The Joys of Teaching … or Judging the Judges

 

                                       The Joys of Teaching … or Judging the Judges   

                                       Published in Marietta Daily Journal 10/30/21

If one loves a particular academic subject or a manual skill but doesn’t particularly love and enjoy people, he or she might still find a measure of joy in teaching it. However, if one gets no enjoyment from their learners, it’s doubtful that he or she could bear up for very long in a school or college classroom.

            Here is an example of what helps a teacher bear up and bounce into a classroom day after day, year after year. In Cobb County’s Wheeler High School 1980 yearbook, seniors were asked to write a few things for which their fellow graduates might remember them. Senior Tain Kell wrote, “Likes heck raising, fun, portraits of famous generals … Dislikes 7:00 AM … Plans for the future: huh?” 

            I cannot say when and how the future Cobb County Superior Court Judge raised heck. I can only testify that he definitely raised both the intellectual and fun level in his senior English class. Along with his classmate and friend, Richard Ozment – now Doctor Ozment – the future judge could get us all very quiet one moment with an incisive comment or question, only to crack us up the next moment with a hilarious, though precise, illustration of his point. One day, to the delight of the class, the judge and the medical doctor turned on each other to seriously debate whether or not Cardinal John Henry Newman’s definition of education was accurate. The debate was a draw.

            The Kell-Ozment class was no “Welcome Back, Kotter.”  Its members were all too intellectually astute for that comparison; however, in regard to fun and sheer joy, on a Kotter scale of 1 to 10, the class was a strong 6/7. Let’s just say John Travolta would be proud.

            As for the “huh?” about his future plans, in a recent delectable confab with Kell and another former student, former GA Supreme Court Chief Justice Harold Melton, Judge Kell asserted that he was interested in “The Law” from the first time he conceived that there was such a thing.” Kell revealed that as with so many lawyers, the novel “To Kill a Mockingbird” had a profound effect on his desire to be a lawyer. And where lies the joy in being a judge? “I have seen people change their lives for the better” … and “have seen others exercise an almost supernatural forgiveness in unforgivable situations.”  Having taught in men’s and women’s prisons for the last decade, I know what the Judge is describing.

            Harold Melton was a 1984 graduate of Wheeler. The pleasure of knowing and teaching him came about in Melton’s 10^th grade English class. Full disclosure: the faculty lounge is where teachers often “talk about” students, but for positive purposes such as comparing notes and discussing progress or lack thereof of individual students. Perhaps as a stress reliever, teachers spend much time reveling in discussion of students who are exemplary and inspiring. More than once I heard Melton referred to as “a prince of a guy.”           

            That he was. Judge-like even while a 10^th grader, Melton listened intently. Though he stated recently at our confab that he had no interest in a legal career during college, intentionality was still writ large on his 15-year-old face. Melton was the type who, after a time of confusion about a point of grammar or about a poet or story writer’s purpose, would wrap matters up with a single clarifying sentence, the kind of sentence that makes other students utter “Oh, I see.” (All teachers need that kind of help occasionally.)

            His joy of being a Supreme Court Justice? “”It’s enjoying the role of making decisions that shaped Georgia’s legal landscape rather than being an attorney who argued and pleaded for the judges to decide in my favor.” Melton’s father was the first person to suggest he consider law school. Melton did so after obtaining a degree from Auburn University in International Business. Melton says, “Deciding cases is a weighty process. On the Supreme Court, being the final arbiter of the law adds additional pressure to the quest to be right and clear.”

            The effects of teaching are often mysterious. Did you help anyone or not? But students’ effects on teachers are just as mysterious. Most students probably will never know what effect they had on their teachers. These two men brought delight and inspiration to their teachers. I judge them worthy to judge.

            Yes, what most drives teachers from teaching is students, and what most keeps teachers in teaching is students as well.

 

Roger Hines

10/28/21

Et tu, Anglo Nations?

                              

                                                       Et tu, Anglo Nations? 

                                Published in Marietta (GA) Daily Journal, 10/2/21

            Have all the English-speaking nations  of the world gone crazy? Before considering that question, hearken back to Shakespeare’s play titled Julius Caesar. In the play a number of senators have grown alarmed by Julius Caesar’s growing power. When their planned assassination of Caesar takes place on the Ides of March, they are joined by one of Caesar’s supporters and friends, Marcus Brutus. In joining the assassins, Brutus declares, “Not that I love Caesar less, but Rome more.”

            While Caesar is being stabbed to death by the senators, he sees Brutus lift his knife to deliver his blow. Caesar stares at Brutus and says “Et tu, Brute?” (“You too, Brutus?”) Their friendship was well known.

            Recall and survey mentally for a moment the rise to prominence of the English-speaking world. Ponder how a small island nation the size of the state of Alabama became a world power as she spread her language around the globe. Ask how in 1588 the tiny ships of England were able to defeat the huge Spanish Armada, determining on that day that North America would speak English, as would many islands, small nations, and a huge continent down under. Ponder why representative democracy has thrived in English-speaking lands.

            England - later dubbed “Greater Britannia” or Great Britain - is graded differently by different historians. Most, however, credit her with generally improving the lives of all the lands wherever her ships harbored. Faulted for imperialism, Britain even so spread her culture and influence. For centuries England cradled and spread the Christian faith. Producing great leaders, thinkers, and communicators became her habit. Eventually Britain would give her empire away, still leaving England as a world power. Could anyone argue that India, Hong Kong, New Zealand and Australia, to name a few, are not better off for being visited, touched, even shaped by British influence?

            Much if not most of that influence has been colored and characterized by Christianity. Wherever the Christian Gospel has gone, schools, hospitals, and orphanages have followed. Wherever the English language has gone, enlightenment has followed, particularly scientific advancement. The ancient Greeks were the first westerners, but the early modern British were the chief perpetuators of western civilization.

            But how fares western civilization today? How is it different from the governance, the amount of freedom, and the pursuit of happiness in the Middle East or Far East? How should we grade the Islamic countries, Communist China, or expansive Russia? How should we grade America on the holding forth of principles such as freedom of religion, freedom of speech, and individual liberty?

            To borrow a phrase from fellow columnist Bob Barr, western civilization “crumbles around us.” Barr’s words are fearful, yet they size up precisely what is happening not just in America but in all English-speaking nations. We are driven to ask, “Anglo nations, are you too going the way of totalitarianism and moral relativism?” Today there is evidence we all are, not with armies or bombs but with ideologies that are anything but subtle. England is run by a Prime Minister who is conservative in name only. Canada’s man at the helm is a cool young dude without a traditionalist bone in his body. The head of the Australian government, a Pentecostal with strong religious views, is a center-right leader, yet as with all other Anglo nations, Australia teeters toward bureaucratic tyranny. In America nurses, teachers, and cops are being fired for not getting a booster shot. Don’t tell me that Covid-fear and government checks aren’t being weaponized for political ends. 

            The crumbling of the west is not only a political event but a religious one as well. Defund the Police, open borders, profligate spending, centralized government, cancel culture, and the steady intrusion of socialism are all dangerous developments, but so is the social/sexual contagion (transgenderism, gender denial, sexual “openness”) that long ago reached our schools.   Our current president is contributing to that contagion. No longer a likeable, pragmatic politician, he is a sad, pitiful puppet of the leftists to whom he surrendered. Consider our abandonment of “one nation under God,” which is to say our religious underpinnings. The loss of a foundation means the fall of a structure,

            Is a turn-around at hand? Can populist electoral uprisings halt western civilization’s plunge? Can normal working folks defeat elitist hypocrisy and the sensate craziness of Hollywood which columnist Barr so aptly described? Will another attack send us to church, at least for two months, as the 9-11 attack did? Will western nations wake up, read history just a bit, and realize what’s happening in the world?

            English-speaking nations, blessed above all others, have always been leaders. It’s time they lead again instead of caving to the lovers of Old World medieval authoritarianism. 

 

Roger Hines

9/30/21