... And Justice For All.

With the retirement of U.S. Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens there has been much speculation about whom President Obama will nominate to replace him.
In considering possible replacements President Obama should consider some facts.
Since the late Justice Thurgood Marshall retired in 1991 there has not been one member of the United States Supreme Court who has made a career of defending clients.
There is not one member of the court who has been elected District Attorney by voters.
The current Supreme Court is entirely comprised of former federal appeals court Judges who have had no connection to the issues that confront ordinary Americans.
The role of the Supreme Court is not merely to interpret case law;it is to consider if those laws are fair and serve the interest of justice.
When Justice Marshall was appointed by President Lyndon Johnson in 1967, Marshall was not only the courts first African-American Judge, he was one of the nation’s top defense lawyers.
In 1954 Marshall served as lead council in the landmark case of Brown vs. Board of Education. Marshall won a historic judgment by attacking the concept of “Separate but Equal” which had been set in Plessey Vs. Ferguson (1896).
In Brown, the issue was not simply that African-Americans were being forced to attend separate schools; the issue was that those schools were not providing students with an equal education. By overturning the concept of “Separate but equal” Marshall broke new ground in civil rights law by demonstrating that access is important for people to exercise their rights.
In our time issues of access effect people with disabilities and other communities in their pursuit of the American dream. Another Justice who had extensive experience as a trial attorney was Louis Brandeis.
In 1920 in the case of Gilbert vs. Minnesota, Brandeis wrote the dissenting opinion stating that “ … If the First Amendment means anything, it means that a State has no business telling a man, sitting alone in his own house, what books he may read or what films he may watch.” This was one of the first instances of the court asserting the modern concept of privacy that the Warren Court would later expand upon.
While it may be preferable for presidents to nominate justices who don’t cause controversy,we the people need justices such as Brandeis and Marshall who are staunch defenders of civil liberties and are dedicated to idea of “Justice For All.”
One person who fits this model is Bryan Stevenson. Since in 1989 Stevenson has served as the director of the Equal Justice Initiave. Through his work with the EJI Stevenson has built a career defending clients in the Deep South who are facing capital punishment.
According to Stevenson’s biography on NYU’s faculty page, Stevenson has earned the Reebok Human Right’s Award in 1989 and the Olaf Palme Prize in Stockholm, Sweeden for International human rights. Since the Patriot Act was adopted in 2002 the power of the federal government has increased and our civil liberties are threatened as never before.
It is time that at least one member of the nations highest court be someone dedicated to the pursuit of justice for the people. Stevenson could be another Brandeis but President Obama has to have the courage to nominate him.