Superior Court Judge Feels Welcome
Yet again an outsider has come for a visit and found our area and its people to be extra special.
Where the outspoken gloom-mongers among us see only the negative, the Honorable Norbert Ehrenfreund, a distinguished California Superior Court judge, found himself unexpectedly moved this week by the warmth of our people and the depth of our hospitality.
Judge Ehrenfreund was in Jamestown to talk about the legacy of the Nuremberg war crime trials and of Robert H. Jackson.
He spoke eloquently of the legacy:
• Nuremberg established the precedent of fair trial. Every person accused of a crime, no matter how heinous the charge, no matter how high or low the person’s status, must have a fair hearing. Judge Ehrenfreund said the concept may seem obvious to us now but it was not so obvious in 1945.
• Nuremberg established the principle of accountability, he said. Leaders of nations, as individuals, will be held accountable for their war crimes.
• Nuremberg expanded the human rights movement to an international level. The judge said it sent a message to all victims of a barbaric leader that they are entitled to protection by other nations; that a nation’s sovereignty does not grant impunity to its leaders for inhumane treatment of persons within its borders.
To the young Norbert Ehrenfreund, who was in Nuremberg 60 years ago as a reporter for Stars and Stripes, Robert Jackson’s lead role in establishing this legacy, his insistence that the Nazis be given fair trials and then his brilliant work as chief prosecutor, were so striking that Ehrenfreund was moved to change his life’s career from journalism to the law.
Robert H. Jackson seems as close to being a personal hero to Judge Ehrenfreund as anyone could be. And in examining his hero, the judge concluded that Jackson’s strength of character, the deeply held values which prompted him to insist on fair trials for war criminals and the talents that propelled Jackson to be considered one of the most eloquent U.S. Supreme Court justices in our nation’s history, derive from his upbringing in Chautauqua County and the education he received in Frewsburg and Jamestown schools.
In short, Judge Ehrenfreund already had a high opinion of our area when he came to speak at the Robert H. Jackson Center in Jamestown this week.
What seemed to take him by surprise was the reception he received. After his address, after the applause, after the audience thought the program had ended, Judge Ehrenfreund motioned for everyone to quiet down, to listen to him for a moment longer.
He wanted us to know, he said, how extraordinary he considered our hospitality to be. He couldn’t quite seem to get over how warm and welcoming everyone had been and so he repeated this a number of times to different assemblages.
He spoke as if he has never experienced such a thing before — and to the great credit of everyone here, we suspect he has not.