Bryan Stevenson

But it does mean that you're not looking for the worst in others.

You're not trying to create a world...

of us versus them.

You're not trying to build division where you're on one side of the wall and other people on the other side of the wall, and they don't deserve mercy and you do.

It's the opposite of that.

It's the way in which we think about tearing down walls, creating less harm, less injury, less misunderstanding by being willing to give as much mercy as we hope people will give us.

Yeah, I think it's the beauty of a journey.

You keep learning things.

And I represented a man who was intellectually disabled.

He asked me to try to prevent his execution.

He'd already been through the appeals process.

Even though I knew it would be very hard to stop the execution, you know, we jumped in because our courts have actually banned the execution of people with intellectual disabilities.

So I went to the trial judge and said, he's intellectually disabled, you can't execute him.

But the trial judge again said, too late, somebody should have filed that motion years ago.

The appellate court said too late.

The federal court said too late.

And I did the hardest thing I have to do, which is to pick up the phone and talk to this man.

I said, I'm so sorry, but I can't stop this execution.

And then he did the thing that I dread.

He started to cry.