Transcript of Georgia’s WIN List Speech
January 28, 2014 | Atlanta, GA
Leah Ward Sears
Thank you for your wonderful introduction.
It’s an honor to speak before such an important organization dedicated to changing the face of leadership by supporting the election of more women to public office. Hopefully, the women chosen to carry this torch will serve as effective advocates for issues important to women and children.
It was 23 years ago, around Valentine’s Day, when Governor Zell Miller made the call to me in my chambers in the Superior Court of Fulton County to, in effect, tell me that my life would be changed forever and I would become a torch bearer. He was appointing me to the Supreme Court of Georgia. It was a call I never, ever, expected. But I took it as a challenge.
It was a challenge to me not only because I am a woman but because, as a member of one of America’s many minorities, I grew up seeing what popular opinion had done to our nation, as far as allowing racism and bigotry in our laws and in our hearts. And I had long felt that if it had not been for the judicial system in this country, many civil rights that I, and those I love, enjoy today, simply would not exist for minorities like me.
And so I was proud to be joining an independent judiciary, essential to a democracy, because not only was I getting the power to interpret the Constitution in a way that acknowledged certain principles fundamental to our society, I was also free to daily exercise the premise that all men and women are created equal. I was further pleased to be breaking into the “brotherhood”, as it were (because, quite frankly, that is what the judiciary was at the time as there weren’t any women). And in joining that exclusive club, it was my intent to become a jurist who believed that judges should acknowledge that we live in a modern world, one which is vastly different from the world in which our founders lived. I thought then, and I believe now, that those who see our Constitution as frozen in the past are also frozen in the past, unenlightened, unwilling and unable to move forward.
I remember the first time I heard argument in the Supreme Court and fully realized the living, breathing, importance of laws in our lives. I was Black and female and young (36 years old at the time), so I was full of ideas; things I wanted to do to make a difference. In many ways, coming from a different generation than most of the other justices, and being so different, I was more a teacher than a judge, even though I had a lot to learn myself! My head was full of how things “should be” (because a lot of things really did need to change). And it was often excruciatingly hard work dealing with so many people who possessed firm, sometimes unshakable convictions, on how things “were”—and should stay!
The gap in those early days between what I–and others who thought like I did–thought needed to change and what some were sure needed to stay the same, was wide. And there were times when bridging it was difficult. There were even times when it seemed impossible, and I wanted to give up. But like most women, I didn’t.
There were some things that came as a surprise to me back then as well, some of which I believe now were peculiar to me as a woman.
One was what I call the “Goldilocks Syndrome”; the uncanny feeling I, like many others when they take on new challenges, had that any minute a real judge was going to turn up and demand to know who’d been sitting in his chair. The judicial Papa Bear who was lurking in the darker realms of my subconscious greatly resembled Chief Justice John Roberts of the U.S. Supreme Court!
The second was the phenomenon depicted in one of my favorite films, the “Dead Poets’ Society”; that simply looking in the other direction can make a big difference. There can come to different views when you have a different view! What I mean by this is that while lawyers in a courtroom turn their backs to the public gallery to present their cases, judges who face the public when they hear the cases cannot help but see the naked emotion on the faces of those directly involved in the human drama routinely played out in our courts. There may be a young mother with a handkerchief held up apprehensively in front of her mouth, an older man with white knuckles and tightly drawn lips, or a grandmother with tears streaming down her face or even, from time to time, an anxious lawyer who knows he has a bad case. Having to look directly into the faces of these people every day was always a reminder of the intrusive power of the law and the responsibility that must accompany its exercise.
Sadly, as well, the several decades in which I served as a jurist, both in the trial and appellate courts, I often saw the law in Georgia administered by fear and knee jerk responses. In the late 1990s and the early years of this century, for example, it was fashionable for those in charge to chant mantras like “law and order”, “tough on crime”, and “hanging judge”. But judges must do justice, not merely appease sophomoric demands for toughness. When I was a judge, the fashionable fad of mandatory sentencing, for example, subverted that duty.
During the time I served on the Supreme Court there was also, unfortunately, a concerted effort nationally as well as in this state, by mostly conservative organizations and their followers, but on some level by liberals as well, to turn judges from earnest interpreters of the law into no more than political partisans. So any judge who would dare to deliver an unpopular opinion was often attacked with efforts to have them removed. I was a periodic recipient of such attacks.
Many in politics don’t seem to get this but judges must be immune from that kind of political pressure. They should never have to work with the threat that they had better not rule any way that would anger the extremists or they will be without a job. To this end, it always seemed odd to me that when a judge delivered an unpopular but not politically motivated opinion, especially to conservatives, he or she was labeled an “activist judge“. If, however, a judge’s opinion was popular but politically motivated, then these same folks deemed that the judge was just doing his job by interpreting the law. That’s such a double standard!
That judges should be free from political pressure and certainly political polarization is just one of the reasons I believe that judicial elections are problematic. Electing judges, especially when those elections take on partisan overtones (which so many did when I was on the bench), is a conflict of interest to our right to an independent judicial system that is not just another political arm of the powerful and where the weak and the poor have no council or advocate.
Of course the other two branches of government, the legislative as well as the executive, and also the media (the so-called “fourth branch of government) are, unfortunately, today often plagued by such polarization and incivility. I ask myself a lot, for instance: Why is our public discussion so dominated by rancor and divisiveness? Why do our politicians increasingly resemble silly children throwing food at each other? Why do our television “news” programs so often consist of people heaping on abuse and accusations?
There are many likely causes. I believe one of them is intellectual, concerning not so much what we think as how we think. I call this phenomenon “polarized thinking”, and I believe it’s very dangerous.
Why?
First, polarized thinking reflects the notion that only some values matter.
The psychologist Jonathan Haidt in his book “The Righteous Mind”, points to six basic ethical concerns that human societies appear to value most. They are: care for others, fairness, liberty, loyalty, authority and sacredness. Liberals today tend to focus largely on care and fairness, while conservatives usually make more room for the other four. But polarized thinking goes further than putting different priorities on different values. It says that my preferred values are everything and yours are nothing. It’s like a right-handed person saying not only do “I favor my right hand” but also my “left hand is of no use.” It’s crude thinking. Try walking around one day using only one hand.
If you don’t think polarized thinking matters much, just remember that such thinking is part of the reason why women are in such bad shape in Georgia. The underlying, often unspoken, theme in this country and state is that women are simply not as important as men. For example, in Georgia no women hold U.S. congressional seats. But I can tell by just looking around this room this morning that there are women who are capable of going to congress. Also, In Georgia, where 53% of us are women, more than 20% of us live in poverty and are uninsured (with no plans to expand Medicaid), and women make only 81 cents for every dollar earned by a man. This is not how it should be.
To change all of this, women have got to play some of the important leadership roles.
Second, polarized thinking is typically binary thinking, in which everything divides into two mutually hostile forces – left versus right, believers versus secularists, good people like me versus bad people like you. Some scientists suggest that humans are hard-wired to dichotomize, to classify other human beings into two artificial categories. But this way of thinking should be resisted and cannot work in a world that is extravagantly plural.
Third, polarized thinking undermines doubt. Many people today appear to view doubt as a weakness. Some religious leaders even suggest that it’s a sin, that doubt will endanger your soul. But the older I get, and the more I read and think, the more I’ve come to view doubt as my friend. Doubt keeps me honest. Doubt keeps me curious. By always reminding me of what I’m not completely sure I know, doubt protects me from arrogance and self-righteousness. Yes, truth is objective, but we can only approach it subjectively because everyone sees everything through a glass darkened by their own experiences. To treat doubt as a friend is to recognize this basic fact of our humanity.
I know there are plenty of people in public office today who’ve already discovered the truth and whose main mission now is handing it down to others. But I seldom find them to be helpful or very interesting, for that matter. I’ll take a good question over a final answer any day.
Fourth, polarized thinking tends to replace the clash of ideas with accusations of bad faith. Instead of focusing on content, we get name-calling and speculation about wrong motives. It’s profoundly anti-intellectual.
Many leaders I know and care about tell me how little it matters today what they actually say about the issues. What matters are the personal attacks. These attacks seem to be attempts to deny standing. The charge is not “What you say is wrong” but “You’re so personally flawed that you have no business saying anything.” When I hear such things, I am shocked by the brutality of it.
Finally, polarized thinking turns opponents into enemies. It says not only “I disagree with you” but also “You and I have nothing in common” and “You are a threat to me.” The result of this transformation is that civic engagement itself can become pointless and the normal practices of a healthy democracy can fall into disuse. After all, why bother? Why listen to someone from whom you can learn nothing? Why compromise with those whose only aim is to cause harm?
I guess there is a reason we call it a “culture war” and why one of the most frequently used words in politics today is “fight.” It’s harsh and aggressive and intended to be so. It works in times of actual war. But it’s no way for citizens to treat one another. It’s no way to participate in civil society. It’s no way to run a democracy.
All of this reminds me of a story in the Bible about the prophet Elijah. Upset by the waywardness of his people, he sought guidance from above. As Elijah crouched in a cave, a great wind arose. The great wind split the mountains and broke huge rocks. But Elijah did not find God in the wind. After the wind came an earthquake, but God was not in the earthquake. Then came a fire, but God was not in the fire. Finally, after the fire, there came a still small voice. And it is in that voice that Elijah heard God.
I believe that the leaders of this country, seeking the secret of America’s strength, will not find it in our drones or missiles, though such things can also split mountains and break rocks. Nor will it be found on Wall Street or in the largest shopping centers or across the street in the Capitol or in the most luxurious private homes on Tuxedo Drive or Cascade Road.
No, instead it will be found in the still, small voices of good Americans of integrity like you and me, many of whom are women; people who strive to separate right from wrong, to judge others as we would be judged, and who believe in their hearts in the birthright of every human being to be treated fairly.
Many of these voices belong to the young and the old, the rich and the poor, black people and white, Asians and Latinos. We need to listen to such people wherever we find them and whoever they are, and heed their advice. To do so we must develop in ourselves an open mind that invites growth, a heart that is compassionate to the cares of others, and souls that are open to their views and values.
Before we leave here this morning we should all also pledge our very best efforts to find and elect leaders of integrity who will listen to such voices and follow their advice, when it is right to do so, even if it is at the expense of their own self-interest and personal gain. We ought to put good women (and men) in office who are ethical and who practice civility and good stewardship. Government can’t legislate it. Judges can’t adjudicate it. Lawyers can’t litigate it. Politicians can’t appropriate it. Only WE can orchestrate these leadership changes, ladies and gentlemen!
Can we do it? Of course we can. The only question is: will we do it? I sincerely hope so, because when women come together, we win!
Thank you.
