Ronald M. George: Final judgments

Free the Supreme Court One! Oh wait — he did it himself. Ronald M. George, California’s chief justice for 14 years, says happy trails — and trials — to the state high court in December. He really will spend more time with his family — wife Barbara, sons and grandchildren — and good books instead of court paperwork. People inside the court system may say George’s legacy is his top-to-bottom administrative overhaul of California’s courts. The rest of us might cite his deciding vote that briefly cleared the legal path for same-sex marriage. The robe he will hang up is the very same one his colleagues in the state attorney general’s office presented to him when he was first appointed to L.A.’s Municipal Court in 1972 by Ronald Reagan — five governors ago. Hail and farewell to the chief.

You said you were retiring in order to “pursue the richness of a life outside the law”; from that language, I thought maybe you were going to become a pirate!

That comes from writing too many opinions! There is a lot out there that I have had difficulty being able to do just by virtue of this being an all-consuming job. My workload tripled at least when I [became] chief justice [with] responsibility for negotiating with legislative leaders and governors and administering the $4-billion budget and the largest judicial system anywhere in the world — 1,700 judges, another 300 or 400 court commissioners and 21,000 court employees. I’ve enjoyed it tremendously, but I thought it was time to get a life back again.

Will you take up marathon running again?

My knees are the only things that have not stood the test of time. Certainly the marathon days are over.

You might be invited to be at the marathon finish line and give out the awards!

I don’t want to even stand in judgment on that!

How does the will of the people through the ballot figure into California’s system of law?

The process [is] almost like a fourth branch of government. [The court spends] a lot of time trying to interpret initiative measures. We have competing initiatives; we have some that run afoul of statutory provisions or constitutional provisions; it’s difficult to ferret out in some instances what the voters intended because these are not a model of the best draftsmanship. We occasionally have to invalidate something put forth as the people’s will because it comes into conflict with their own constitution, by which they placed limitations on their own ability to legislate.

You once said the endless stream of constitutional amendments has made state government “dysfunctional.”

I favor retaining the initiative process, but in California [it is] probably more extreme than it is in the other states. Initiative measures pass by a 50%-plus-one vote no matter what they involve, and [one] can get an initiative measure [on the ballot] by paying people. $1, $2, $3 per signature. [In] some states, some substantial rights provisions of constitutions are off-limits for the initiative process, or require legislative review.

Is “judicial activism” in the eye of the beholder?

Much is in the eye of the beholder and may depend on whose ox is getting gored. Nonetheless, I think there is such a thing as judicial activism, and what it does involve is letting one’s personal political, economic, social preferences dictate the result in a judicial decision, [or] reaching out to decide issues that are not squarely presented by the case, and that aren’t put forth by the parties [in the case].

A hallmark of your tenure is that people think you’ve stuck to the straight and narrow.

We try to, even on most controversial decisions, like the marriage case. We sort of groan sometimes when these hot potatoes come before us, but it is just as improper for a judge or a court to shirk one’s duty to resolve cases as it is to reach out and decide matters that are not in contention. There have been results I have either authored or participated in [where] I personally, as a voting citizen, favored a certain result but had to declare it invalid or possibly unconstitutional because it did not pass muster under the law. By the same token, there’ve been laws I’ve considered totally foolish that I’ve upheld.

Earl Warren and Sandra Day O’Connor are cited as judges who grew and changed on the bench. Are you a different judge now from when you came to the high court?

I think I’ve always tried to approach the law with an understanding of its proper role and limitations; I don’t see any particular changes in course. We all learn from experience — judicial and personal — but I see consistencies in principles. It’s funny; [I] recently obtained CDs of my six arguments before the United States Supreme Court as deputy attorney general; it was eerie hearing my voice 40 years ago. [One] was a case involving the constitutionality of the death penalty. I heard myself urging principles that I still as a judge adhere to — what I viewed as neutral principles of law that are still as applicable as when I was making those arguments 40 years ago.

The trio of same-sex marriage matters that came to the court — from the outside it looks like the same subject, but the underlying issues are very different.

Exactly. It’s the same subject but three distinct issues. Each involved limitations on governmental power: on executive power, on legislative power and on judicial power. Each of them provides a giant civics lesson.

[In] the first case, the court intervened to put a halt to the same-sex marriages authorized by the mayor of San Francisco. Our ruling was that it was not up to any one of the hundreds or thousands of executive officials in California to decide which laws are valid or invalid. If there is a doubt, go to court and file a lawsuit. Within hours, the mayor filed a lawsuit. The trial judge found the [anti-same-sex] marriage laws unconstitutional. The court of appeals reversed, we took up the case and by a 4-3 vote reversed the court of appeals and upheld the trial court.

The second was on the Legislature’s passage of the bill that limited marriage to persons of the opposite sex and the parallel initiative that did the same thing.

And the third element, the court had to pass upon the validity of [ Proposition 8], the people’s repeal of that part of the constitution which had been the basis for our ruling in the same-sex marriage case. We upheld the people’s right by a 6-1 vote to amend their constitution to eliminate the right which we had recognized and which had been the basis for our decision.

Did anyone ask you to perform a same-sex marriage when it was briefly legal?

I was asked to perform one ceremony in the interim period and I declined, because I knew I would have to pass on the validity of Proposition 8. If it were to become legal once more, I would have no reluctance. I would apply the same standards that I apply in deciding whether to perform marriages of opposite-sex couples; I confine myself to performing weddings for persons I know or who are perhaps the offspring of people I know.

How do you regard the California hybrid model where judges get appointed by governors and then run for election to keep their seats?

All things considered, California has a process that’s quite superior to what exists in other states. In, for instance, Ohio, there are candidates for the Supreme Court who run against each other on political party [membership]. I was informed that one year, we had competing candidates for the Texas Supreme Court backed by competing oil companies. So the [California] system has its flaws but appears to be superior to any others.

Does the ghost of Rose Bird still haunt the court or anyone who aspires to it?

The position that the court has taken on some very controversial issues should put a lie to that. Any time a judge would feel that he or she could not rule because of the political consequences, that is the time for the judge to hang up his or her robe.

You instituted huge reforms, among them unifying Municipal and Superior Courts, cutting duplication and changing funding sources.

Sometimes I think I should have gone to business school! I wanted [the system] to be self-operating long after I’m gone; that’s what makes the long hours worthwhile.

Is there any case in history you would have liked to be on the bench for?

My gosh, being part of Brown v the Board of Education on the U.S. Supreme Court (which I would not have wanted to serve on). [The case] took a lot of skills that I have tried to emulate in getting judges to work out their differences and speak with a single voice, which we do far more often than the U.S. Supreme Court does.

You wouldn’t have wanted to be on the Supreme Court?

I’ve been told by a couple of justices that I have the better job!

Death penalty cases are one obligation of your court. What’s the state of capital punishment here?

One time I made the quote of the day [in] the New York Times: “The leading cause of death on death row in California is old age.” That’s not a way to administer [the death penalty]. I’m not speaking about pros or cons of capital punishment, but I think the system is dysfunctional if it takes an average of 20 to 25 years to bring about an execution. Although I don’t favor arbitrary timelines, we should know within, let’s say, five years that it’s either a valid death penalty judgment and gets carried out, or if it isn’t. It discredits the whole system of government for these cases to drag on for so long.

Is there some TV show about the court system that drives you crazy with its inaccuracies?

You could probably give me the names of those shows and I would tell you I’ve never heard of them. When I’m asked about the leading challenge facing the court system, I say requiring a greater public appreciation of [our] rights and responsibilities, and awareness of the workings of our system of justice. A poll a few years ago revealed that more [Americans] could name the Three Stooges than the three branches of government. [An informed public] is the basic underpinning of our system of democracy, which with some irony we’re trying to export while our own citizens often lack an understanding of [it].

There are complaints to the Commission on Judicial Performance that Judge Judy wouldn’t do this, or else thinking she’s a real judge — “Why doesn’t she get disciplined?” There’s a total confounding of the roles of reality. People expect rabbits to be figuratively pulled out of hats, a la Perry Mason, or some other more contemporary show.

Who are you going to play your famous practical jokes on after you retire?

My poor sons, I’m sure. The problem is they’ve learned from the master.

Are black robes still a good idea? Were you tempted to add gold stripes like Chief Justice William Rehnquist?

The black robe as I understand it is to illustrate the impartiality of the judge, to in that sense dehumanize the judge [as] not being an individual who would differentiate according to wealth or stature in life. I’m certainly comfortable with that. Though I, too, enjoy Gilbert and Sullivan.

patt.morrison@latimes.com.

This interview was edited and excerpted from a taped transcript. Interview archive: latimes.com/pattasks.