When I think of what Roberts is like, I think of David Garcia, now retired from the San Francisco Superior Court. Garcia was a judge who often detested his own rulings. One morning when I was in the Law and Motion Department of the San Francisco Superior Court during the time when Garcia roosted there, and I was waiting for my turn to be heard on a motion in the case I had before the Court, Garcia became agitated over having to render a decision that went against a poor family which was suffering from what was happening to them. He deviated from his rendition of the law, as he often did, by remarking that he often has to rule against persons in cases where his sympathies lie with them and their plight, and he is sorely grieved in knowing that a ruling adverse to them makes their situation even worse. But, he explained, that attitude comes from "David Garcia the person." When he dons his black robes and sits on the bench, he said, he is "David Garcia the judge," and in that role he has to follow what the law tells him, even when the result is deplorable to him. Roberts is the same. And that, more than any other factor, is what you will find governing Roberts' conduct and opinions as the Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.
*Burton H. Wolfe bhwolfe(at)msn.com is the author of numerous articles on legal matters as well as a book that explains, largely through the stories of Death Row convicts and efforts on their behalf by defense lawyers, how the U.S. Supreme Court deals with a constitutional question: Pileup on Death Row (Doubleday). Since 1986 Wolfe has been the principal director of the Homosapiens Educational & Legal Project, based in San Francisco. Though that non-profit organization is presently inactive, Wolfe continues to pursue public interest litigation in the state and federal courts as a layman unrepresented by counsel, since lawyers willing to pursue the litigation are not in season.
*Burton H. Wolfe bhwolfe(at)msn.com is the author of numerous articles on legal matters as well as a book that explains, largely through the stories of Death Row convicts and efforts on their behalf by defense lawyers, how the U.S. Supreme Court deals with a constitutional question: Pileup on Death Row (Doubleday). Since 1986 Wolfe has been the principal director of the Homosapiens Educational & Legal Project, based in San Francisco. Though that non-profit organization is presently inactive, Wolfe continues to pursue public interest litigation in the state and federal courts as a layman unrepresented by counsel, since lawyers willing to pursue the litigation are not in season.
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