somebody that you once loved, you only you really fuck yourself all up. Well all of the air went out of my body? I said, you know, dear, that's the most profound thing that has ever happened to me in or out of divorce. Came around home to Ann and I said, let me tell you what this gal said.

Never forgot it's in my head. You know something, Mister Simpson, if you ever pretend you unloved somebody you once loved, you really fucked yourself all up. I can say that with great emotion.

It's profound.

And it it was the touchstone of of my life because you you can't hate somebody that you gave your body and your soul and and your money and your property and everybody. Those were things. I sent a lot of people to Al Anon. In fact, they had Al Anon. They had a AA statewide meeting here, invited Ann and me, And they don't do they don't do that.

I'd send people to Al Anon , you know, it's a great thing. And this one woman came home and said, you know, he came home last night and he came in the door and then he shit his pants. I said, well, that will happen. And then the next morning he he said, you didn't clean that all up. And and so I said, well, I don't think you should.

And I think you should go to Al Anon where you can tell people when they shit their pants that that they can get up and clean off their own thing. And and she came back after weeks. She just looked sharp as a tack, you know, just attractive. You're always pray to that when you're 30, 40 years old. You have that's a perilous course for and they're they're pouring your heart out to you.

You get all snug a little close, but I'd rush home when that would happen. I figured there's something better at home than this. Anyway, she just said, you know, he did that again and and and I just let him just sit with the shit all over him. And I said, well, that's good. I didn't know.

Anyway, there was so much there was child abuse. There was incest. There was rape. I didn't yeah. I didn't seek those things, but I did them.

And I well, I could they're not worth relating, but but there's there was a strange stereotype that that I learned about. I don't think you would have to go into it, but I found that found that rodeo guys, especially if they got a big belt, are often abusive to their spouses. Yeah. You know, honey, I'm coming home because I'm gonna show my spouse, and I just won one of those big buckles out there at Cheyenne Frontier Days, and you're gonna play around. You know, put the kids under the rug and then show my five stars.

That's unfair. That's unfair stereotype, but I did get a lot of people. I can name their I can name the rodeo stars Oh, wow. Who were who were, you know and I did send, you know, the that old phrase, you know, get away from them. That that doesn't work.

Forget that one. I'd send them to the crisis intervention service where they know how to handle that. But someone came up to me, don't tell me that one about get away because they come right back with the flowers. And then they beg and scratch on their ass and and they're evil. Well, enough of that.

But I did send some. I just reached their own pocket and send them out there to take the kids. Somebody's never gonna stop. I didn't know any difference. And then there are those those mistakes you made.

Some old farmer came in from Powell. He said, you know what I got here, Simpson? I wanna collect on it. I think it's a seed note . Said, oh, sounds like the promise you know, but it isn't.

A lot different. He came back in a few more weeks and he said, I lost my ass on that but thanks for your advice. This is a seed note. I said, what's the I didn't say what's the difference. We don't promise for it.

He said, I just maybe thought you wanna maybe correct it. Well, I said, not how long you thought. I said, here it is. I said, that's a terrible mistake. And I learned a lot about seed notes.

I suppose because you represent Powell people and they they they know what seed notes are. I didn't. But, you know, I would make it right. There were some people that say, you know, I think you're screwing me. I said, well, what is what did you think I should charge?

Well, I don't know. Seemed like a couple hundred bucks. Well, I said, you know, you know, you of course, you were I was in politics. I didn't wanna piss anybody off. You know what mean?

I was part of that. And so there were some perilous, you know, make a mistake. One guy went to the grave. He convinced me to to notarize something. I said, where is the notary?

He said, that's me. He said, I'm an alias. I said, you know, fuck that stuff, I'm not gonna do it. And then he's dead and I was greatly relaxed. JK: I'm sure AS: When he perished I said to Ann, he's gone.

And with him, one of my biggest mistakes. Anyway, enough of that. I think I oh. I think oh, you asked about you didn't think I was gonna get this. Great bone writing.

Anywho, there were so many curious things and you you learn you learn a lot about human beings especially if you ignore what you're always taught in law school. Never get emotionally involved with your client. I'm not talking about jumping in the sack with them. I'm saying if I can't get emotionally attached to my client, then I'm I'm not worth a shit.

I agree.

So they would be there and and oftentimes, especially in divorce, I would never say a word and I timed myself once because this person was right in front of me. I never said a word for thirty two minutes. JK: Wow. That's impressive. AS: And in that process, she had solved all of her problems because she came from a situation where nobody gave a shit.

She'd bend over to turn on the television and he’d say, you know, your ass is big as your mother's. You gotta yeah. And and how about the shit on your shorts down in the bathroom, you big turd, you know, and so they sort that stuff out and he tore my pants. I gave him at Christmas time. We were out there messing around in the hayfield.

I said, well, that's difficult. And then there was one over where they both sat here on the Court and said and the Judge said, well, why don't you pick first? We'll flip a coin. Well, I'll take the the chair. I that's my favorite chair.

The second one, forgot how to hose the other one. And the judge kept the list in front of him and he said, I'm gonna just reverse these. You keep that crap. There was a council and I thought, that's Solomon like. JK: I like it.

Because they were just after each other because they're never gonna tell each other anything that's comforting to them. They're breaking the bean barge in the cabinets. It's two in the morning. I said, what am I supposed to do about that? Well, they're priceless birds right up there.

Well, they're made of ceramic. Anyway, I said, can't I can't come over there and help you and but just know that they're never gonna say anything kind to you. You're gonna take children away from it, prove that you're a whore, and that you've pussied around all over the countryside, and and and you're gonna have to take that and you must strengthen yourself because that's that's that's the cruelty that goes with this stuff. But anyway, it was you can ask anything you want. Those were some of the cases.

How hard was the decision to quit your law practice and run to, you know, run for US Senate knowing that you would no longer practice law if you won?

Well, I'd gone to the state legislature and Kep, you know, I'd be gone for forty days and Kep would say, you know, I, you know, I I miss you.

I do miss your billables.

And and I'd say, well, I just I give I give him my per diem and I lived in a house from somebody who'd gone to Arizona. I'd stay in their house and and bring home chow from from these receptions. I was great at that. And so he he called one day. He was pissed off.

He said, I gotta break this up. This is you know, I can't do this. So let me let me get home and and we'll we'll resolve it, and he did. It was so fair, but he there were there were just times well, when I knew I was gonna run for the Senate, I just began to wind it down, and he was still here. Kep was still there.

And and and I I didn't feel any remorse because I was in the campaign. I went all over all over the state. There were 88 municipalities, and I went to all of them. There's this out in the hallway that pin board where I went. So I didn't but then you couldn't you couldn't you couldn't practice before with the Senate rules, so I I didn't.

But Ted Kennedy and I did a talk show called Face Off. JK: I remember. And it was on mutual radio five days a week, two minutes a crack, you know, and he I'd go back to the floor and he'd say, god, you bastard. You stuck it in. Well, I said, you deserved it.

He said and then I'd say, good. You didn't have to bring that up. Anyway, we were we were getting $40,000 a year, the two of us. Boy, that ended. Jake Garn was making a $2,000, that's when you could make a little honorarium and I'd give mine to the university.

And so anyway, that ended and so Ann went to work as a realtor it suited her. They put the kids in school. Okay. Colin went down to Colorado College. He says there's too many Simpsons at the university.

Yeah. And Susie was down there. She went down to see her big brother. Bill went to the university, and they both went to law school there. But it was you don't know what you you really don't have any idea what the cost of of what it is, and you get a you get the salary was a hundred no one's gonna complain about it.

When I started it was a hundred and six thousand a year. Who's gonna you're gonna come home and tell the town meeting?

No. No. Not this town.

You ain't gonna make that. And then it went up to a hundred and sixty and a hundred and sixty. Think it was about a hundred and sixty. So anyway, but there was nobody listening. There's no violin music out there for that.

But a lot of people cut corners, and I have plenty of times to do that out in the Senate. One guy came up to me and said, you know, I noticed you were connected with Husky Oil Company, your father, and I'd like to assure you that I'm in a business practice where I could give you a penny a gallon, a penny a barrel JK: Wow. AS: If you can help me do this. I I said, for what? Well, he said a penny a barrel is is I said, you know, I you know, well, there's there's so many temptations.

And Kep and I never would take stock in a company we incorporated. Had offered a lot of opportunities and a lot of lot of good things happened to the stocks that we left. But Kep said, don't get into that. Don't ever get into that. We can do the annual report, and we can do this and do that and represent the corporation, but we're not we're not and they were gonna pay us in stock.

So there there are so many temptations. But I guess the thing that if you have integrity, nothing else matters, and if you don't have integrity, nothing else matters.

Makes perfect sense.

I never was indicted. Did get into trouble shooting mailboxes. It was on federal probation.

That's a federal crime.

It is. I didn't know how much, how many dollars per hole. And then I got drunk and heeled a cop one night and ended up in jail. Oh, no. I called Ann.

I was going with her. I said, you know, Ann? She said, where are you? It's about two in the morning. I said, it's I'm in jail.

I need $300 bail. Oh, wow. She said, are you kidding? I said, I'm working my way through school. Her dad died when she was sixteen over in Greybull.

Didn't have a pot or window to throw it out of. And so I said, what about me? She said, stay there and then all the puke and shit in in that jail that night, guys vomiting.

I said, woman, she's got something she's got something to offer, like sanity. Was that here in Cody? Laramie. JK: Oh, College days. AS: Yes, it was.

And don't know if could read that. You have did you have a question? Oh, there was another great one which met us. Kep and I tried a case and people came over from Jackson to see us. We did a lot of work in Jackson because the streets were named after the Sherman.

Simpson, Millwood, Glenwood, Pearl, Virginia.

I didn't realize that until just now, but makes a lot of sense.

And so they came to us. The government had condemned 5.81 acres of on condemnation, which, you know, it's just setting the values. You can do it. So they came over and and Kep and I looked at it all and and took views of it, you know, spectacular views of it.

Snow fences and the Teton in the background way out there. One gal who never had a skirt on in her whole life. She was all dressed up in Levi's, you know, Bessie. She testified and and it was before Kerr and a jury in the Federal Court. So we made a deal with them.

Look. They were offered $800 an acre for their condemnation. And we said, look. Whatever we get over that, we'll take half of it. JK: Okay.

And if we and if we can't get that amount, we won't charge you anything. Oh, shit. We went over there and we both tried the case and, of course, not realizing that one of the jurors was a babysitter of mine.

That never hurts.

She came up later and said, do you remember me? I said, I do. I never asked you. But, anyway, to make a long story short, the jury came in with, I think it was $1,800 an acre.

Very nice.

I think it was. And it was called USA versus five point eight. And Kemp and I drove home at night or that afternoon and didn't have the wisdom to realize that from that instant of judgment everything was 1,800 an acre. JK: Gotcha. AS: We were in Jackson.

I bet. And we should have drilled him right there, but we were too dull. Boy, they were tickled to death and it set the tone and Kep just destroyed the appraisers for the government and then there was another wonderful story of the of the park because we represented the Hamilton stores, you know what they were. The Hamilton stores had the ice concession in the park.

Okay. That's a big deal.

Mhmm. And then the the Yellowstone Park Company and Bozeman or whoever decided to intrude or get in. And there's really a lot of money can be made from water that's turned by a switch into ice. JK: Indeed. AS: That heat or, you know, what is it, $2 a bag or and Kep and I won that one and and so they invited us up to the to at one of the lodges.

And Kep and I were just feeling so cocky and all the board of all these people saved their ass and they made millions and they had a bottle of old Yellowstone whiskey in front of every plate. Well, Kep was never one to turn down

Man after my own heart.

In combat. I think they overran a castle in Germany somewhere and he was in command. He was the second lieutenant. He said, we're stalled here. There's a lot of counter attacking, but it was a it was a safe with all this wine.

They stayed there about five days

Oh, boy.

Drinking these fine joyous things. And anyway, so we both got absolutely we thought we were locked out of our car, which is how bad it was. JK: Oh, no. AS: And so I we we both slept out, but the next day we never said anything. And the wives, they lived right down the street.

She said, what's wrong with them? I said, they're sick. Kep and I never did that again. That's for sure. But anyway

Those lessons stick. I said those lessons stick.

Oh, boy. But there's lots of successes and some failures. Failures were very few, at least in our minds. And and we just we we practiced law by the seat of the pants. I don't I don't know how I mean, I can't even read the code of the requirements.

So and I and I I tuned in this guy, Sean Sean, he's c l e.

Oh, sure. The comedian.

Sean Carter. Yes. Fun guy. I talk with him and we tell stories. He's gonna be at the bar convention.

Anyway, we're talking about, you know, the things we did. And there was a gal that was just a block away and she said that someone she was babysitting and somebody opened the door, it was in the fall, and and he raped her. And so they put him in jail and and and then Spence represented him. JK: Okay. AS: And against the Cody enterprise and and the guy who wrote this guy crawled out from under a rock.

JK: Okay. Yeah. AS: And on and on and on. And she came in one day with her parents, I think it was a Lutheran minister, and she said Kemp and I sat there and she said, I made all that up.

That's unbelievable.

I made I made all that up. Even when the police came and the door was open. And she said, I don't know why it did it. She began to cry, and her parents were just stunned. And old Kep just reached over, called the Judge, and he said, let the guy out now.

And the Judge says, I'll do it right now.

That's amazing.

Yeah. So that's how we practiced a lot. JK: Things have changed. AS: As she has admitted, it is all fraudulent and made up. And anyway, Spence sued.

I bet he did.

And there was one lawyer who's here today. He later he came back from Maine. He represented Burt Fendrick, the owner of the Rustler, and and Dick said, we gotta get you out of the case. And he said, do you have do you have any money? He said, I don't have any money.

This thing runs by every week with the ads. Well, could you get up $2,500? He said, I could do that. So Dick went over to Spence and he said, Jerry, my client, you know, is well, he's not judgment proof, but he's he's hanging by his nubs there. Would you you accept $2,500 to get him out of the case?

He said, it'll pay my expenses. JK: Perfect. But he went for the other guy and then they broke him, boy, I tell you, because it was it was always fun with Jerry. Well, now, I was just at Teton County, I had that.

hWen you look back on your life and your career, do you think of yourself more as a lawyer or as a politician?

I I just I thought of myself as a guy who whether he was on the floor of the Senate or in a Courtroom or in my office, I always thought of myself in a cocky way as a guy you'd want on your side.

I like that. I like that.

And that didn't mean I was gonna ram my head into a wall at at something. I mean, they've I've turned down things that say, you can do that now. You it's just made for you. And I thought, no. It isn't.

There's something in there. Listen to your gut instead of your head. And so I'd always listen to my gut and and but and then, you know, do the right thing. It's not as simple. It's rather simplistic.

And and, you know, hatred corrodes the container it's carried in. JK: That's beautiful. AS: Little phrase. And my father said, If you're damned if you do and damned if you don't, then do.

I like. I like.

And so or my great grandfather said, You know, just stay in the middle of the road. Don't get in a rut to the left or the rut to the right. Just stay in the middle of the road and just keep plowing. So there's some awful so a much terrible bitterness with the left and the right and and anyway, those are those are things, you know, those are things you put on the locker room door and then you don't do anything with them.

But there some great phrases that I learned and they're ingrained, they're not something that you pull off with the locker room. Best one was never let your face show how hard they're kicking your ass.

I like that one.

And that was Warren Morton. No, no, he was in the Senate. I was raging. I wasn't raging, but he said I was. Said I think you're pissed off anyway.

You look pissed off and I was raising hell about something. And he said, but he said, Al, if you're gonna do that, never let your face show how hard they're kicking your ass .

That's damn good advice.

That's that's that's good stuff. So but, no, I I just never I never thought of the transition. There there have been awards and and accolades and nice things that have happened to to me and and and, you know, at night, you just you have you you you you're very content except your knees when you get a little fracture in your pelvic. JK: Right. AS: I said to somebody the other day, fractured my pubic.

And I said, no. Must be your pelvis. Well, I forgot. I got that. But no, I loved I loved the work.

I loved if I didn't I loved I loved it. I cherished it, but I'd I could I could I had a great philosophy of life, which is if if an attack an attack or if you if you're attacked and you're horrible in politics or your privacy, An attack unanswered is an attack believed. Mhmm. And furthermore, an attack unanswered is an is attack agreed to. And the people who telling you not to respond are the people who love you the most.

Your wife, your brother, your mom, and your pop, your children, dad, no one's gonna believe that. And I say, well, you're entitled to be called a fool, boo, asshole, ass, you know, that's all fair, but never let them distort who you are. And when people were trying to distort who I was, I tell you, I could give dry birth to a porcupine, and I'd take them on. And I'd see them at a I'd say, I'll bet you a hundred bucks. I can stick it up your ass.

Well, why are you saying that? I said, because of what you said about me, which is just a fake. And then I'd think back to my grandfather and I'd think, no. I don't wanna go go that far, but but I would and and because what you realize is that you're you're at night, and it's it's your name being assailed and made fun of or distorted, not Ann or Pete or mom or pop, you know, and and you don't have to take that. And so it was quite amazing.

I never lost an election . And one would say, he ripped he he can bristle a gun. I said, well, look. I mean, if I'm working on immigration, I'm calling a bigot. I don't have to listen to that shit.

I can see the firing your eyes.

And if I'm working on veterans issues and I'm a veteran, I am a veteran, but why the hell a guy who served six months and never left camp Beetle Bailey doesn't even know a mortar tube from either end to get the same as a combat veteran. So I just go Yeah. Here. How about this? I've done that before.

Rockefeller did that at a convention, did you see? JK: Oh, yeah. AS: In in any way. I've been called a rhino, and I call them Republicans ignorantly needling others, and they get pissed off. And and then my favorite phrase is to people who write me if they have their name.

I don't I don't answer an anonymous letter.

I don't blame you.

Is to say, dear sir, you need a pane of glass in your navel so you can see out during the day. And they will say, I don't think that's worth it. You're just gonna bait them. I say, I know, but it makes me feel better. You know, I have a pane of glass in your navel so you can see out during the day.

Well, that's a good thing. But you have to have to be who you are and you and who you are is sacred. And I learned other things that are very that are very vital. The minute I would compare myself to another lawyer or Spence, and I'd come home and say Ann, and, you know, I'm sorry to do this or whatever, someone I admired, you've already you've already put yourself in second place. You have by just comparing, you have given up your role as as your own hero.

If you're gonna have a hero, don't this was given to me by James Earl Jones. He gave a wonderful talk one night down in Cheyenne. He said, why not be your own hero? JK: I like that a lot. AS: Because then you don't have to look out for somebody else and think, that's my hero.

No. Be your own hero. And he's dealing with disadvantaged kids and, know, some of those people down in Cheyenne do a beautiful job with the young people, the courts, those those children's courts down there, wonderful friend. Anyway, now as I ramble on there, something else will come to me.

Did you ever have any desire to be a judge?

No. JK: Not at all? AS: No, no, no, because I wasn't smart. I can't reallyI can look at a graph and pretend that I know what it is. It's like reading in a Greek newspaper.

I can't sit and philosophize, you know, about the world and and my role in it before I croak. I don't spend any time on that, but no. I and research is not my bag. I love I love history and I love these I love to read about history and, you know, and western history. Our our lawyer friend over there in Buffalo does a good job.

John, you know JK: Oh, yeah. AS: With the was the Ten Sleep paper. Anyway, I I read snippets. I I might have maybe 12 or 15 books that I've made maybe read two pages or three and never gone back to them in three years. And so, Newt Gingrich and I was the assistant leaders of this house and the senate, and we'd meet once every couple weeks.

And so, Newt was a different different breed. He brought in three books for me and he said, I'd like you to read these three books and when we meet a couple weeks from now, I'd like you to review them and talk about them. So he came in and he said, what what about that, the the books? I said, never touched them. I said, because I really I'm not into that shit.

I said, you know, what I'd like to know is how you feel, not the guy that wrote the book.

I like that.

And I said that to Jack Kemp once. He was always talking about a book. I said, no. No, Jack. Where are you in the maelstrom of chaos and the ethos?

Well, by what this guy wrote, I said forget what he wrote. He found it. But, anyway, so when Newt said, well, what what do you do when you're not in your district? Well, I said I go to the Frick or or up in New York or catch the shuttle or or to the Folger library. I was on the Folger library board.

And, you know, I go to the Smithsonian. I was a member of the board of regents of the Smithsonian. And so those and he'd say, well, you know, that sounds interesting. I said, it it is. It it's tremendously interesting.

And and we had a teacher in Cody High School named Winona Thompson Auditorium. She taught us Shakespeare. And I always say to young people, do you know any Shakespeare? Coming in and having a sandwich. I was just gonna launch into my Shakespeare because I'm out through, but Anne's heard them all.

But she is my world. Ann S: Are you ready? AS: Yep. I'm her count. And so Anne's heard I was on the Folger Shakespeare Library Board advisory, and she was in her eighties.

And she would play records. There was an old World War two building down there where she had her teaching and she would bring in deca records collection of Othello with Jose Farrar as Iago, Paul Robeson as Othello, and Uta Hagen as Desdemona. And then she and and she'd play it in in the darkened room and then Hamlet with Sir Levene . And we even drove to Laramie to see a movie of Hamlet. Drove all the way down.

And so she called me and she said, I wanna tell you, I I heard you're on the library, and I want I want in there. I want it. I want to be in the vault. Well, I said, Misses Thompson, I don't have the she said, just knock. You could get me through.

You're using the same crap you used in my class. Right. So she came with her sister who had better sight and I arranged everything, the clothes, in the vault. And I have the curator and the wizard and I am all in the basement. JK: Wonderful.

And she said, I would like to see if you have Hollingshead's history of Scotland. He said, Misses Thompson, there are only two copies of that. We have one. She said, may I may I handle it? And she did.

She said, this is where he lifted MacBeth. This was this was exactly where he where he took Macbeth. I don't know. Now do you have folio 16? And the guy said, yeah.

Well, that's where they changed the line from Romeo to Juliet at after he had published it. He said, how do you know that? She said, I know. And she just picked that place apart, and and they were stunned, you know. And so we left and took her to lunch.

She said, Alan, you've done that before. You'd have had a better grade. So I I learned Shakespeare.

Well, I've got two questions I'd like to ask and then we can eat some lunch. AS: The what? Two questions to ask and then we could get some lunch? Yes. We're gonna go in here.

But I got two questions first. AS: Oh, yeah. JK: So you wrote a popular book for the general public, and I was wondering how much of a challenge that was to transition from legal writing your whole career to writing a popular book.

It was the worst thing I ever did. They gave me a year and they paid me $50,000 and then they sent it to someone to tighten the manuscript. I said, I thought you have editors to do that. So that cost $30,000. Wasn't much left after that.

And then they took me on a book tour and we thought we were staying at the Today Show in LA, but they were deducting that. JK: Oh, no. AS: So nothing left. No, it was terrible. It ruined weekends.

It it ruined holidays. It was it was part of doing graphs. What do you how do you assemble something for into chapters? If I hadn't had Mary Mary K. Hill, whose whose whose husband was the Supreme Court Chief Justice. JK: Sure.

She was on my staff for nine years. She was a great help, but, you know, it was terrible. I never would do it. But then Don Hardy did a book, a biography on me called Shooting from the Lip.

Yep.

I have a copy of it. There's several copies.

Sure you do.

Anyway, so that yes. It was a tedious tedious and very unfruitful thing. And then but it it it was it was good because some people who who I loved in the journalism practice in Washington, and I was I was I was never crucified out there. One guy came up and said, you know, you son of a bitch. That that book was harsh, but he said about 70% of it was true.

I said, well, that's what I wanted. And Mark Shields died the other day. You wouldn't have known him. There was a quote from me years with him. Wonderful, wonderful guy.

But I I got in trouble with him. I just say the First Amendment belongs to me too and that whole business about buying pig by the barrel, fuck you. I can't do that. Jk: Love it. AS: I won't play that game.

Well, then that's because the people who love you the most are speaking again. And you're not gonna get into it with them. I said, hey, I'm gonna take on the New York Times and tell them you don't even know who I am.

I like it. Well, I think that's a great place to break and thank you so much for your time.

Oh, yes, we're gonna get up.

Indeed.