Bird Warns of Dangers Facing Judicial System

In her final public appearance as California chief justice, Rose Elizabeth Bird decried what she considers to be the public’s limited understanding of the judicial system and took a swipe at Gov. George Deukmejian’s proposed appointees to the state Supreme Court.

Bird, speaking before a group of more than 50 American law school deans on her last day in office Sunday, refrained from commenting about her nine controversial years as the state’s first woman chief justice and instead primarily stuck to a generic discussion of the dangers threatening the independence of the nation’s judiciary.

Before her prepared remarks, however, Bird told a luncheon group at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion that she was dismayed at the governor’s failure to include an Asian among his nominees to fill the three court vacancies. Bird, along with Justices Cruz Reynoso and Joseph R. Grodin, were defeated in the Nov. 4 election after conservatives, primarily upset over the three justices’ record on overturning death sentences, targeted them for removal.

“It’s the last barrier, having an Asian on the Supreme Court, one of the very last barriers we have in the state of California. I was disappointed to see that,” Bird said.

Singling out one of the proposed appointees, Bird said, the governor “did have somebody (nominated) who was self-described as a redneck with a high IQ. I suspect that comment alone raises 1629516149comment.”

Bird was referring to Marcus M. Kaufman, 57, a conservative appellate judge from San Bernardino, who has been quoted as describing himself that way.

Standing behind a dais decorated with pink and red tulips, the chief justice urged the law school deans, who had gathered in Los Angeles for a conference of the American Assn. of Law Schools, to help educate the electorate about the judiciary’s special place in society. If they do not, she warned the judiciary could become an “anachronism.”

“We sometimes must stand in the way of the most powerful groups in our society--governments, presidents, governors, legislatures, special interests--in order to do what our oath of office demands of us,” Bird said. “And yet we have no means by which to enforce our decisions other than the acceptance and understanding of this difficult role by the people and the other two branches of government.

“We are not an institution which can achieve that acceptance by the use of slick public relations gimmicks and entertaining news hooks,” she said. “We have no way of pandering to the public or pampering the press.”

Informing the public will apparently be one of Bird’s goals as a private citizen. She told the San Francisco Chronicle that she plans to form a nonprofit group to explain to the average American the importance of the rights guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights.

‘Life of Beginnings’

She apparently hopes to raise the money through the proceeds of a book she plans to write about her career on the bench and as a cabinet officer in the Administration of Gov. Edmund G. Brown Jr. The tentative title of her book is “Life of Beginnings,” Steven Glazer, her press spokesman, said Sunday.

At the luncheon, Bird only remotely alluded to the political campaign waged last year to remove her from her post.

“If we judges and lawyers are not to be popular, let it be because we are standing on the forefront of protecting people’s rights during a time of transition. Let it be because we have the courage to represent unsympathetic individuals and make difficult rulings in order to give life and breath to our constitutional guarantees.”

Greeted with hearty standing ovations before and after her speech, Bird declined to answer questions from the press or the law school deans. She did choose to answer one question, but only in jest, that was asked privately by someone at the luncheon.

“What was the most difficult part about being a chief justice? I think it is eating lettuce in front of 1,000 people on a dais,” she told the crowd. “I finally learned how to do it and I lost my job.”