‘Justice in Motion’
Judges, former elected officials talking about democracy, public trust on bus tour
The celebrations of the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence happened last weekend, but lessons about it continued Tuesday afternoon at the LeMoyne Community Center in Washington.
The teachers were a group of former judges and a former Pennsylvania governor who told students about the importance of the document and the rule of law. Their stop at the LeMoyne Community Center was part of a three-state “Justice in Motion” bus tour that is taking them through Pennsylvania, Ohio and Michigan.
Moderator Jon Delano, a former political reporter for Pittsburgh’s KDKA-TV, noted that when the Declaration of Independence was drafted in 1776, many Americans were not included in its calls for life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, including women, men who did not own property, Black people and Indians.
“It did not apply to many people at the time,” Delano said. “Almost everybody in America was excluded. How the words became applicable to all of us depends on what we call the rule of law.”
Tom Corbett, who was Pennsylvania’s governor from 2011 to 2015, said the Declaration of Independence “was a start. It planted a seed. You should be thinking about what you have as a result of the Declaration of Independence.”
The stop at the LeMoyne Community Center followed a visit to the Westmoreland County Courthouse in Greensburg. On Wednesday and Thursday, the bus and its occupants were due to travel through Ohio, making stops in Columbus, Wooster, Sunbury and Cleveland before wrapping up in the Detroit suburb of Grosse Pointe.
The participants in the bus tour are from both the major political parties. The tour has been organized by two groups: Keep Our Republic, a nonpartisan civic organization that seeks to strengthen trust in democracy, constitutional norms and the rule of law; and the Democracy Rising Collaborative, another nonpartisan group that organizes lawyers, retired judges and civic leaders to support democracy and the rule of law.
The stop at the LeMoyne Community Center was sponsored by the Washington County Bar Association.
“The rule of law – that is what has kept our democracy together for 250 years,” said Michael Donnelly, a former justice on the Ohio Supreme Court. “You let the process decide.”
Maureen O’Connor, a former Ohio lieutenant governor and Chief Justice of the Ohio Supreme Court, recounted how she was part of some decisions on the bench that angered members of the Republican Party, of which she is a member. O’Connor remembered how she was told that “you didn’t vote like a Republican,” and “that is the biggest compliment I’ve ever gotten, that I didn’t rule like a Republican.”
Timothy Lewis, a retired federal judge, told the students, “You are our future and the country needs you.”