I'm ashamed to admit I had not seriously considered this as a criterion for the Court, but what do you think?
http://www.sftt.org/main.cfm?actionI...30&htmlId=3051
SFTT Special Report: A Combat Vet Needed For the Supreme Court
By Michael S. Woodson
With the announced retirement of Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, and the expected retirement of Chief Justice William Rehnquist, President George W. Bush, who has described himself as a "war president," will have a chance to put at least one experienced war veteran on the U.S. Supreme Court.
There are number of practical reasons why this would be valuable to both the Supreme Court and to the nation as a whole.
The Court needs such a nominee to help it credibly handle the workload it will inevitably have handling war veterans' cases and constitutional issues in the war on terror. The war on terror, being more of a guerilla war, requires something the U.S. Supreme Court has never had in this century: a veteran who lived the lessons of a guerilla war, such as Vietnam or Iraq.
The ideal nominee would understand these issues first-hand, from the realities of counter-terror operations to the struggles that veterans often go through when attempting to receive adequate help from the VA. Not only that, but a man who has actually undertaken military operations will be an invaluable resource to the rest of the Supreme Court as the justices deliberate on the complex and murky constitutional issues of what is and is not necessary law to achieve the compelling government interest of better homeland security.
Such a candidate should have recent experience with people from all walks of life and not necessarily too much time in the cloistered halls of marble and granite associated with long appellate court service. There is enough of that experience present on the Supreme Court already.
Do such judicial candidates exist? One much-discussed candidate with prior military experience is Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Emilio Garza, a former Marine officer who served during 1970-1973. While his official biography avoids calling him a combat veteran, Garza's service, conservative record, political value and runner-up status to Clarence Thomas as a high court nominee have already put him high on the Republicans' list of potential successors to Justice O'Connor.
Military service is clearly a plus in running for office, unless overdone as a sales point to get elected. Few politicians fail to mention it when running for office. However, in an appointee to the Supreme Court, the combat experience question goes to whether President Bush's nominee possesses a special empathy and wisdom about people that is derived from knowing their frailty and strengths as revealed in combat. While such experience is never a self-glorying element for the veteran, it would be a huge windfall of independent perspective on a terror war without an end date.
Still, this is not to say that prior military service guarantees that a prospective nominee is the best person for the job. Judge Garza currently shines brighter than Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez as a potential Supreme Court nominee, partly because he did not undertake the stigma of writing legal memos opening the established legal definitions of torture to discussion.
And yet, Judge Garza has made some appellate decisions that raise the issue of whether he would cut individual citizen (including citizen-soldier and veteran-citizen) rights, interests and concerns in ideological obedience to sovereign government and the corporate powers it favors. That tendency could make for an arduous uphill road for individual veterans facing the impersonal bottom-line agencies and institutions that are literally incapable of gratitude to veterans of war. Was that not the rationale for smaller government championed by President Ronald Reagan?
While the Supreme Court consists of great minds (including their clerks) sharpened by years of appellate experience, few have come straight from the trial courts to the high court. It would be a good exception to have a justice more recently in touch with litigants, witnesses, jurors and local community service sitting on the Supreme Court. Such a person could identify with real people in his opinions. Such a person would not be a political ladder climber, but someone settled into public service for its own sake.
One such potential candidate clearly fitting this description is the Honorable Thomas S. Reese, a Florida Circuit Court Judge in Lee County serving in the trial court trenches since 1979. Those supporting the concept of a high court justice with a military background would likely find Reese to be a very favorable nominee. His record is not one of ladder climbing, but of satisfaction with public service where he is.
According to his 20th Circuit Court bio at the Florida courts site, Judge Reese was a distinguished University of Miami history graduate who "entered active duty after graduation and went on to serve as a Captain in the U.S. Army Special Forces for six and one half years." He saw combat with the 5th Special Forces Group (Airborne) in Vietnam. "Judge Reese [also] served with the Green Berets in Central and South America including Paraguay, Panama, Brazil, Dominican Republic, and Chile," his biography continues. Since then, Reese has been active with the VFW, American Legion and the 82nd Airborne Association.
News coverage of Reese reveals a working judge who takes victims' rights seriously while actively engaging in community service. He labored to found juvenile rehabilitation and drug treatment programs in and around his 20th District near Naples, Fla., and has served on judicial quality and gender bias task forces as part of pulling extra duty to improve the judicial system itself.
Judge Reese once refused to accept a plea bargain offered by a prosecutor regarding a therapist accused of hypnotizing and molesting female patients, because he said it "trivializes the complaints of witnesses." Judges seldom reject a proposed plea agreement from the prosecution, but Judge Reese proved that he would not sell out the individual victim to get along in a criminal justice system that too often pretends abstract justice for all, but delivers justice for no one person.
The justice for all, but justice for no one attitude suits the ironically activist position of radical judicial restraint. The common law is made up of judicial decisions and is the foundation of American law. You cannot be for radical judicial restraint and believe in the genius of American common law any more than you can be for representative government and be an extreme judicial activist. Better to embrace Grandma's jurisprudence that says, avoid the extremes, dear. One of Judge Reese's chief qualities is his evident ability to be a judge and not a political automaton, who is flexible enough to avoid extremes in his philosophy of law.
The judge has handled countless circuit court level cases and has majored in a criminal docket during his years on the bench. He has seen it all. Overall, he has been tough on crime, tender to victims, and stressed meaningful preventive solutions. His extensive experience with juries would be a significant high court check on society's power brokers jockeying for influence, control, and the loyalty of the American juror.
Reese's concern for the unjustly harmed and the weak extends not just to victims, but to helping offenders change their lives. He was not satisfied with processing sad stories through his courtroom for drama's sake, but did something about it himself.
Judge Reese's veteran status brings to mind the record of one of the Court's greatest jurists, Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, a Civil War combat veteran whose experiences helped shape his approach to constitutional law and philosophy. Holmes once said, "The greatest act of faith is when a man understands he is not God," and also wrote, "Certitude is not the test of certainty. We have been cocksure of many things that were not so."
A combat veteran cannot hide from his mistakes. He must live with them and get in the habit of admitting them. Such a person is given to wise historical reflection as a guide to the future. However, persons camouflaged in rhetoric for most their lives can more easily hide from the humbling realities that bring crucial contextual wisdom to their thinking. This is another reason why Judge Reese's dedication to his locality without strutting into politics from the bench is so impressive.
It is likely, based on the overall account of his career, that Reese would be an unwilling nominee for the High Court. In my opinion, that is an additional sign that he would do an outstanding job.
Judge Reese was once quoted to say, "There is no goal that cannot be achieved so long as there is no concern for who gets the credit." Wouldn't it be nice to have at least one Supreme Court Justice so well grounded in public service and uniformed combat service that he no longer cared about getting the credit? It would be a true service to veterans and the country if the Honorable Thomas S. Reese were given a priority look and salute from the President.
Michael Woodson, an attorney, is a Contributing Editor of DefenseWatch. He writes on public affairs and can be reached at
singingmountains@yahoo.com. Please send Feedback responses to
dwfeedback@yahoo.com.
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