…That’s something the late Russell Amos Kirk often said. Even when things are at their apparent brightest or dimmest…the future remains an unknown. Things will change, and the way they change is rarely up to us.
This Michigan Supreme Court race has taken up what some of you have said is an unfortunate amount of time/space at this site. True, I might have been better off to launch a website just for this…but in another sense, this is Delayed Justice, too. If there is not fairness at the state’s highest court, what chance have all those who hunger and thirst for justice? What of all the efforts of the police officers and the prosecutors who service justice in their pursuit of clearing murder cases (and other kinds of cases, too, of course)? What of the hopes of the families of the murdered victims? That’s why I have undertaken this effort. Why at this time? Because now is when those seeking high office are declaiming exactly who they (and the others they are running against) are…rule-of-law judges or empathy judges or…. When you have proof to the contrary there is an obligation to step forward.
I have no idea who will win this day’s election. The polls for the Supreme Court race have put Judge Mary Beth Kelly in the lead, followed by Justice Robert Preston Young, Jr., followed by Justice Alton Thomas Davis, followed by Judge Denise Langford Morris. The ultimate poll, of course, is the ballot box. We’ll just have to wait and see. I’ll wait without hope, because, as T.S. Eliot wrote in Four Quartets “For hope would be hope for the wrong thing.” If Justice Young and Judge Kelly are successful there may be a every good reason in service of an unknown future and truth. The same goes if they are defeated. If Justice Young is unelected I would hope and pray that he is lifted up and made a better and stronger man, ablaze for what is just and right. Oh, he has many gifts and talents, and one of the best things about this country is that you can have a second act, a third act, and a fourth act if you need it. People are giving and forgiving and once we (yeah, we) see the error of our ways and admit it, then there is all the hope in the world. The same holds true for Judge Kelly, that she will grow into who God calls her to be. I hope and pray the same for myself. Every day I have prayed for these candidates…all of them.
And for the election, I have prayed that prayer we’ve been told never fails: “Thy will be done.” Whatever the result, even if I don’t understand, I can trust. I can choose that.
Yes, and they do. However, most (maybe all) Supreme Court cases are matters of the Constitution, and how it shulod be interpreted in a given circumstance. Not only are the Justices a product of their times, they take into consideration public sentiment and the generally accepted ideals of justice.Most laws are applied based on precedents, they become case law. Judges and lawyers look at how a law was interpreted in a prior case and aim for consistency. That is why the difference between a great judge and a poor one is how well they write their legal opinions. Because future judges will look to their ruling and try to find the specific details of a case that dictated his or her application of the law. Supreme Court Justices often have a dissenting opinion put on the books, too. The minority of Justices who disagreed with the ruling explain what their interpretation of the law is as it pertains to that case and what details of the case shulod have been more or less significant.