I just celebrated another birthday. Yet again opening Leo season with pride. While getting older has many perks getting wiser is certainly at the top of that list. Unfortunately, not everyone who gets older gets wiser federal judges in our nation’s capital fully recognize that that is a reality. A three judge committee on the Judicial Council of the US Court of Appeals just re issued a year long suspension of a 97 year old colleague who refuses to retire from the bench and continues to decline mental fitness exams. Judge Pauline Newman, who was appointed to serve for life, by the late Ronald Reagan, would rather be barred from hearing new cases, then be interrogated about her ability to serve. Our Constitution authorizes her to hold the job for life, and apparently she plans to serve that full term. It’s past time, Congress must impose age limits on the federal bench. Because as our founding fathers knew, Father Time stays undefeated. I fully support the judicial Council’s decision to sideline judge Newman. She predates movies with sound absent resolving questions of fitness, it’s fair to question the abilities of judges who are older. And the real question here really should concern why we still allow federal judges to serve for life. There’s simply no reason for it anymore. Life is different today than it was some 240 years ago, when our founding fathers authorized lifetime judicial tenure. As Alexander Hamilton explained in Federalist Paper number 78. The inherent effect of life tenure on the workings of the judiciary was the quote citadel of the public justice and the Public Security, unquote. At that time, service for life made sense. The average life expectancy for an American was 38. Today, it’s more than twice that number as most Americans will live until the age of 80. You can’t tell me that the Founding Fathers ever foresaw a nonagenarian serving on the bench. Also the purpose of lifetime tenure made sense then, when confirmed employment helped federal judges remain independent. Because they didn’t fear losing their jobs or facing demotion, they were less likely to be swayed by outside parties. And that is certainly not the case. Now. Just look at the Supreme Court. Justice Clarence Thomas is cuddling up to billionaires without consequence, our district court judge, Eileen cannon who can’t seem to apply legal precedent to save her life is out here benefiting Donald Trump in broad daylight. And let’s not forget that Trump appointee down in Texas who disregarded established science so he could push the Christian nationalist agenda and an attempt to ban the perfectly safe abortion drug NIFA per stone.

This idea that lifetime tenure would somehow bolster independence is long gone, as today it only allows corruption to run unchecked. Judicial jobs certainty now creates more problems than it does public security.

You know, other than her age and some wiki facts I don’t know that much about Judge Pauline Newman. I can however, tell you that the woman grew up in the wake of World War Two, earned a PhD in chemistry from Yale. It complemented her master’s from Columbia and her law degree from NYU. She’s kind of a baddie rode motorcycles and broke gender barriers all the way to the federal bench.

Newman is called a heroine of the patent system, a prolific dissenter, who has been ahead of her time in many of her rulings, or I should say dissents, such that the chief judge has said that many of Newman’s dissents have later gone on to become the law. No one can take Newman’s accomplishments away from her. But it is unfortunate that her colleagues have to bench her because we’re still allowing lifetime service for those on the federal bench. And that is something that must change.