Today a co-worker and I took a short field trip to the United States Supreme Court (credits to Wikipedia for the photo -- I didn't take my camera so I wouldn't have to mess with getting a locker to store it since you can't take anything inside the chambers).We saw about 15 minutes of oral arguments for "Quanta Computer, Inc. et al. v. LG Electronics, Inc.," which was a patent dispute over microchips. Normally, a visitor is granted 3-5 minutes to view the court, but our group was admitted about 10 minutes before that session was supposed to end at 11 a.m. I think the ushers assumed the session would wrap up at or prior to its scheduled time and intended to let us stay until the end to prevent disruption. Instead, we were ushered out about 5 minutes after 11 (which is when the next case was supposed to start but obviously would not). I'm glad we were sent in towards the end of the allotted hour because that's when the justices were asking a lot of questions and interacting with the speaker.
For anyone planning a visit to the Supreme Court while it's in session -- dress for the weather but otherwise pack lightly. We stood in a line outside on this plaza for an hour in the cold and wind before we got to ascend the pictured staircase. Then we went through security, checked our coats, security again, line again, and finally inside. The view is a bit obscured due to curtains (which presumably help drown out the shuffling of visitors in and out), but I could see all of the justices at some point as I moved around in my chair and strained my head. The sound was good though, since there were speakers mounted on the ceiling in the back of the chamber where we were.
A fun experience and one more thing to check off in my guide book!
