Much has already been said and will be said about Justice Ginsburg, but I want to take this occasion to remember Chief Justice Gants. Our paths had crossed a few times, although mostly I observed his important work from a distance. Chronologically, we were close contemporaries, and though we were of like minds, he devoted himself to full-time public service while I only dabbled in it as a sideline to my paying gig. I suppose his was the type of career path I would have liked to have walked if I'd had the courage and discipline to take a job in public service, but he walked that path so much better and more successfully than I ever could have in any event.
Numerous tributes to Chief Justice Gants have already been written and I cannot improve on them, so I will simply link to two of them here, and here. I am most familiar with his dedication to ensuring that all citizens have equal access to the courts, which of course means making legal representation available to those who cannot afford to pay for it. His leadership of the Access to Justice Commission, which he co-chaired with Boston attorney Susan Finegan, is a testament to his strong and persistent efforts to achieve such equality in Massachusetts.
On a generally cold winter weekday every year (I suppose 2021 will be an exception), the Massachusetts Equal Justice Coalition sponsors the Walk to the Hill for Civil Legal Aid. With the strong support of the Massachusetts and Boston Bar Associations, the event provides an opportunity to speak to Massachusetts legislators about the importance of state funding for a variety of civil legal aid organizations. Hundreds of lawyers crowd into the Great Hall of the Massachusetts State House on Beacon Hill in Boston to listen to remarks from leaders of the bar associations, legal services organizations, and legal aid clients about the vital work these organizations do to provide free legal representation to indigent clients faced with eviction or deportation, or who need help accessing available health, disability, unemployment, and other public assistance benefits. Once the speeches are over, the lawyers disperse to find their legislative representatives and ask for their support for legal services funding. It is an inspiring event that makes those who attend proud to be part of something greater than themselves.
In 2011, as then-President of the Boston Bar Association, I had the privilege of being one of the speakers at the event, as was Justice Gants, who at the time was an Associate Justice of the Court. According to the EJC website, Judge Gants was the first SJC Justice to attend the event, and he continued to do so as recently as this year. In 2011, you may recall, the nation was still struggling to come out of the most significant economic crisis since the Great Depression. The "Great Recession" resulted in high levels of unemployment and severe financial crisis for millions of Americans, and put strains on state budgets that threatened their ability to continue their support of civil legal services even at the commendable but insufficient levels at which they had supported those services in prior years. It was significant, therefore, that Justice Gants attended this event, urging all in attendance to show their support for continued, if not increased, legal services funding. His remarks from that year, quoted on the EJC website, reveal the high ideals for which he was known. He said:
Hundreds of thousands of school children in this Commonwealth began their school day by reciting the Pledge of Allegiance, which declares this nation to be indivisible with liberty and justice for all, not justice for those with enough in their bank account to afford an attorney. This year, like every year, we walk to this house on the hill to insist that the words 'justice for all' are more than just words.
While Justice Gants fought hard to ensure that all who lived in Massachusetts had access to crucial legal services, he always did so with a smile on his face and warm respect for the people he encountered. One of my most cherished photographs from my year as BBA President, shown above, was taken on that day, shortly before he and I delivered our remarks in the Great Hall. His warm smile on that occasion and countless occasions before and since conveyed a sense of goodwill and confidence that, through hard work and dedication, we would always be moving in the direction of real, positive change. I post the photo here in fond remembrance of a man who, over the years, inspired thousands of lawyers in Boston and state-wide to take time out of their busy days and away from their paying work to attend to the needs of those less fortunate than themselves, and to promote the ideals of liberty, justice, and equality that seem to be fading from our civic discourse. May the memory of this outstanding public servant inspire us all to work that much harder to preserve, protect, and defend equal justice for all. I know his memory will inspire me.
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