By Elliott Brack
Editor and Publisher, GwinnettForum
AUG. 30, 2022 | The wheels of progress sometimes turn mighty slowly. Yet every now and then, the wheel moves a little so that when changes arrive, it sometimes surprises us.
Earlier this year, the Supreme Court restricted the ability of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) ruling to regulate climate change. That thwarted the Biden Administration. But help was soon to be on the way.
It came at the recently passed climate change legislation. It has in it specific language addressing the Court’s ruling to rein in EPA. The new law defines carbon dioxide produced by the burning of fossil fuels as an “air pollutant,” giving the EPA room to regulate it. This is considered a landmark case, in which the Congress clarified what it considered a poor Supreme Court decision.
That’s the same approach that some people are anticipating that the Congress will take some day…..who knows when….on the abortion question. With a majority of the American people opposed to the way the Supreme Court looks upon abortion, relief now focuses on the Congress. It can legislate whether a woman has a right to determine what happens to her body. Many feel it’s a basic right that the Court disregarded, which needs correcting through legislation.
You see many other cases where change comes, but not so quickly.
In Georgia last week, the two-year-old case of the death of Rayshard Brooks found new light after intensive investigation. A hearing resulted in exoneration of the two police officers involved in the killing. Extensive footage of the case was gone over in great detail by the investigators, one of whom was former Gwinnett Attorney General Danny Porter.
Pete Skandalakis, executive director of the Prosecuting Attorneys’ Council of Georgia, who led the investigation, says he believes Officer Garrett Rolfe, who shot and killed Brooks in June 2020, acted appropriately. He also said the second officer involved in the encounter, Officer Devin Brosnan, will not be charged.
“Given the quickly changing circumstances, was it objectively reasonable that he used deadly force? And we conclude it was,” Skandalakis said.
Members of Brooks family may not be satisfied with the ruling. Yet government officials went into great detail, and cost, to thoroughly review the case, and drew an unequivocal conclusion.
This investigation moved rather quickly, concluding in two years.
Yet another case getting a decision recently in Gwinnett County was from several years back, eight years ago, showing justice moving slowly. And it may not be over. This case involved a Ford pickup which killed two Georgians in 2014 in a rollover accident. Jurors awarded a record $1.7 billion punitive verdict against the Ford Motor Company, after awarding the family of the victims $24 million the day before for wrongful death, pain and suffering. (The jury apportioned 30 percent of the damages against Pep Boys, a tire distributor that installed the wrong size tires on the 2002 F-250 truck in 2010.)
Virtually the time the outcome was announced, Ford Motor Company was saying that it would appeal the verdict, meaning more delays in the final outcome. Meanwhile, interest accrues on the judgment, at an enormous rate. Ford should hope the appeal moves quickly.
Also moving at a slow pace is the nation’s effort to bring to light all the allegations involving the 2020 election. The pace seems turtle-like. Citizens probably will not know any conclusions before the midterm elections.
What these unrelated cases show is that our country continues to be ruled by reason, fact and law, if ever so slowly. Time will tell.
- Have a comment? Send to: elliott@brack.net
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