Ever wondered what it's like to attend an oral argument in the United States Supreme Court?

This is high drama high stakes stuff for most spectators, but especially so in the recent case, Food Marketing Institute v Argus Leader Media, if you care about the future of public records access laws.

I've attended several oral arguments in cases involving the open records and open meetings laws in the Kentucky Court of Appeals and Supreme Court. I've often wondered how much the courts are swayed by their exchanges with counsel for the opposing parties.

It's high drama high stakes stuff in these courts as well —whether the issue is access to the attorney general's "discovery" files in the Purdue Pharma litigation that exposed the causes of the opioid scourge; access to records relating to donors to the University of Louisville Foundation that may have influenced curriculum and informed university decision making; or access to child fatality or near fatality records maintained by the Cabinet for Health and Family Services that revealed failures in the child welfare system resulting in the tragic deaths of helpless children under the Cabinet's supervision — these oral arguments are always super charged.

This article suggests the magnitude of the moment as oral arguments proceed before the United States Supreme Court in the case that will decide the future of the public's right of access to records that — ultimately — belong to us.