![]() LONGORIA: You just hear this man come to life.ĪL SMITH: These huge buildings that I had to live in. But in a stroke of incredible luck, this law professor at the University of Oregon had spent hours sitting with Al Smith in the '90s, and he had recorded his interviews. I learned that Al Smith actually died in 2014. I was so eager to talk to Al Smith, so I started making phone calls. And to me, growing up in a Catholic environment where, you know, we have wine at mass, it seemed a little odd. And the court actually said, no, you can't break a drug law for religious purposes. And so he took his case all the way to the Supreme Court. He was a Native American man from southern Oregon who ingested peyote in a Native American church ceremony and then was fired for doing so because peyote was illegal at the time in Oregon. It involves a man named Al Smith, as you say. LONGORIA: I first read about the case in high school. But my understanding is the man that this first episode centers around - Al Smith - is actually a story that you have been wanting to tell for a very long time. We're going to spend a few minutes talking about episode one of your new season. ![]() KHALID: So I want to ask you about one of the people at the center of these cases. And that just makes for really incredible radio documentaries about people's lives intersecting with the biggest stakes possible. But I find it to be a place where ordinary people clash with some of the biggest arguments and ideas in our country. And just learning about the court - to me, it seemed like it really could be a place above politics, which - today, politics have seeped into the court and maybe have for as long as it's existed. Both my parents are Cuban refugees, and it was a pretty conservative environment. So what is it about the Supreme Court that has kept you engaged enough that you wanted to host an entire podcast about it? You were a self-described Supreme Court nerd in high school, competing in the national We the People competition. KHALID: So the story of the Supreme Court is something, I understand, you have been invested in personally for a very long time, since childhood. JULIA LONGORIA, BYLINE: So nice to be here. Julia Longoria is the host of More Perfect, and she joins me now. It's the show's fourth season, and it tells the human dramas behind big Supreme Court cases. This week we're featuring More Perfect from WNYC Studios. Every week at this time, we share a little bit about a podcast that we are really into from the NPR network. ![]()
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