AI lets Chief Justice Earl Warren speak from beyond the grave

Seventy years ago, the Supreme Court held that segregated public schools were unconstitutional. The unanimous opinion in Brown v. Board of Education was read in the courtroom by its author, Chief Justice Earl Warren.

Thanks to  information received  from John Q. Barrett, law professor at St. Johns University and expert on  Justice Robert H. Jackson  (1941-54), I recently listened to a  recording of Warren announcing  the court's decision in 1954. This would be unremarkable had not recorders been forbidden in the court then.

And no one could have snuck in a tiny recorder, which didn't exist yet in the pre-transistor age.

"Recordings" like this can be wonderful educational tools. But the technology which produced it also has dangerous possibilities.

A transcript of what Warren actually said, not exactly tracking the text of the Court's opinion, was available. Recordings of Warren speaking in other situations existed. Someone read the transcript aloud, and an artificial intelligence (AI) program  converted the recording  into Warren's own voice.

Thurgood Marshall — later the court's first Black member — was the plaintiffs' lead attorney .  The same AI process was used to "record" the  oral arguments of his team  before the court.

The virtual "resurrection" of Earl Warren and Thurgood Marshall is a fascinating development with legitimate uses. However, this technology also has serious downsides.

It could make it impossible to be sure that what we  hear  is genuine. In an age of photoshopping, seeing is no longer believing, and now AI may also undermine our confidence in the reality of what we hear.

Maybe ways to ascertain whether a recording is genuine will be found, but AI programs could then figure out how to evade them. Legislation requiring the equivalent of watermarks in AI recordings might help, but wouldn't protect us from people willing to break the law.

Imagine what faked recordings might do to  political campaigns ! An AI faked voice of Joe Biden was already used in robocalls discouraging voter turnout in the 2024 New Hampshire Democratic primary.

At the personal level, telephone scammers pretending to be relatives who have gotten into trouble and need money — fast! — are already using AI technology.

Fortunately, we can protect ourselves if we get such a call. We must avoid panicking. We should ask the caller questions that only the person they are claiming to be could answer. These questions should not be obvious ones like birthdays, information that is often widely available.

This should help even with scammers who are not using AI technology, one of whom recently called me, saying, pathetically, "Hello, Grandpa."

I asked "Is that you, David?" Astoundingly, he admitted to being David. Unfortunately for this crook, I have no grandson named David.

AI having brought Earl Warren back to "life," it may be a good time to review his involvement in Brown v. Board of Education. Looking back 70 years later, we may feel that its unanimous finding was inevitable, but the truth is more complicated.

When the case was first argued, the chief justice was Fred Vinson, a conservative southerner, who some feared would convince the court to uphold segregation. But Vinson died unexpectedly at age 63 before the court could decide the case. President Dwight Eisenhower then appointed Earl Warren to replace him.

Warren didn't have a great record on racial matters. As California's governor during World War II, he had supported forcing all Japanese-Americans from West Coast states into "relocation" camps.

But Justice Felix Frankfurter considered Warren to be a great improvement. Commenting privately on Vinson's death, Frankfurter said, "This is the first indication I have ever had that there is a God."

Warren later regretted supporting the "relocation" of Japanese-Americans, and as chief justice he led the Supreme Court to its unanimous decision striking down segregated schools.

Vinson actually had a decent record in previous civil rights cases. Whether Brown would have been different if he had survived is  still being debated.

Paul F. deLespinasse is a retired professor of political science and computer science at Adrian College. He can be reached at [email protected] .

This article originally appeared on The Daily Telegram: Paul deLespinasse: AI lets Earl Warren speak from beyond the grave