CommentsCORRUPTION WATCH-The problem with “Integrity” is that it lacks a true antonym.
There are many words that convey some aspects of its opposite: deceitfulness, corruptness, unrighteousness, degeneracy, untruthfulness, etc., but we lack a single word to describe the moral void which is created when integrity leaves our lives.
The Judicial System’s Lack of Integrity is Destroying the Republic
America is not a democracy. The U.S. Constitution established a Republic in which power was balanced against power. A primary way to check power, which was seen as a very destructive force due to the colonies’ experience with King George, was to create a Republic. Thus, we have a President to operate the government, a Congress to make the laws and a Judiciary to settle disputes and declare when the other two branches are exceeding their constitutional powers.
The people get to vote on the President, the Senators and the Representatives, but not on members of the federal courts. Although a judge can be impeached, it virtually never happens, and that power does not rest with the voters. At the time we adopted the U.S. Constitution, there was real concern that a “mobocracy” could turn the country into another tyrannical entity. Thus, judges had to be protected from the passions of the majority who could rise up and disenfranchise, enslave or kill the minority. Without a judiciary that is protected from the impulsiveness of the rabble, our Constitutional rights would be but one election away from dissolution.
When judges are placed beyond the reach of the mob, what power will constrain their illicit passions? Answer: Integrity
While we tried to devise a system for appointments to the federal courts -- one which has probably worked relatively well for over 200 years -- there have been huge failures. Presently, the lack of integrity in the state courts is far worse than in the federal courts, but it would be both naive and downright stupid to overlook the gargantuan ethical voids that exist within the federal judiciary. But now is not the time to discuss Antonin Scalia and his liberal enablers.
The courts are supposed to be the keel that stabilizes the ship; the personal integrity of judges must be the rudder that allows us to steer a true course. When the most important thing for judges, however, becomes their own care and feeding, then they use their official positions to aggrandize their personal power and wealth. By undermining the consent of the governed, a corrupt judiciary endangers the Republic.
As the Declaration of Independence stated, a government’s right to exist derives from its securing our inalienable rights. But a corrupt judiciary tramples on those inalienable rights. People do not jump from knowing about a few faithless judges directly to creating a revolution, but corrupt judges tend to eat away at our faith in the fairness of the government. People cease to look to their inalienable rights as the basis of their well-being and instead seek out some power that will smash the evildoers.
Because courts basically operate by the consent of the public, a dearth of judicial integrity causes them to look for different ways to protect themselves. In the aftermath of the Crash of 2008, people on Main Street learned that the courts were the enemy of the average citizen. While many lost their homes to foreclosure, the courts did nothing to the criminals who had crashed the economy, resulting in people losing their jobs and homes. The guy who specialized in robbing widows of their homes, thanks to the quirks that were part of Reverse Mortgages, became Secretary of the Treasury. When the shipping of jobs overseas left workers destitute and their families broken, we had courts that could lock up their kids who fell into the clutches of the Opioid Epidemic.
In brief, a corrupt judicial system became the handmaiden of the Wall Street crooks. Because the nation began with an overriding need to protect the judiciary from the emotions of the masses, the public became accustomed to living in ignorance of how the courts function. Secrecy is the breeding ground for corruption. Since power tends to corrupt, we should have realized that secrecy enhanced the likelihood that judges would be corrupted. The myth of judicial integrity, e.g. “sober as a judge,” lulled people into complacency. It was easier to pretend that everything was going fine. Myths make for nice bedtime stories but ruinous political policy.
Enough people have lost faith in the Republic’s ability to protect their individual inalienable rights that they have shifted to a new means to seize what they believe will enable them to take back what is rightfully theirs – and so we have what is called Group Rights. The right-wing supporters want to take back their country and the left wing wants to redistribute the wealth. The GOP has thrown in its lot with right-wing religious sects and white supremacists to counteract the left wing’s Identity Politics, which repeatedly promises to swamp the white population within a few years.
The White Group Rights advocates on the right and the Minority Group Rights advocates on the left are correct about one thing – the judicial system has become so corrupt that it no longer secures our individual inalienable rights. Rather, people feel the need to group together and trample down the opposition, whether by votes or by guns. The integrity void which now defines our judicial system has left us with no institution to defend the individual.
If anyone gets in the way of a greedy judge, his colleagues do not speak up. They watch corrupt judges steal people’s property, rule on matters in which they have a personal stake and alter records or change facts to suit their personal whims. The silent judges have ways to justify their cowardice: “If I oppose this altacocker, then he will thwart my career. I better remain silent.”
As Edmund Burke allegedly said, “all that evil needs to succeed is for good men to remain silent.” Let’s be blunt. Judges who remain silent as they watch injustice are not good men or women; they are co-conspirators for personal gain.
(Richard Lee Abrams is a Los Angeles attorney and a CityWatch contributor. He can be reached at: [email protected]. Abrams’ views are his own and do not necessarily reflect the views of CityWatch.) Edited for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.
