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U.S. District Judge James Ware was a Clinton nominee for the Ninth
United States Court of Appeals in San Francisco. However, he got
shot out of the saddle, or rather shot himself in the foot. Judge
Ware had a canned story he regaled audiences and the media with
for years. He dramatically related the 1963 story of riding his
bicycle in Birmingham, Ala., with his kid brother Virgil sitting
on the handlebars. White racists shot and killed his brother who,
the judge said, "died in my arms."
In 1994, Judge Ware told the San Jose Mercury News, "When
I went through the death of my brother, I came very close to becoming
someone who could hate with a passion. What happened to me was
a defining experience, a turning point in my life, and I’m actually
very proud of how I came out of it."
There was just a small problem with Mr. Ware’s story. It
was a boldfaced lie. There was a Virgil Ware, shot and killed
in Birmingham, who had a big brother named James. The real James
works for an Alabama mining company and his words for "Your Honor"
are not kind. "He’s trying to better himself off somebody else’s
grief," James said in an interview with the Washington Post.
The act of nominating a self-martyred, chronic liar to one
of the most powerful positions in the American justice system
is an insult to the citizens and the judiciary. It casts serious
distrust upon all appointees to the court. Who are these non-elected
officials who powerfully influence every citizen’s life? Are their
rulings influenced by the Clinton-Gore environmental mandates?
One of the past rulings by the infamous green Ninth District U.S.
Court of Appeals is a red-flag indication of federal court justices
imposing their views in environmental and community affairs. The
ruling opened the gate wide for a new breed of environmental lawsuits.
The Natural Resources Council, a New York non-profit corporation
in partnership with the National Audubon Society, sued the U.S.
Department of the Interior and its various agencies. The lawsuit
contended the defendants, including U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
(FWS), violated the Endangered Species Act by failing to designate
critical habitat for the coastal California gnatcatcher.
It is meaningful to note that the FWS wrote the Endangered
Species Act and of all the pinheaded, empire-building bureaucratic
organizations, it has the most to gain from its enforcement and
expansion. FWS contended that designating critical habitat "would
likely make the species more vulnerable to prohibited taking activities."
That is to say in plain English, landowners would find where the
troublesome little varmints were located and get rid of them before
losing use of their land.
Not content to allow even FWS to protect a largely unknown
and unheard of bird, the Ninth slapped a rigorous reprimand on
their fellow Feds, saying they had indeed failed to designate
critical habitat for the gnatcatcher. Judges Harry Pregerson and
Dorothy Nelson waxed poetic about "a songbird unique to coastal
Southern California" and found "the Service failed to discharge
its statutory obligation to designate critical habitat when it
listed the species." These San Francisco judges read the ESA as,
"When a species is listed, critical habitat must be designated."
This dangerous ruling has encouraged scores of environmental
lawsuits, most notably the recent flurry filed against the U.S.
Forest Service and grazing permittees in the Southwest. The sanctioned
words of these non-elected authorities have given green activists
a whole new tool to use in their war on ranching.
Such rulings?made far away from affected communities and
lands by politically appointed justices who have no relationship
with or understanding of either?strike whole populations and industries
as cast-in-iron, can’t-ever-reverse-it, federal court decisions.
These judgments from political pawns who probably don’t know a
hoot owl from a holler control each of us, our land, our livelihoods,
our rights and our tomorrows so heavily that the extensive impact
cannot be fully measured or even imagined. Their words, regardless
of the citizens’ will, become law.
Judge Ware was withdrawn from consideration for the Ninth
District, but he is not resigning, nor has he been asked to resign
his current U.S. district judgeship. A citizen who lies to a federal
judge, or any member of the federal judiciary, is charged with
perjury and faces a mandatory prison sentence. Which raises the
question: Why are people such as this man, this known and proven
liar, empowered to judge actions of others, and make crucial decisions
which affect our lives and those of future generations?
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