James M. Redwine

Judicial

The Wheat From The Chaff

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The Sixth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution provides:

“In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been Committed ….”

Our Declaration of Independence raised these issues and complained of King George III:

“For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of trial by Jury; (and) For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offenses.”

The Book of Matthew uses the example of separating edible wheat from its husks as an analogy about dividing the good from the bad. In our legal system we almost always assign this task to judges with probably less than 3% of criminal cases being determined by a jury. The recent case involving the death of George Floyd, Jr. and the conviction of Derek Chauvin is one of those extremely rare jury events. However, this is not a column about that media saturated matter that took place in Hennepin County, Minnesota. I do predict that two of the issues raised by Chauvin when he appeals the guilty verdicts will be whether trial judge Peter Cahill should have granted Chauvin’s motions to change the venue of the trial and to sequester the jury. Those specific assigned errors will fall to the Minnesota state appellate judges and maybe work their way over to the federal judiciary before the saga crawls to an unsatisfactory halt. Shakespeare was right about the Law’s Delay. George Floyd, Jr’s. death was May 25, 2020.

What this week’s column is about is the American legal system’s mental gymnastics involving the relative imbalance between trial judges’ assumed ability to be objective versus that of jurors. Perhaps a few specific examples might help define the dichotomy. During my forty years as a trial judge in a small, rural county with only two judges I was faced countless times with having to process cases about which I had personal knowledge. For example, a crime might be reported then the police or sheriff’s department would present me with a sworn affidavit in support of a request to arrest someone and/or to search their home. A great amount of detail about the alleged crime and the suspect would be laid out before me. Then later I would sit as judge on the case.

Another fairly frequent circumstance might be I would know both the named victim and the defendant. I would sit on the case. In fact, I have remained as the deciding judge on countless cases at the request of victims, defendants and their legal representatives because they all wanted the cases resolved without delay and excessive cost and because everyone, including me, assumed I could separate the wheat from the chaff and both follow the law and be fair and objective. If I could do so, so can jurors. Black robes are a symbol not an inoculation against biased decision making. Facts are what matter, not irrelevancies unconnected to the case at hand.

There are cases where judges should not serve and where the pool from which jurors are selected should be changed. But usually judges and other people have the ability to take on the sacred mantle of administering justice whether they wear a black robe or not. Our legal system should afford to the citizenry that pays for it the same respect we assume for judges who are paid by it.

The delay, expense and great inconvenience caused by changes of venue and juror sequestration should be a last resort. This was true when we gained our independence and communication was untimely via printing presses and quill pens. How much rarer should such dire remedies be when finding a venue and jurors who have no knowledge of a case would require a trial beyond Mars?

A Delicate Balance

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Five-foot, four inch tall “Little Jimmy”, James Madison, Jr. (1751-1836), applied his gigantic intellect to melding the Natural Law theory of John Locke (1632-1704) and the Separation of Powers theory of Charles Montesquieu (1689-1755) into the Constitution of the United States. Locke and Montesquieu postulated that all things being equal no person should harm another in his/her life, liberty, health or possessions. They, along with Madison, also believed that every person who has power is apt to abuse it. Therefore, governments are necessary to keep individual power in check but the power of government must also be kept in check.

According to Edgar Bodenheimer (1908-1991) in his treatise on jurisprudence:

“The basic idea of the American Declaration of Independence as well as the Bill of Rights is the recognition of the natural and inalienable rights of life, liberty, and property, as conceived by Locke, while the main body of the United States Constitution is a practical application of Montesquieu’s doctrine of separation of powers. The connection between these two doctrines in the American government is made by the theory of judicial review. The United States Supreme Court has held that, in order to guarantee the enforcement of natural rights, the power to make laws must be separated not only from the power to execute laws, but also from the power to review laws with their regard to their conformity with higher principles, as recognized by the United States Constitution. Thus, in the United States the courts, and especially the United States Supreme Court, have assumed guardianship over natural law.”

See Bodenheimer, Jurisprudence at p. 146

This separation of powers has served America well since 1789. As is to be expected in matters as complex as government and politics the powers of the three branches have each waxed and waned from time to time. However, we have always managed to keep our democracy by remaining moored to the rock upon which it was founded. Just as our founders recognized that individuals and governments will abuse power unless checked, they also recognized the danger and guarded against any of the three branches having unfettered power. The wisdom of Madison, et. al., is once again being tested. Has the Executive Branch gone outside its traces and incited violence against the Legislative Branch? Has the Legislative Branch blurred the boundaries that should keep all three branches separate by both charging an impeachment and then filling the role of the Judicial Branch by having one of its own members serve as the presiding officer at the trial? And, has the Judicial Branch been marginalized because the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court will not be serving as the neutral and detached trial judge as designed by our Founders.

For as Bodenheimer points out, “Any abuse of its power by the legislature should be curbed by the Judiciary Branch of the government, to which falls the duty of declaring void all statutes which are repugnant to the Constitution.” See Bodenheimer, Jurisprudence, at page 148. Perhaps Chief Justice John Roberts and the rest of the Supreme Court are anticipating being confronted with such an issue later.

The crimes that were committed on January 06, 2021 are being investigated and several alleged perpetrators have already been identified and charged. Numerous others will and should be. America’s normal criminal justice system can fairly and efficiently provide due process to those involved. If Donald Trump committed any state or federal crimes either on or before January 06, 2021 he can be prosecuted separately from the impeachment. And if a pardon is considered it would cover only federal offenses.

In our current test of our charter’s application, the Legislative Branch has filed an article impeaching the head of the Executive Branch, former President Donald Trump. It is alleged he engaged in:

“[H]igh crimes and Misdemeanors by inciting violence against the Government of the United States” on January 06, 2021 and for in the months preceding January 06, 2021 repeatedly issuing false statements asserting that the Presidential election results were the product of widespread fraud and should not be accepted by the America people or certified by State or Federal officials.

The Article of Impeachment was returned against President Donald Trump on January 13, 2021 while he was still the acting President. On January 25, 2021 after Donald Trump’s term had ended, the Article of Impeachment was sent to the Senate for trial. The Senate has set the trial to begin February 09, 2021 with Senator Patrick Leahy, Democrat from Vermont, to preside and the senators to serve as jurors.

Article I, Section Three, of the U.S. Constitution provides that in the trial of the President of the United States the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court shall preside. For reasons not yet fully explained, Chief Justice John Roberts will not be involved, so only two of our three equal branches of government will be embroiled in this matter of grave national concern. It is suggested that this is because Donald Trump is no longer President. However, that does not take into consideration the bed rock reason why the Founders made it mandatory for the Judicial Branch to be involved.

The impact of this omission upon public confidence in the fairness of the process is worthy of consideration. After all, it is not Donald Trump’s fate that is most important, but the country’s faith in the process that determines that fate. However, this faith might be shaken by a trial where the role of a “neutral and detached magistrate” is filled by a member of the body that both files and prosecutes the charge. Symbolism is important and a level scales of justice is one of our nation’s most potent and delicately balanced symbols.

Attenuation

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From The Ford Library Museum Website

The season of our discontent is set to begin February 08, 2021. Soon we will be forced to talk to our spouses again and eat an actual meal instead of gobble chicken wings during commercials or at half-times. I can feel the ennui closing in. ♫ It is a long, long time from February to September ♫ when football season returns. It is not that I have no interest in other sports, but other than the Olympic downhill ski race and the baseball World Series I just do not want to watch them on television. On the other hand, I will gladly spend four hours watching Goadie Bowl Tech and Reyfert Hogart Junior College drop passes and fumble kick-offs. Such pursuits as yard work and household chores quickly fade in the afterglow of a football game. Ah well, perhaps it will give me an opportunity to ask Peg what she has been doing since September 2020. Also, I might give some thought to such things as our battle with ’Ole 19 and our political malaise.

Perhaps I can combine my concerns about the end of the football season, the Corona Virus and such political madness as the January 06, 2021 assault on our Capitol including its impending impeachment imbroglio. After all, President Gerald Ford was the hero or villain, choose one, of the President Richard Nixon impeachment controversy and President Lyndon Johnson often alleged Ford’s decisions were affected by Ford’s having played too much football without a helmet. Gerald Ford played center on the University of Michigan football team. Ford graduated from college in 1935, an era when leather helmets were in vogue. For safety reasons leather has been gradually replaced with the rock-hard plastic we now use. Hello, spearing or targeting penalties and TIB’s (traumatic brain injuries). However, from an esthetic viewpoint, the hard plastic provides a better surface for team logos and sticker awards for hard hits.

Football and politics do have some similarities, and when it comes to dealing with misdeeds in either, the legal concept of attenuation is relevant. With football a hard hit with his helmet by one player against the head of another player can be analyzed by re-tracing backwards from the hit. While not even the player himself, or now perhaps herself too, may know for sure if he intended permanent harm, the referees and the re-play booth can carefully review and discuss the event. This may disclose guilt or innocence of the player but is he the only one to blame?

The fanatics who cheer on teams often call for the players to “fight’ or even “kill ’em”. One’s teammates may urge super aggression. Coaches spend months in conditioning drills and two-a-days pre-season practices explaining how starters push the limits while bench setters are more timid. And what about the player’s parents? Who is responsible for engendering mayhem instead of mercy?

The same type of analysis is an element of our criminal justice system. When there is a lynching, how far back the causal chain should punishment go? Is it just the one person who slips the noose over the victim’s neck? What about the on-lookers, the news media that fanned the flames, the leaders who gave rousing speeches, the sworn law officers who did not intervene and the rest of the community who acquiesced in silence either during or after the lynching? Perhaps an entire country might be responsible or even a silently accepting world. How do we decide whether we are applying appropriate punishment or simply burning a few witches to shoulder the blame for everyone?

Then, of course, we need to look at the dynamics of the attenuation itself. Who is making the choices about whom to burn? Are the decisions just or are they just decisions because the ones who execute them have the power to do so? And most importantly, are we a better society because of the choices or are we simply fomenting more targeting? Finally, where and how does it end?

A Legal Revolution

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Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1859) was a Frenchman who studied American society during a nine-month tour in 1831 when the United States were still simmering with vitriolic political animus from the 1824 and 1828 elections between John Quincy Adams and Andrew Jackson. Adams was elected by the House of Representatives in 1824 and Jackson won via the Electoral College in 1828. After neither election did the United States fall into chaos, even though Jackson won both the popular vote and a plurality, but not a majority, of the Electoral College vote yet Adams grabbed the presidency in 1824.

Four men ran for president in 1824, John Quincy Adams, Andrew Jackson, Henry Clay and William Crawford. Because the Electoral College vote was split in such a way that none of the four received a majority, as required to be elected President, under the Twelfth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution a “contingent” election was held in the House of Representatives. Each state’s delegation was given one vote and Adams was elected. Jackson and his supporters alleged that Adams and Clay had entered into a “Corrupt Bargain” to shift Clay’s votes to Adams. Regardless, Adams was elected by the House and the country moved on until 1828 when Jackson ran against Adams again.

In his treatise on American democracy de Tocqueville defined America’s presidential election as “a revolution at law” and described it as follows:

“Every four years, long before the appointed (presidential election) day arrives, the election becomes the greatest, and one might say the only, affair occupying men’s minds…. As the election draws near intrigues grow more active and agitation is more lively and widespread. The citizens divide up into several camps.… The whole nation gets into a feverish state.”

De Tocqueville’s ultimate verdict on America’s democracy was encapsulated in his general verdict on how political controversies were ultimately resolved. His observation was that:

“In America there is hardly a political question which does not sooner or later turn into a judicial one.”

De Tocqueville’s opinion was that the American manner of resolving political issues without bloodshed worked because, unlike European monarchies, the United States citizens respected the law and they did so because they had the right to both create it and change it. Since we get to choose our legislators who write our election laws and because we can change the laws by changing whom we elect if we are unhappy, we accept the laws as written including who is ultimately declared the winner of a current election.

The laws we have the right to create and the right to change include filing for an elected office, running for that office, who counts the votes, how they are counted, as well as how and when someone can legally contest an election. That legal procedure applies to all facets of an election cycle. Each state’s legislature has the authority to establish its own procedures in this regard as long as they do not violate federal law.

As an Indiana Circuit Court Judge I was involved in a recount of a congressional race, a county clerk general election, a county council general election, a town council election and a county council primary election. The Indiana legislature had enacted and published a clear statutory procedure for each type of election contest, including what role each public official should play in any recount. The statutes demanded total openness and media access to ensure the public could have confidence that if all involved followed the law a clear winner would be fairly determined. There were time limits, controls and transparency. After a recount result was certified in each contest life moved on and the eventual losers and their supporters accepted the results because they had had their “day in court”; that is, democratically enacted law was followed not the arbitrary or partisan activity of individuals.

De Tocqueville compared America’s hotly contested democratic elections to a surging river that strains at its banks with raging waters then calms down and carries on peacefully once the results have been properly certified. From my own experience with several elections and after the recounts of some of them, I agree with de Tocqueville’s analogy.

That is not to say I am for or against any type of recount for any office. I absolutely have no position on whether any candidate for any office should concede or contest anything. My position is simply that as long as the law is properly followed our democracy can handle either circumstance.

Hope Is The Plan

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It is not what I have not known that has caused me the most concern, it has been those things I have known for sure that turn out to be wrong. Usually when I have had no doubt of my position on an issue it matters little if the facts belie my stance as only personal embarrassment is the result. However, as a judge, when I have cavalierly approached a problem, say the best way to legally process non-violent drug offenders, real harm may have resulted. At the least, real good that might have been done may not have been.

I do not assert that I now have the answer to what is the best way for a judge, at least one judge, to handle non-violent users of illegal substances. In fact, I seem to have transitioned from absolute certainty that the best way to save the miscreant and society was to slam a prison gate for a significant time to fearing I have no solution.

I am still comfortable incarcerating anyone who harms others physically, police officers for example. But when one harms only him or herself or even engages in the sharing of substances with other consenting adults not for profit, expending significant public resources to prosecute and lock them up no longer strikes me as rational.

While I have spent years helping to prosecute and/or judge many non-violent offenders it was yesterday’s chance encounter with someone on the other side of the Bench that caused my most recent re-examination of my judicial philosophy concerning these issues. This person shared with me that he has already done several years in prison for illegal drug sales to and from acquaintances. He works full-time and helps support his children. He is still on active probation. His sentence is one I might have imposed had he come before me.

Each year of prison cost taxpayers near $20,000 not considering the taxes an inmate could have paid in had he been working those years. This person I was talking with is a skillful and willing workman. Of course, many drug users often have difficulty finding a job or showing up for work and holding on to a job. That is where a good probation system is key. Assuming society does not believe non-violent drug users should be imprisoned for life, all such offenders must be released sometime.

I am acutely aware that almost all low-level non-violent drug offenders are not “first timers”. Often parents, clergy people, police officers and friends have tried to help drug addicts for years before formal legal proceedings are filed. Then, many times an offender is given another chance to rehabilitate themselves, usually with generous allowances made for “backsliding”. But, if the offenders are harming mainly themselves, society is only wasting taxpayer resources to “punish” a repeat offender who sins again. I can attest that it is extremely frustrating to have someone who has been given repeated opportunities fall off the wagon. On the other hand, the alternative simply kicks the can down the road and takes resources away from other more pressing public problems.

Please remember I have already admitted I have no solutions. On the other hand, I think, a cost benefit analysis is not unreasonable. At least with the non-violent drug abuser I spent time with yesterday it appears to be the best answer. I do not offer this approach either as a general panacea or a prophylactic for our country’s drug pandemic. But, if we encourage some to become producers instead of consumers of public resources, the ones who are not redirected will be fewer and we will all be better off.

Independence Day

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Lexington Minuteman
Lexington Battle Green, MA

The Fourth of July is called Independence Day with good reason. Our Founders were willing to die for the right to control their own lives. They were not seeking war with the most powerful nation on Earth in 1776. They were not attempting to dictate to King George III how the English should behave. They sought only free will for America to determine its own course. In these troubled times we are now navigating, perhaps a look back to America’s early struggles might be helpful.

We may wish we could ask George Washington or James Madison for advice. But the best we can do is read about past heroes’ courage and sacrifice and try to learn lessons that will help us during our own battles.

For example, one of my heroines is Frances (Mad Fanny) Wright, that fighter for women’s rights, Black rights and freedom from religion who spoke in New Harmony, Indiana on July 04, 1828. Oh, how much we could learn if we could speak with her now. However, we do know she dedicated her life and fortune to eliminating slavery. Had she lived only nine more years she would have experienced the start of the Great Struggle that ended a whole race of Americans’ loss of control over their lives.

Control, isn’t that what matters most to all of us? The visceral need for the freedom to make our own choices is why on that day we now call Patriots Day, April 19, 1775, at Lexington and Concord those suppressed colonists “Fired the shots heard ’round the world”. And in our current political climate when Americans get embroiled in political discussions it sometimes feels as if both sides have muskets at the ready.

When I find myself surrounded by the competing political mini balls, I try to remember this is nothing new. Over the two or three hundred thousand years we Homo sapiens have been around, after air, water, food, shelter and procreation we seem to have two more basic needs: the control of our own lives; and the strong desire to control the thoughts and behavior of others. These two related but directly oppositional impulses apply to groups of people and nations as well. You know, we will each defend to the death the right of our political adversaries to agree with us. But conversations can rapidly turn to confrontation if someone comes down on what we believe is the wrong side of such issues as religion, race, global warming, immigration, war and peace, who should or should not be President of the United States and a thousand other subjects.

The right to control our own lives makes us smile. The desire to control other peoples’ lives can lead to such things as vitriolic statements and sometimes even vicious interchanges in our public and interpersonal interactions. Sometimes today’s discussions about control may center on sexual assault and the “Me Too Movement” or hate crimes and “Black Lives Matter”.

Rape is a terrible crime not because of forced sexual contact, billions of humans have had sexual relations. No, rape is a terrible crime because of the victims’ loss of their right to decide for themselves whether and with whom to have sex. The fear, terror, anger and humiliation caused by losing total control of one’s body is incalculable. It is in itself a life sentence that can lead to permanent bitterness toward and distrust of our legal system much as lynchings can result in an entire race of people living with constant concern about their freedom.

Lynchings, such as those that were committed on the Posey County, Indiana courthouse lawn on October 12, 1878, are a collective denial of another’s right to control their own destiny. And it is not just the victims who lose, but even those who deny justice to others may reap the whirlwinds of retaliation and political correctness.

Wars of aggression, not constitutionally authorized wars for national defense, are our country’s intentional denial of another country’s or people’s right to independently determine their own destiny. One of the main causes of our country’s post-WWII denials of the right of other countries to control their own lives are wars instigated by independent executive action without congressional authorization.

We can each quickly cite evidence of such wars based on false premises and rash executive action. President Lyndon Johnson used the shaky premise of the Tonkin Gulf Resolution to get us hopelessly embroiled in Vietnam. President George W. Bush relied on false intelligence reports that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and was involved in 9/11. President Bush then precipitously led us into what appears to be an endless and pointless war in the Middle East.  As Pete Seeger’s song “Where Have All The Flowers Gone?” asks us, “When will we ever learn?, when will we ever learn?”

Our Founders’ wisdom of placing the authority to wage war in congress is that such a procedure keeps all of our citizens more closely involved in these grave decisions. And, it requires much more careful deliberation when congress is involved. Also, when we eliminated the military draft, we turned from a citizen minute man type military to a professional and less ecumenical type force. To make the tragic choice to go to war all Americans should feel the direct cost. It is too easy to hire others to impose our will on the powerless. With a professional standing military our armed forces never stand down. And the temptation for any of our presidents to play with these awesome powers as if they were toy soldiers is too intoxicating for most to resist. Of course, the draft is one of the ultimate impositions of loss of control. Our country should only use it when our national survival is truly at issue. And then it should include all able-bodied adult citizens. Not everyone needs to serve on the front lines but everyone can serve somehow.

One of the good things we received from one of our British cousins were John Locke’s Enlightenment philosophies as highlighted by the doctrine of separation of governmental powers. Our independence as a nation has survived great trauma due in large part to our three separate and equal political powers: Executive; Legislative; and, Judicial. We forget this at our peril. Control of our lives is an inherent need for individuals and nations and, if lost, can lead to long-term bad effects for both the invaders and the invaded. Freedom of choice is essential to our personal and national well-being. Our Founders enshrined that opportunity for us in our Constitution and that is what we celebrate on Independence Day as we struggle to afford that right to all of our citizens.