First Day on the Bench

Think back to your first day on the bench. I remember mine.

I walked into the courtroom in my brand-new black robe. The bailiff called out, “All rise!” and every person in the room stood up before I had said a word. I had spoken in courtrooms all across the country, but this was different. That moment wasn’t a tribute or an honor. It was a reminder of power and the weight of what comes with it.

The calendar that day was light. Just a few local ordinance violations. The Village Attorney struggled to present a case, so I stepped in. I examined the witness. I made the record. I did what a seasoned trial lawyer would do. But halfway through, something hit me.

I stopped. I left the bench. I went across the street to my office, sat at a terminal, and started typing a list. First, the worst things I had seen judges do to lawyers over the years, abuses of power I had never forgotten or forgiven. Then I made a second list: the moments when judges had dignified the courtroom, when they had earned respect. That list was much shorter.

I read those pages to myself before I returned to the bench. And I read them before every session for the next eight years.

The next day, I began visiting the judges I had appeared before over years. I went to them to apologize. I told them, “I understand now what I didn’t understand before.” One judge, who endured my cross-examinations during the Agent Orange litigation, just smiled and said, “You made my life difficult, but at least it was interesting.”

That’s when I learned the most important truth about judging. You feel the power. Every judge does. Anyone who says otherwise is lying or asleep. You can send someone to jail. You can bankrupt them. You can tear a family apart. If you don’t recognize the weight of that power, you’re not ready to wear the robe.

Ethics isn’t about what you can get away with. It’s about what you owe to every person who ever stood before a judge in fear, in hope, or in pain. You bring your whole life with you to the bench: your beliefs, your biases, your scars. Your work as a Judge begins when you learn to carry that baggage without letting it dictate the outcome.

The Calling of Judgment

Judging did not begin with a rulebook. It began with trust. In the Hebrew Bible there is a Book of Judges, long before there is a Book of Kings. Judges came first because justice had to come before power could be exercised with moral authority.

That tradition lives on. Not just in the federal and state courts of record that handle big money civil cases and criminal felonies, but in the local town and village justice courts where people bring their fears and disputes and confusion and ask for a fair trial and a just decision.

Judging is a judicial act, but more than that, it is a moral act. If you accept the robe, you accept the burden.

The Robe Never Comes Off

Judging is not a part-time moral obligation. The moment you take your oath to support the Constitution, you swear to protect the rights and liberties of individual American citizens.

You are a judge. Every day. Every hour. Everywhere you go.

You are a judge when you are on the bench, and you are a judge at the gas station. You are a judge when you are making a ruling, and in the frozen food aisle of your local grocery store. You are never unseen. You are never unheard. And you are never off duty.

That is not a burden unique to federal judges or supreme court justices. It is felt most acutely by those of us elected to serve the communities where we live, where we practice law, where we raise families, and where the people who voted for us are also the people who appear before us in court.

Village and town judges are chosen not by political parties or presidents, but by their neighbors. The legitimacy of the entire judicial process and the rule of law starts in the People’s Courts. If we fail there, no robe in Washington will be able to cover the loss.

What the People See Is What You Are

In the courtroom, you are not just a judge. You are the law, the government, and in many ways, the face of justice itself. To the litigants, to the defendants, to the people sitting quietly in the back rows, you are what justice looks like.

It doesn’t matter what is buried in a law library. It matters how you act, how you speak, how you carry yourself. Judicial ethics begins not with canons and codes, but with perception, the people’s perception. If they don’t trust you, they won’t trust the system. If they don’t believe you’re fair, they’ll stop believing in the possibility of fairness at all.

You are a judge whenever and wherever you are seen, heard, or even recognized. Whether it’s in court or at a PTA meeting, in the grocery line or at your local diner, your demeanor matters. That’s the burden. That’s the badge. And we all wear it whether we like it or not.

We do not have the luxury of invisibility. One foolish comment to a reporter, one tone-deaf joke overheard in a public place, one smirk at a local fundraiser and you have lost something that may never be recovered. Not just your reputation, but the standing of your court. And worse, you’ve made the rest of us look smaller too. Because we are all judged by the worst among us.

The community doesn’t see separate judges. It sees the Judiciary. If one of us falls, all of us lose something. It’s unfair, perhaps, but it’s the job. If it is too much to carry, you shouldn’t take the oath.

The Courtroom is a Theater

In the courtroom, everything is about performance in the theatrical sense whether you like it or not. Many courtroom observers liken legal proceedings to Theater of the Absurd. To many, it all seems surreal: high stakes, strange rituals, and outcomes that defy common sense.

Every glance, every pause, every word from the bench is judged by the people in the room. Jurors, defendants, attorneys, and the public don’t just hear what you say. They watch what you do. And they draw their own conclusions. That is the reality of judicial life.

Most people don’t know or even care what the law says. They know what they saw. They know how you treated the witnesses. They remember how you spoke to the attorneys. They notice how you treat the court clerks and the stenographer. They watched your face when you ruled. If they sense contempt, if they sense bias, if they sense you’ve already made up your mind, they walk out believing the system is rigged. And they tell other people.

I learned early to stay on the bench from the opening gavel until the last case was heard. No sidebar negotiations. No whispered conferences in chambers. If I had to take a recess, I explained why. Told the courtroom where the restrooms were, how long we’d be gone, and where to find coffee. Transparency wasn’t a gesture. It was a duty.

A judge must be visibly fair. Not just fair in private reflection. Fair in public action. It is not enough to follow the rules. You must be seen and understood to be following them. A wink to one lawyer. A casual nod to another. A raised eyebrow at testimony you dislike. These things echo. Not just in that courtroom. But in every courtroom. Because every judge inherits the public perception shaped by the worst moments of other judges.

If the public sees a judge going behind closed doors and meeting with attorneys, they assume a deal is being made. That’s not cynicism. That’s experience. And we must do better. Because in a small courtroom, where the whole town knows everyone else, one appearance of favoritism is enough to ruin everything.

You are not there to manage outcomes. You are there to hold a public space sacred. If you want to be persuasive, do it through reason. If you want to be effective, do it through transparency. Never refer to the courtroom where you sit as “My Court” or “My Courtroom” in a possessive sense. The courtroom is not yours. It belongs to the people. You are not its owner. You are its steward and guardian.

Fairness Is the First Obligation

Fairness is the foundation of good judging. You can be brilliant. You can write thoughtful, well-reasoned decisions. You can cite a hundred cases and still lose the trust of your courtroom if you are not fair. The first obligation of every judge is not correctness. It is fairness.

What does fairness look like? It begins with how you listen. If you treat one lawyer like a nuisance and another like a colleague, the courtroom sees it. If you interrupt one attorney constantly and let the other ramble, the courtroom sees it. If you roll your eyes, sigh, or let your impatience show, especially with a self-represented or pro se defendant, everyone in the courtroom sees that too. And they remember.

You bring your past with you to the bench. We all do. Your education. Your politics. Your resentments. Your fears. They don’t disappear when you put on the robe. But your duty is to contain them. The public does not need a perfect judge. They need an honest one. One who knows when their own bias is whispering in their ear. One who slows down before deciding. One who listens to the weaker voice just as carefully as the strong one.

We all know what it looks like when fairness is absent. We’ve seen judges make up their minds before a word is spoken. We’ve seen them humiliate attorneys in front of their clients. We’ve seen them raise their voices, bark orders, dismiss arguments with a smirk. That is not justice. That is abuse of judicial power and the people in the courtroom will not forgive you.

If you don’t know how you appear to the people in your courtroom, ask someone you trust. Ask your court clerk. Ask your bailiff. Ask a colleague you trust to tell you the truth. Every judge needs a mirror. Every judge needs a voice that will say, “That wasn’t fair. You can do better.” We are not entitled to respect. We have to earn it. And we have to keep earning it every time we take the bench.

Reserving Decision

You do not have to rule on every issue the moment it is argued. And sometimes, you shouldn’t. When the facts are complex, the law unsettled, or the consequences far-reaching, reserving decision is not hesitation, it is humility. It shows respect for the process, the parties, and the law itself.

The pressure to rule quickly is real, especially with crowded dockets, anxious litigants, and public scrutiny. But speed is not the test of good judging. Fairness is. And fairness often requires silence, study, and the discipline to wait until you’ve fully thought the issue through.

Reserving decision is not retreat. It is responsibility. It tells everyone in the courtroom that this case matters. That you are listening. That you are thinking. No lawyer has ever objected to a ruling that came too carefully. But the damage from a careless one can last for years.

The Danger of Cynicism

When they take the oath at the start of their careers, most judges believe in justice, due process, and the dignity of the law. But over time, the weight of the calendar, the repetition of human failure, and the parade of petty disputes can wear down that idealism. It’s not corruption that erodes a judge’s moral compass. It’s fatigue.

Cynicism doesn’t shout. It whispers. It tells you that everyone is lying, that no one deserves a second chance, that outcomes don’t matter because people don’t change. It convinces you that the role of the judge is not to do justice, but just to keep the docket moving.

That is the most dangerous lie of all. Because once you stop believing in the people who come before you, you stop serving them. And when that happens, you’re not just failing them, you’re failing the system of justice you swore to uphold.

Judges see the worst of people. But we also see the moments when someone tells the truth even when it hurts, when someone owns their mistake, when someone chooses grace instead of vengeance. If we don’t recognize those moments, we don’t deserve the robe.

The antidote to cynicism is attention. Watch closely. Listen carefully. Make room for surprise. The courtroom is still a place where courage appears. If you believe that, you’ll judge wisely. If you forget it, you’ll judge poorly and do damage that no appeal can repair.

The Weight of Silence

Not every failure on the bench is loud. Some are silent. A shrug. A blank face. A question left unanswered. A sentence imposed without explanation. Silence can be just as damaging as bias or arrogance. In that silence, people fill the void with fear, with doubt, and with the worst they’ve seen elsewhere.

The courtroom is not a stage for personal expression, but it is a theater for justice. People come there afraid, uncertain, or angry. When they leave, they may still disagree with your ruling. But they should never walk away confused about what happened or why. They deserve to hear your reasons. They deserve to know that their voices were heard, even when they did not prevail.

I have seen what happens when a judge refuses to speak plainly. The gallery grows restless. Lawyers lose confidence. Defendants feel forgotten. Silence, in the wrong place, becomes a kind of contempt. It suggests that the outcome was inevitable. That the people involved didn’t matter enough to deserve words.

Words matter. A clear sentence, a moment of explanation, even a brief acknowledgment of pain or complexity carries weight. They remind the courtroom that justice is not automatic. It is chosen, voiced, and owned. If you don’t speak to the people before you, you are not judging. You are just presiding.

The Judge as Teacher

Every time you take the bench, you’re not just deciding a case. You’re setting an example. Not just for the parties in front of you, but for the attorneys, the court staff, the public, and even other judges. You are teaching people what justice looks like, how it sounds, and what it expects. Whether you intend to or not, you are always teaching.

You teach through your tone, your patience, your willingness to explain. You teach when you uphold the dignity of the court even under pressure. And you teach when you correct a lawyer without humiliation, when you clarify a point of law without condescension, when you give a self-represented litigant the space to be heard without compromising fairness.

People carry those moments with them. A young attorney remembers how they were treated. A courtroom regular hears your words echoed elsewhere. A defendant, perhaps for the first time, understands what justice is supposed to mean. It’s not your job to lecture. But it is your duty to educate—through clarity, through example, and above all, through respect.

There are moments in a courtroom when everyone is watching—not for entertainment, but for guidance. What you say then, and how you say it, will shape what they believe about the law long after the case is over. The law is written in books, but justice is learned in courtrooms. And judges are its teachers.

The Bench Is Not a Throne

The bench is elevated so that voices can carry, not so egos can rise. It is not a throne, a pulpit, or a pedestal for personal opinion. The judge does not reign. The judge serves. That distinction is not just symbolic. It is foundational.

Too often, authority is mistaken for superiority. But a judge who confuses the two begins to believe they are owed deference instead of earning respect. That is how arrogance seeps in: quietly, but with consequences. Lawyers grow timid. Litigants grow resentful. And justice loses its moral force.

Humility is not weakness. It is the discipline of remembering who you were before you wore the robe. It is knowing that the power you hold is borrowed, not owned. It is recognizing that the people who stand before you are not beneath you. They are why you are there.

The bench does not make you wise. It gives you the opportunity to listen, to learn, and to exercise judgment with care. But the moment you begin treating the courtroom as your domain, you’ve forgotten your oath. And you’ve betrayed the trust of the people you serve.

Judging Is Not About Control

The courtroom is not a kingdom, and the judge is not a monarch. Judgment is not dominion; it is discipline. A judge does not dictate outcomes but interprets the law with fidelity, rigor, and restraint. If statutes alone resolved every dispute, judges would be unnecessary. But Americans live under a common law tradition, where judicial decisions reflect discernment, reasoned judgment drawn from precedent, principle, and fact.

A judge’s power is circumscribed by ethics, tradition, and the law itself. When a judge leads a witness, steers a narrative, or silences dissent, the courtroom is no longer a level playing field. It tilts in favor of one of the parties. When a judge tips the scales, justice surrenders its legitimacy. The rule of law, which once commanded respect, begins to breed contempt; not just for the judge, but for the judicial process itself.

Judges earn respect through restraint and are measured not by how often they speak, but by how intently they listen. The goal is clarity. And clarity demands the courage to rule by principle, not impulse, and to stand alone when the law leaves no other path.

Independence Is Not Isolation

Judicial independence is not a privilege. It is a burden. It does not free a judge from accountability; it binds the judge to principle. Independence is not the right to decide alone. It is the duty to decide justly, even when standing alone.

Too often, judicial independence is confused with detachment. But a judge is not removed from society but embedded within it—shaped by its struggles, entrusted with its laws, answerable to its ideals. What judicial independence demands is not aloofness, but integrity: the courage to resist political pressure, the discipline to ignore popular opinion, the resolve to disappoint power.

Judicial isolation is not independence. It is abandonment. Judicial independence is something else entirely. It is the fierce refusal to let fear, favor, or fatigue shape the outcome of a case. It is the still center of the storm, a place where law holds firm while everything else is shaking.

Judging Requires Lifelong Learning

Judging does not end with the oath. It begins there. The legal landscape shifts. Social norms evolve. Precedent is challenged. And even the most experienced judges are tested in ways their education never anticipated. That is why continuing judicial education is not optional. It is essential.

Too many judges stop learning once they take the bench. They stop listening. Some retreat into routine and become custodians of process instead of guardians of justice. But judging demands more than experience. It demands intellectual, ethical, and personal growth.

Participation in judicial organizations is not just professional housekeeping. It is a moral obligation. It keeps you connected to colleagues who challenge your assumptions, remind you of your responsibilities, and help you see your own blind spots. No one is immune to error. But isolation magnifies it. Community helps contain it.

A judge who believes they have nothing left to learn has already begun to fail. Lifelong learning is survival. It is the only way to ensure that the law evolves without losing its anchor in principle.

Neutrality Is Not Indifference

Judicial neutrality does not mean detachment. Neutral judges are not bystanders. They are the last line of defense against unfairness. To be neutral is not to look away from injustice. It is to confront it without bias.

Indifference looks away. Neutrality sees clearly and acts. It is the discipline of holding every party to the same standard, the vigilance to prevent the courtroom from tilting toward the powerful, and the courage to intervene, not to influence the outcome, but to protect the integrity of the process.

A judge who mistakes neutrality for silence abandons their post. The bench is not a place to hide. It is a place to stand. True neutrality does not retreat from hard truths. It meets them head-on—anchored in law, unmoved by fear, and untouched by favor.

Demeanor Is Not Disinterest

A calm bench is not a cold one. Judicial demeanor—measured, composed, restrained—is not indifference dressed in black robes. It is a visible act of engagement, the assurance that the court sees, hears, and understands. But when composure collapses into detachment, the judge vanishes. And when the judge disappears, justice follows.

A judge’s bearing sets the temperature of the room. Disdain chills it. Impatience poisons it. Boredom drains it of gravity. When judges look away, litigants lose confidence. Lawyers pull back. The courtroom becomes a ritual without meaning.

Judicial presence is not passive. It does not withdraw. It commands. It listens. It engages without entanglement. The robe does not excuse disconnection; it demands awareness. Respect comes not from silence or distance, but from attention, focus, and the unmistakable sense that the judge is present—and so is justice.

Nothing Is Really “Off-the-Record”

Judges do not get to be anonymous, even in private settings. A careless comment at a social gathering or a knowing glance at a public event can do more damage than a poorly reasoned opinion. You are always seen. You are always heard.

We live in a world where every phone is a microphone, every conversation a potential recording, and every remark can be stripped of context. The standard for judges is not just fairness. It is the appearance of fairness. And nothing destroys that faster than a thoughtless moment made public.

Informal conduct shapes public trust as much as formal rulings. A smirk, a stray aside, or a whispered opinion travels fast, especially in close-knit communities. Judges may not like living in a glass house, but that is the nature of their oath. If you are not willing to live inside that house, you should not wear the robe.

There is no off-the-record for a judge. There is only what you meant to say and what others remember. In the end, what they remember is what counts.

Recusal and the Appearance of Impartiality

Judges must not only be impartial, they must be seen to be impartial. The legitimacy of the judiciary rests not on power, but on trust. And that trust collapses the moment the public begins to suspect that a judge is ruling with a hidden hand or a personal agenda.

Recusal is not a courtesy. It is not a gesture. It is a duty. When a judge’s impartiality might reasonably be questioned because of personal ties, prior involvement, financial interest, or political alignment, the only ethical path is to step aside. To remain on the bench under those conditions is to invite doubt, diminish confidence, and erode the very system the judge has sworn to uphold.

Even when the law is silent, conscience is not. A judge who clings to a case despite glaring conflicts may keep the robe, but forfeits the respect that gives it meaning. When one judge places personal loyalty above judicial duty, the damage is not personal, it is institutional. That is what we are witnessing now. A sitting Justice of the United States Supreme Court has refused to recuse himself from cases in which his spouse played an active political role. While the statute may not compel recusal, ethics and public trust do. His refusal raises profound questions about the impartiality of the highest court in the land. The damage is real. It reaches far beyond one case or one Justice. It shakes the foundation of public belief that justice is still possible.

Recusal demands clarity. It demands humility. It requires a judge to step back—not out of weakness, but in defense of a principle older than the bench itself: no one should sit in judgment of a case shadowed by personal interest. The public deserves more than fair rulings. They deserve to believe that those rulings come from a place untouched by influence, ideology, or private gain.

We Are Always Judges

Judges are always judges from the moment they sign their oath of office. We are Judges every single moment of our public and personal lives. We are obliged to maintain the dignity and integrity of our office at all times. Some of us may only be part time village, and town justices, paid nominally. But our ethical duty is full-time. We are held to the same standard of conduct as a Supreme Court Justice. The Canons of Judicial Ethics are not aspirational. They are binding. We are expected to understand them, honor them, and live by them, at all times.

Campaigning for election or continuation in office

It is not easy to run for judicial office without making promises. The public wants answers. Reporters want clarity. Interest groups want commitment. But judges are not supposed to offer certainty about outcomes. We are not supposed to be elected or appointed because of our political philosophy or ideology. We are elected to uphold the law without favor, without fear, and without campaign trail guarantees.

When you campaign as a judge, you walk a narrow line. You are asking for votes, but you cannot trade them for promises. If you do, you are undermining the legitimacy of the bench you seek to occupy. Judges do not swear loyalty to voters. They swear loyalty to the Constitution.

The hardest thing about running for judicial office is refusing to say what people want to hear. But that is the very discipline that the job demands. If you cannot hold that line in a campaign, you will not hold it when you take the bench. And if you blur the line between judging and politicking, you make it harder for all of us to defend the independence of the judiciary.

Perception and Appearance

The foundation of judicial ethics is perception. How do litigants, defendants, and the public see us? Their perception is the standard by which we are judged. And it is the standard we must live by.

We are never off duty. The robe may come off, but our role as judges does not. As long as we are identifiable as judges, we must act like judges. We are not just men and women in black robes. We are the face of an institution that depends on public trust. That trust is always only one careless moment away from being lost.

We are not mediators. We are not facilitators. We are Judges. We do not merely manage proceedings. We embody justice. That is how the public sees us, fairly or not. That is what we carry into every courtroom, every public event, every overheard conversation.

Every word we speak, every expression we show, every careless joke or aside, especially near a camera, a reporter, or an open mic, reflects on all of us. One lapse can discredit all of us and shake the authority of the judiciary itself.

We’ve all been in social gatherings where some judge’s latest blunder becomes entertainment. Everyone laughs—until they remember you are in the room. Then they glance your way. The question that follows is quiet, but deadly: “What makes you any different? Maybe you just haven’t been caught yet.”

That’s not just a question. It’s a reckoning. There is no true privacy for a judge. No off-the-record conduct. No personal moment free from scrutiny. Our oath does not end at sundown. It follows us everywhere, always.

The Judge as Witness

We are not only judges. We are also witnesses. Witnesses to everything that passes through our courtroom. We see truth and lies, courage and cowardice, justice served and justice denied. We are the only ones who see it all. Lawyers see only their side. Litigants know only their pain. Spectators glimpse fragments. But judges see it all and carry those images throughout their lives.

The people who pass through our courtrooms often forget us. But we remember them. Their faces. Their failures. Their silences. Some of them never leave us. Fast Eddie Colton is still with me.

What we see changes us. If we are not vigilant, it can scar us. That’s why a judge needs not only legal discipline, but moral discipline: the ability to see without flinching, to absorb without hardening. To confront deceit without losing faith. To witness human suffering without growing numb to it.

This is the quiet weight we carry. And it has to be faced honestly. If you don’t process what you see, it builds up. It leaks out. And eventually, it turns you into the kind of judge you once promised you’d never become.

Life After the Bench

Your oath does not expire when the gavel falls for the last time. Retirement ends your authority, not your professional obligations. Once you have worn the robe, you are never just a private citizen again. You carry the institution with you in how you speak, where you appear, and what you choose to do.

A single reckless comment, a partisan nod at a fundraiser, a consulting gig with the wrong client are not just lapses in discretion. They are breaches of trust. They erode the credibility of the system you once vowed to uphold.

Retirement is not a license to say what you could not say before. It is a final test of whether you will live by the standards you once enforced. When the rules no longer bind you, will the principles still guide you?

Whether you spend your post-judicial years in public service, private life, or quiet reflection, your duty endures. So does the weight of your example. Your robe may hang in a closet, but the public will still judge the judiciary by the way you live without it.

An Admonition and Exhortation

Because you Judges are men and women of honor and integrity, there may come a day when doing what is right costs you your seat on the bench. You may face a contested election and lose. You may be forced to step down. When that day comes, do not flinch. Make the decision you know to be just. Then, if you must, take off the robe and walk away with your integrity intact, still proud, still a judge in every way that matters. I did. And I am.