What Makes A Good Judge?

What Makes a Good Judge?

By Joseph Parish

For this rant, I would like for my readers to consider this question very closely. Our Supreme Court is composed primarily of the Chief Justice of the United States, along with a number of Associate Justices which are designated by Congress. The current number of Associate Justices is set to eight, according to the US Code. The power to nominate a justice lies entirely with the President along with the consent of the Senate.

Judges are human just like anyone else and this trait makes them less than ideal in many people's eyes. In the American social structure, any qualified individual may be appointed as a judge. It is vital however, to mention that most of these appointments are party and policy related assignments. Unfortunately, these nominations need not be considered one of our nation's foremost authorities in modern jurisprudence. Constitutionally, there exists no established requirement for the president to appoint the most brilliant lawyer in the nation; in fact, a chief justice need not be an attorney at all.

You hear me correct; our Constitution stipulates very few requirements for the position of Supreme Court Justice. Although the position is one of the highest court designations in the nation, there are a few prerequisites necessary for the job. The United States constitution does not even state that the justices under consideration must be native-born citizens. There are no provisions provided which indicates a specific age, no education requirement or profession attributes. Historically, six of our 110 justices have been born outside of America. These justices do not have to be attorneys or even graduates of a law school. Traditionally, however, our appointed justices have had professional legal training in one way or another. The only legal threshold we encounter is that a nominated justice must swear to uphold and apply equally the statutes as set forth by our constitution.

To qualify as a good judge the person must possess the appropriate judicial temperament necessary to deal calmly and fairly with the parties appearing before them. Any overtly emotional or aggressive individual or one who is so blatantly arrogant that they make up their mind prior to hearing the various arguments presented by both sides will certainly not make a substantial judge. Good judges should question themselves on how their nomination will improve upon the overall ideological composition of the bench they plan to serve.

An apt judge must apply relevant legal rules in such a fashion that justice is appropriately serving in the case at hand. The judge must possess a sense of fairness and base his justice upon equality of law. They will need to understand how specific rulings affect the litigants and realize the consequences awaiting such rulings for our society as a whole.

Judges must display a keen perspective of the separation of powers as stated within the bounds of our constitution. He or she will need to carefully reflect upon every aspect before resolving a decision which might intrude upon the powers of any other branches of government. All judges must temper their desire to support party rules as it may do more harm to our justice system in the long run.

Lastly, a good judge must be courageous and display a means of independence with a will and personal fortitude to not shy away from otherwise unpopular decisions in their efforts to uphold the Rule of Law. Judges also must be aware of their power limitations and use proper justification when flexing their legal muscles.

As an unapologetic critic, I fully support the concept that as a nation of hope and progression we should avoid judges who tragically harbor views of hatred or those which appreciate laws based upon racial divide. Judges decisions must not abridge any fundamental rights of individual freedom. Judges should be utterly opposed towards unfair discrimination based on the individual's personal beliefs or orientation.

Judicial restraint is defined basically as that judicial interpretation which encourages a judge to limit their exercise of power. It contends that judges be vigil and hesitate to eliminate those laws already established unless the legislation is obviously unconstitutional. Judicial restraint is the direct opposite of judicial activism.

In the course of judicial restraint, a judge goes to all extremes to uphold a law whenever they possibly can. One major concept of judicially restrained judges is the principle of upholding previously established rulings by past judges. I am a firm believer that judges at all levels of court should exercise judicial restraint. I base my decision upon the following policies:

* Judges must occasionally defer to the judgment of our elected officials.

* These same judges should respect precedent of laws handed down from previous judges

There are several related theories which follow this line of thinking as well. The primary theory which comes to mind is "Minimalism" which argues that judges should place a wide berth upon precedent and should only make minor changes to constitutional laws.

The role of our judiciary has been debated for centuries due to the lack of specific mention of its assigned tasks within the Constitution. An understanding of the Constitution is paramount in my decision to support judicial restraint. I choose this policy initially because I am a firm believer that our forefathers created a document that essentially addresses the majority of the values and freedoms presented to man. We view these rights as fundamental and they should not be modified or changed at will.

After completing the proper research, I have concluded that a judge should have a careful mixture of both judicial restraint and activism. It would be foolish to side with one or the other consistently. An example, would be where the Supreme Court once ruled our minimum wage laws infringe upon one's right to negotiate our own business contracts. No judge should lie upon one end or the other of the spectrum. Too much judicial restraint is likely to duplicate decisions such as Dredd Scott v. Sandford, where African-American's were denied equal rights. On the other hand, too, much judicial activism might lend to more decisions similar to Roe v. Wade where the decision was based upon the implied constitutional right to privacy.

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