Stand and Deliver. Always

• Publication year: 2012
• Citation: Vol. 27 No. 4

Maine Bar Journal 2012.

Fall 2012 #4. Stand And Deliver. Always

Maine Bar Journal
VOLUME 27 , NUMBER 4, Fall 2012

Stand And Deliver. Always.

by The Honorable Kevin L. Stitham

On September 5, I had the pleasure of representing the MSBA at the hearings in front of the legislative joint committee considering the renominations of Justices Alexander and Silver, and Judges Stitham and Powers. These events provide an important forum for us to demonstrate to both the legislature and the judiciary our continuing support for the retention of strong, respectful and well-qualified judges They also provide the nominees with an important opportunity to describe their judicial experiences and the reasons for their desire to continue to serve. Below is the Uatement of Judge Kevin Stitham, who, like many others in the judiciary continues to be a member of the MSBA. I thought what he had to say about paying attention to each individual client Hill rings true for us as lawyers. - Bill Robitzek

I have had the tremendous honor and distinct privilege to appear before this committee first in the summer of 1998, and then again in the summer of 2005. I was 46 in 1998, having almost concluded 21 years of being a small town country lawyer in Dover-Foxcroft. And today I have added 14 years of sitting on the district court bench mostly in Dover-Foxcroft, Lincoln, and Millinocket. As I reflect on that span of 14 years as a judge in Maine's courts, I believe that what each of us in the judicial branch are best guided by was written of by Judge Learned Hand. In his words:

It is the daily; it is the small; it is the cumulative injuries of ordinary people that we are here to protect. ..if we are to keep our democracy, there must be one commandment: thou shall not ration justice.

I was in the Lincoln district court yesterday, we started matters at 8:40 am, my first break was at 1:20 pm. Unusual but not unheard of. And while a great number of matters were dealt with, in the last analysis it is always just one matter at a time that a judge deals with. I strive to remember each day that for each person that comes to court whether as a litigant or as a witness, for each of them there is just one case, and that is theirs, and as such it is the most important matter in the world.

The importance of each and every matter is a lesson I learned from a doctor just up the road from Dover, just a few years younger than his contemporary...