03/12/2023
I haven’t addressed a judge as “Your Honor” in probably ten years. This habit started — in part — as a corollary of the Quaker “plain speech” testimony, which eschews among other things titles of nobility. The article linked below, by a state court judge, links to and responds to another article about a federal judge who has rejected “Your Honor” as a title for a similar reason, albeit one grounded in the Constitution rather than the Bible. (I’m no longer a practicing Quaker, but it remains the religion with which I probably still most closely identify.)
The main point of contention between these two judges is whether judges make, or merely discover, the law. The judge who says the latter thinks calling judges “Your Honor” is at odds with the humbleness of the function of merely discovering the law. The other judge says that judges not merely discover but make the law, and therefore “Your Honor” is appropriate (if “aspirational”) because it reflects their great power.
The real problem with calling judges “Your Honor” is that being elected, or appointed by politicians, to a judgeship is by no means proof or even evidence that the person so honored is in fact honorable, or even is more honorable than the general run of lawyers about whom the jokes are legion.
Granted, “honor” means something fairly specific and straightforward to me. It is informed by my experience of the “Honor Concept” at the U.S. Naval Academy, which holds: “A midshipman does not lie, cheat or steal.” Basically, an honorable judge or lawyer is an honest judge or lawyer.
In my 20+ years of being a lawyer I have encountered on well more than one occasion judicial decisions, some in high places, that for lack of better words are simply horrible and mind-boggling. Law school prepares and even whets your appetite for the intellectually stimulating gray areas in the law highlighted by the judge in the article linked below — the “close calls.” It doesn’t prepare you for the judicial decision that, for example, demolishes an argument that wasn’t made and studiously ignores the argument that was made, with catastrophic consequences for the client you’re standing beside. I can find no evidence of honor in such a decision, regardless from how high of a place the decision emits.
I have encountered many judges who I regard as honorable because they seem to follow the law and to decide close cases reasonably and fairly. I even know of one magistrate who I regard as particularly honorable because of the steadfast performance of his former duties as a prosecutor in service of the truth and justice vis-a-vis a sitting judge in a case where performing those duties couldn’t have been easy and required courage. And isn’t that what we really mean when we speak of “honor” — not just doing one’s duty and being honest but doing and being so when it takes courage to do and be so?
But of course I don’t distinguish between judges, and address even the most honorable only as what they clearly and indisputably are: “Judge.” That has gotten me by without any problems for at least the past ten years. The problem for “plain speech” remains in the higher courts, however, where the judges insist on being called “Justice.”
I’m a judge, and I admit it: I like being called “your honor.” Call me entitled if you want, but I disagree with the Kentucky federal judge who made headlines last fall for saying that modesty forbids him from accepting this distinction.
