(This article first appeared in Atlanta Voice.)

President Barack Obama may be about to replace one retiring Supreme Court justice with another retiring Supreme Court jurist. Both US Supreme Court judge David Souter and Georgia’s Supreme Court Chief Justice Leah Ward Sears are leaving the bench. Political cognoscenti say that Justice Sears could be in line to take Souter’s seat.

Reportedly, the 53-year-old Sears who is leaving after 17 years on the states highest court is on the President’s short list of potential nominees. Sears is said to be a top choice since she’s one of only two black women being considered for the prestigious post. There has never been an African American female US Supreme Court justice

“If it were up to me I would appoint myself [to the US Supreme Court],” Chief Justice Sears said during a “NEWSMAKERS” Live interview just one week before Souter’s resignation. At the time, Sears said she would “definitely” be interested if the opportunity ever presented itself. Now, she is staring that opportunity in the face.

“I like being thought of, because that means I’m being well thought of,” she said. “But those are bridges that will have to be crossed when we get to them.”

Despite the fierce partisan politics often involved in “getting and staying on the Court” judges are not politicians, Sears said.  She likens her job as a jurist to that of an umpire.

“It’s a complex thing,” she said. “Politics may get you the job, but the best umpire is not there for their team; they are there calling balls and strikes as they see them. That’s what we do.”

The word ‘activist’ judge is a modern word and it really means that you have not ruled my way,” Sears said. “And, it is used by both sides. People say Clarence Thomas is an activist conservative ideologue. On the flip side conservatives say liberals are activists doing their thing with regard to abortion and gun control. Both sides need to stop. It can be awfully difficult getting knocked down by both sides all the time.”

Despite her own political leanings – no matter what they may or may not be – they don’t sway her judicial judgments, she contends.

“I am who I am like the six other justices on the court; they are who they are,” Sears said. “So I can’t make a decision outside of who I am. Everything I look at is filtered through the fact that I am a black woman who grew up in Germany, my whole history. I look at the law through that filter. That’s what we do every week; we sit around and decide whose view gets four votes.”

Sears admits those deliberations can be intense, heated, even angry legal discussions.

“We don’t sit in there talking partisan politics –never ever,” she said. “We do not go there. It’s much more intellectual. We’re working with the clay of the law.”

But don’t think Sears is just standing by awaiting the President’s call to seek the coveted Supreme Court position; she has significantly ambitious plans for her future. “I’m going full steam ahead,” said Sears, the nation’s first black woman to preside as chief justice of a state Supreme Court.

She wants to take her passionate advocacy for family issues to a national stage.

“I’m going to be the Oprah of families,” she said; though she bristles at TV judges and dismisses them as mere entertainers and not her judicial colleagues. “You don’t play around with people’s lives. It’s not a joke. These are serious, serious problems I have a big job [ahead of me]; its bigger then I have now.”

If Sears is not named to replace Souter, she has already secured a lucrative grant with a top notch think tank to do research and writing on the issues of marriage, fatherless ness and children. Starting August 15, Sears also will serve as the William Thomas Sears Distinguished Fellow in Family Law for the Institute for American Values. The one-year fellowship is named after Sears’ brother, Tommy, who took his life in November 2007 after returning from Iraq. He was 53.
“Tommy had major issues with the family law system,” Sears said. “It made it very clear to me that something has to be done to change the way the legal system handles family problems.”
She is also going to teach a course at the University of Georgia Law School on family law. Perhaps most significantly, on October 15, Sears will begin working in the Atlanta offices of Schiff Hardin, a 400-lawyer firm headquartered in Chicago. Sears said she would be a partner with the firm and work only half time during her first year there.
Sears adds that she is “not closing the door” to running for another elective office.

“If there was one reason that I was getting off the court is, I want to speak louder,” she said. “I’ve taken it [the Georgia Supreme Court] and made it a bully pulpit on these issues of family and even the civil justice stuff. So I want to be able to speak and be heard. I want to see our families intact again. I want to see our families strong again. Because I don’t think that we’re going to make it if we can’t do better then what we are doing. We’ve got a 50 percent divorce rate.”

Since becoming Chief Justice divorces and child custody cases have consumed 60 percent of the court’s caseload,” Sears laments.

“I believe that marriage is the most pro-child institution we have,” she said. “It provides resources for children; it provides stability for children. I think children need both their mothers and their fathers. I believe pretty strongly that men are being marginalized; they are not important in the lives of our daughters.

“I’ve gotten divorced so I understand that it happens, but I think it’s done too freely now. Too many people have children with people they have no intention of making a lifetime commitment to. I’ve been a judge for 27 years; it is rare that the man who is not the marital partner carries through on that financial and emotional commitment to the child. Marriage has a way of bringing families together. You can be a good father, but it’s very difficult when you’re not there. It’s the fault of women too; many women do not include men as part of their mating strategy. They just want to have a baby and the guy is just [she pauses and smiles] not needed.”

In 1955, when Sears was born, 20 percent of all African American children were born out of wedlock. That number is 80 percent now. And, children that are born out of wedlock, one out of four do not see their fathers in any two-year period, she said. Eighty percent of the black men in prison come from single parent families

“I didn’t think I’d ever see a black president,” she said. “(So) I won’t have this it can’t be changed [attitude]; it is what it is and it can’t be reversed. It is an uphill climb, hell I’ve made uphill climbs before and I intend to make this uphill climb. I’m going to work very, very, hard to do what I can to try to make a dent in this bad issue – lecture, cajole men, women anybody that will listen.  A lot of people don’t even talk about it anymore; it’s a taboo subject.”

And why retire now, Sears was asked? Call it restlessness, wanderlust or a higher calling, perhaps.

“When I got put on the court I was shocked,” she said. “I wasn’t anticipating it. [But] I never wanted to do this the rest of my life. There are more mountains to climb; other avenues to explore and I want to do that before I get too old. I would actually like to do some more things.

“I also don’t think you ought to stay in office and spend the rest of your life trying to just stay in office because you get jaded and you’re not good anymore.”