U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit

Most Americans have knowledge of a few basic rights: the right to free speech, rights under the Fourth Amendment, and the right to counsel. However, too many Americans lack a true understanding or appreciation of our rights and roles as citizens, let alone their accompanying civic responsibilities. Equally shocking is the general public's lack of understanding of the design of our democratic structure based on the provisions and concepts contained in our founding documents. It is that lack of understanding of the design of our democratic structure based on the provisions and concepts contained in our founding documents. It is that lack of understanding, the danger that it poses to our democracy, and the pressing need for something to be done about it that have drawn my interest during my time on the bench, and that I feel deserve continued attention.
Other members of the judiciary have noted the profound ignorance of many of our citizens concerning the role of judges. Judge John Jones wrote in the Spring issue of this publication about Judicial independence and the outpouring of personal attacks against him as a result of his opinion in Kitzmiller vs. Dover Area School District, a sad demonstration of ignorance about precedent and how judges reason in arriving at their decisions. Even worse, some of our lawmakers exhinit similar ignorance. When Judge James Whittemore ruled in case of Schiavor ex rel Schindlet Vs Schiavo, U.S. Rep. Tom Delay denounced the ruling and charged that judges were"ignoring the legitimate will of the people." Need I state what should be obvious to a dourth-grade civics class? It is the job of the legislature to do the will of the people; the judiciary must follow the rule of law.
I need not say more about the prevalent misunderstanding of what judges do, I merely submit that these criticisms of judges and their rulings are not only evidence of the profound ignorance in our society about how the judiciary operates but are also signs to a larger problem: the general lack of understanding among too many of our citizens about how our system of government operates, how power is divided among the three branches of our government, and the importance of the rule of law. In short, this country lacks a serious foundation in civic education.
Unfortunately, the media, one of the institutions best positioned to educate the citizenry, has missed a number of opportunities to do so. For instance, last year, a controversy erupted whent the Department of Justice (DOJ), part of Executive Branch searched the office of Re W Jefferson and confiscated documents. Certain members of Congress urged that the Constitution's Speech and Debate Clause immunized lawmakers from such searches. This situation had all the makings of a good civics lesson on the separation or powers. However, many newspaper stories sI read failed to focus on the fact that the third branch -the judiciary-was involved, having authorized the search through issuance of a warrant. Notably, the concluding paragraphs of an article in the New York Times about the subject reflected an inability to get past generalizations and competing arguments, to precisely whatr was at stake:
Members of Conngress are mindful that much of the public is not familiar with the speech and debate clause, which, among other things, requires that lawmakers be "priviledged from arrest during their attendance at the session of their respectice Houses, and in going to and returning from the same." Many people may wonder why a Congressional office cannot be searched in a criminal case and what members of Congress are complaining about. To many lawmakers, that is secondary to the larger separation of powers principle they see at risk. "I clearly have serious concerns about what happened," Mr Boehner said, "and whether the people at the Justice Department have looked at the Constitution."
More recently, the controversy over the dismissals of several U.S. Attorneys has presented many important issues and a potential lesson regarding issues and a potential lesson regarding how our United States of America government is organized. Do our citizens realize that the DOJ is a part of the executive branch? Are they aware of the inherent tension between prosecutors as officers of the court, who are bound to legal and ethical standards, and prosecutors as political appointees, who are presumably chosen based in part on the political objectives of those who have appointed them? The partisan political jockeying has received attention in the media, while there has been little in depth focus on the core issues. Again, the opportunity for an important civics lesson has been missed.
The media's failures to cover the deeper and ultimately more valuable angles of these stories have fostered, if not exarcerbated, the public's lack of understanding of our government's institutions. Recent survey data underscores the extent of the public's lack of knowledge abou the roles of the three branches of government and the importance of separation of powers in our system. For instance, a poll released in September 2006 by the Annenberg Publication Policy Center found that 22 percent of those surveyed believe that the United States of America Supreme Court cannot declare an act of Congress unconstitutional. Nearly half forty eight per cent said it is esssential or very important to be able to impeach or remove a judge from office if the judge makes an unpopular ruling. Only one-third could name all three branches of the United States of America government; one third could not name any. A 1998 survey conducted by the National Constitution Center revealed that more of the teenagers polled could nale the Three Stooges fifty nine point two percent than the three branches of the American Government forty one point two percent.
This lack of knowledge about the way in which our democracy operates leads to civic disengagement, particularly among the youngest members of our society. In a survey of North Carolina teens conducted by the North Carolina Civic Education Consortium in two thousand three, only nine percent of those polled could bale theur two United States of America senators. A two thousand two National Youth Survey conducted by the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement revealed that only half of the one thousand five hundred young people polled believe that voting is important, while only forty six percent think they can make a difference in solving community problems. These are crisis level figures.
It has been said that freedom is placed in jeopardy more by those who will not exercise it than by those who will not protect it, and that indifference opens more gates to the enemy than does tyranny itself. As former president of the University of Chicago stated:"The death of democracy is not likely to be an assassination from ambush. It will be a slow extinction from apathy, indifference, and undernourishment."