Posted on 05/02/2005 5:06:09 AM PDT by Quaker
NEW PORT RICHEY - Pinellas- Pasco Circuit Judge George Greer, who was thrust into the national spotlight and scrutinized by pro-life advocates during the Terri Schiavo case, was a consistent judge who followed the law, colleagues say.
His professionalism and integrity was punctuated by the way he handled the Schiavo case, said Alan Scott Miller, a New Port Richey lawyer and member of the West Pasco Bar Association.
As part of Law Week, which kicks off today, the association will award Greer, 63, its Special Justice Award.
``He's getting this award for all of his contributions on the bench, not just the Schiavo case,'' Miller said. ``It's like a lifetime achievement award for an actor.''
Greer will receive the award during a banquet Thursday at the Heritage Springs Golf and Country Club, 11345 Robert Trent Jones Parkway.
For years, Greer presided over the politically and emotionally charged Schiavo case, which ended when the 41- year-old woman died March 31, 13 days after her feeding tube was removed a third time on a court order.
Some doctors said Schiavo was in a persistent vegetative state since suffering brain damage after her heart stopped in 1990.
Her husband, Michael, fought for years to have her feeding stopped, saying his wife didn't want to be kept alive by artificial means.
Her parents, hoping she would recover, fought him in court after court.
Eventually, Florida's governor and Legislature and then Congress took up the battle.
Supporters and detractors watched as Greer made rulings backing Terri Schiavo's purported wishes and received threats on his life.
``I don't think anyone could ever say his decisions were unlawful,'' said Joan Nelson Hook, president of the West Pasco Bar Association. ``They were very thoughtful. His decisions were meticulous.
``We admired his ability to sustain the pressure not to follow the law. ... I think that shows his character.''
Steve Doran, association president-elect, echoed Hook's thoughts on Greer's handling of the Schiavo case.
``His decisions in that unfortunate case withstood the test of every appellate court in the country,'' Doran said. ``Those who are criticizing him are not seeing the big picture.''
When the association voted this month on this year's recipient of the Special Justice Award, the result was almost unanimous for Greer.
``He's a man of integrity. He's followed the flow. He's done an excellent job on the bench,'' said Miller. ``That's why he's getting this award.''
In addition to Greer's award, the Law Week celebration offers events that allow the community to get a closer look at what the West Pasco Bar Association and the law profession are about, Hook said.
``It's an opportunity to interact with all levels of the community,'' she said.
``It's not just about battles; law is a way of life.''
Here are some events:
* Representatives of the association will be at Gulf View Square mall in Port Richey offering free legal advice from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Wednesday through Friday.
* All week, 22 lawyers will visit Pasco schools to discuss the law and this week's national theme, ``The American Jury: We the People in Action.''
* The 2nd District Court of Appeal will hold a special session at 10 a.m. Wednesday at the West Pasco Government Center, 7530 Little Road, in county commission chambers.
* Business suits, shoes and accessories will be collected at area law offices for Connections, a not-for-profit organization that helps people looking for jobs.
The following law offices are collecting men's and women's apparel:
The Law Offices of Attridge, Cohen & Lucas, 7136 Little Road, New Port Richey; The O'Conner Law Group, 9735 U.S. 19, Suite 2, Port Richey; Pejot Law, 11911 Pine Forest Drive, New Port Richey; and The Law Offices of Gay & Ehrhardt, 5318 Balsam St., New Port Richey.
Reporter Lisa A. Davis can be reached at (727) 815-1083.
My concern over the fanaticism brought out by the Terry Schiavo case, is that it directly challenges fundamental principles of the American tradition; further, that because the media has been able to label it "right wing," and identify it with some Conservatives, it undermines the credibility of all of us. Finally, my concern, as a foe of legalized abortion, is that it sabotages 32 years of efforts to reverse the false reasoning behind Roe vs. Wade.
That is my only agenda. I do not in anyway seek to force the people of any other State or community to accept my social views, if they do not wish to. While I may seek to persuade them, I will never seek to change the rules of civil discourse and the legal limitations on Government--that is to misuse Government--to that end.
Oh how we mocked and aspered Il Duce, and Der Fuehrer and Emperor Tojo! We were all so fanatic in those days.
As one who grew up during World War II, I can assure you that the mocking of our enemies was never of the fanatic variety. Comic relief in a desperate war. The fanaticism was on the other side--indeed, but for the fanaticism on the other side, there would probably have been no war.
We have had other examples of fanaticism in American History, but defending ourselves in World War II was not one of them!
Your response, above, is to my comment on the misuse of a family tragedy. What has that to do with detective skills?
Let me hazard a guess--what you think it has to do? Let me do a bit of detective work, here.
My guess is that you have a fanatic interest in the Terry Schiavo case. That you have never met the lady, are not a physician, nor a lawyer--and certainly not a Judge. That your interest in Conservatism is limited to certain moral imperatives that drive you. That those imperatives do not include respect for the rights of people in different communities to define their own moral imperatives, for themselves. Hence, you do not respect the Ninth or Tenth Amendments to the United States Constitution, nor the limitations of power, implied by the spelling out, in detail, of the powers actually delegated to the Federal Government, by the States.
Let me further hazard a guess, that your personal moral imperatives are more important to you than legal niceties, or questions of the origins of governmental powers, etc..
Now tell me how wrong I am.
William Flax
Defining reason, rationality and the verbal process of "rationalizing," is obviously not your forte, if you can call what happened in the Terri Schiavo case "murder." Why don't you spare your own reputation, by looking up the term?
Like these?
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the consent of the governed, -- That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.
But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new guards for their future security..."
Let me hazard a guess myself, based on your inability or unwillingness to address it in past days, that you yourself give little regard to the Fifth or the Fourteenth Amendment's safeguards on the God-given and therefore unalienable right to life; or in Terri Schiavo's case, as a citizen of Florida, to that State's constitutional guarantees of the same as found in Article One, Section Two of that document.
You're putting legalisms ahead of the right to life of the individual American.
That is a very dangerous course, sir, fraught with peril.
The American people don't need lawyers to tell them what murder is, thanks. Even a child knows.
Can you please explain to us all how taking a helpless person you are responsible for and locking them in a room for two weeks with no water or food til they die is not 'murder' in your universe?
The Schiavo protesters were pretty clearly on the opposite side, here, to that taken by Jefferson, Adams, Franklin and the Continental Congress.
Those "legalisms," Sir, are what protects the rights of the individual American. You would, apparently, trash the system, to keep what is left of a nearly dead accident victim, artificially alive in a form of "Living Death."
Me thinks that your priorities are backwards!
As for your Constitutional argument, it was considered in several appeals, both State and Federal in the case. Why can you not accept the result? There was no great universally applicable issue involved. The issues all concerned the particular individuals in the Schiavo case. Stop trying to use the poor family as a propaganda football. That is simply wrong.
Again, this is only a snap shot of my basic argument:
Terry Schiavo: An End To Rational Analysis?
William Flax
Apparently not, because you clearly do not. You can use words any way you choose. But when you use them in a way that does not scan with the way others understand them, you totally fail to communicate.
Thus you may proclaim the sun to be the source of cold weather. Will anyone believe you?
Okey-dokey. We've established that.
But what in the world does that have to do with the other question I've asked you over and over again, and which you still refuse to address with any clarity or specificity at all?
How was the judicial execution of Terri Schindler Schiavo NOT a violation of Florida's own Constitution, as expressed in Article One, Section Two of that document??
Maybe so. There are a variety of opinions. But, no matter which opinion you hold, I do not see how the physical condition of a citizen of this land who has not been found guilty of a capital offense would somehow invalidate what had heretofore been taken to be an unalienable right. Let me ask the legal theorists here this question: is the right of a person to live under what are arguably difficult circumstances, absent criminality, subject to government dispensation? IOW, does a person's (perhaps profound) physical impairment invalidate their right to life, or does it become merely a case of Die Freigabe der Vernichtung lebensunwerten Lebens?
'Nearly dead'??
'Living Death'??
Can't you even see the moral contortions your chosen position is forcing you into??
Your words are turning downright Orwellian; which of course they must for you to attempt to maintain such an indefensible rhetorical position.
Stating that murder, killing, forced euthanasia is wrong and should never be a private family matter is hardly throwing words around.
The law in Florida, right now, might read that you can murder a person in Terri's shape but that doesn't mean it's right.
The Nazi's had laws about murdering innocents, too, and Nuremburg has shown that one can't commit crimes against humanity or crimes of murder and say that one is just following orders or that it was the law so it's ok.
As for States' Rights? States' Rights are the rights of the people of each State to govern themselves. They involve the rights of millions of people--people fully functional, not propped up in bed with tubes going into and out of them. Your lack of a sense of proportion is dazzling.
They don't want to call it murder because they can't face what it truly is.
And they don't realize we aren't fanatics. We're just good honest people who have seen a wrong comitted and want it never to happen again.
Maybe they are so far left that they only think we are right wing fanatics. It's all a matter of perception.
No, of course not. But that was most certainly not the issue here. The issue here was to determine who would speak for that person, since she had lost most of the attributes of human life, including the ability to form a clear intention as to her own future. Why do you feel a need to state the issue in a contorted manner? Why do you imply that she was being denied anything that she could have done for herself? Whether her husband or parents interpretation of her wishes would be sanctioned was certainly an issue. And someone had to make that determination. The Judicial intervention was to protect Terry! The Court weighed the evidence and made a decision.
I'm not litigating anything.
You're the attorney here, not me.
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