There is a story I once heard about two Supreme Court judges having dinner together sometime in the early 20th century. I can’t remember their names but one of them may have been Oliver Wendell Holmes.

They took a horse drawn taxi home and when it dropped one off he waved good night and jocularly said, “Do justice, do justice.”

The other stopped the carriage, got out, and said, “That is not my job. My job is to uphold the law.”

That in one anecdote describes two contending judicial philosophies and why Wisconsin Republicans are preparing impeachment proceedings against newly-elected Supreme Court Judge Janet Protasiewicz before she has even heard a single case.

They’re not actively moving on impeachment now, it’s something they’re getting together in case redistricting of allegedly gerrymandered districts goes before the court and she refuses to recuse herself.

Prostasiewicz has repeatedly called the legislative maps “rigged.”

“They do not reflect accurately representation neither the state Assembly or the state Senate. They are rigged, period. Coming right out and saying that. I don’t think you could sell to any reasonable person that the maps are fair,” she said.

Well maybe it is, or maybe is just a case of demographic shifts distorting the representation over time. The question is, can a judge who expressed a lot of strong opinions on the campaign trail be trusted to rule according to the law and not their personal opinions?

If you’ve ever served on a jury remember what they asked you during vor dire, “Have you formed an opinion on this case?”

Realistically speaking, yeah we all want to elect or appoint judges who we think will rule on cases so as to produce an outcome we like. But some of us are not comfortable with judges “legislating from the bench.”

Judges are supposed to apply the law, not make law.

Others however are quite comfortable with promoting an agenda through other means than the tiresome and tedious methods of promoting one’s views, creating a constituency, getting elected to the legislature and passing laws you think are needed.

It used to be that young idealists who wanted to defend the downtrodden from harsh or unjust laws would become defense attorneys.

Nowadays more and more of them strive to become prosecutors where they can decide which laws they will actually enforce, or judges where they can decide the law is what they want it to be.

This characteristic of an attitude of it doesn’t matter how it gets done just so it gets done.

But more and more I am appreciating the insights of the Founders that how something is accomplished is at least as important as what it accomplished.

Maybe those legislative maps are in need of redistricting, I don’t know. I presume there’s a process and I assume there will be challenges as both sides try to assure the greatest advantage to themselves.

And in which case I hope Judge Prostasiewicz can put the law before her opinions.

— Steve Browne is a longtime reporter and contributor to the Marshall Independent