Taming New Mexico; Judge James O. Browning Interview Part 2

possible to tame however you want to take that term bring you know bring a sense of stability and law and order to the state without sort of suppressing the sort of frontier spirit that's always been here you know the vitality of the people who live here that kind of thing is that question make any sense to you well I can try okay you ready yes well certainly New Mexico's had its wildness and it still has its wildness and not always has New Mexico and New Mexicans wanted the presence of the federal government in their lives they wanted to maybe graze on forest lands the way their far fathers had American Indians did not want to be on reservations they wanted to be roaming everywhere and certain people want borders to be open they don't want them to be close so when the federal federal government comes in and says no got to stay on a

reservation no the National Forest Service is going to decide who's going to graze here and what trees are going to be cut down when it says no we're not going to have a open border you have to have permission to come here in a host of other things you can't just pollute the way you did maybe in the past you can't use the water either way you have in the past yes they're going to be people that say no they don't want to do that and that's part of what a federal judiciary does because it's congressional law and federal law that is supreme it's supreme over state law and in local law and so when those clash it's often the federal court that is empowered to make those decisions as to what law will apply whether it's going to be a local county ordinance or whether it's going to be the first amendment whether it's going to be you know the grazing habits of certain ranchers or it's going to be the BLM or Forest

Service or the interior department despiteing how much big grazing it's not going to be just everybody going across the border whenever they want to they have to go through checkpoints and they have to present papers and usually federal courts that are the ones that have to do that and that's created friction but it's also brought a a sense of this is the way it's going to be done it's non-negotiable if you don't have if you have a problem with it I know you're going to do any good to go to Santa Fe you got to go to Washington and get the law changed and I think that brings stability but it also brings friction and that's what happens in federal courts all the time we bring stability in the sense that here's what federal law is you got to obey it if you don't you may go to prison you may not get to do what you've been doing you may get enjoined so that brings a lot of stability but it also creates friction and

those frictions have been going on for quite a while and seems like they're keeping us busy today and they'll probably keep us busy in the future okay is that close that's good one of the other sort of themes we're looking at in the last act of this piece is looking at kind of different ends of the spectrum of of the United States coming in and imposing law on everyone as sort of you're talking about versus what happens sort of you know in the late 20th century which was this recognition of civil rights individual rights and so the question is sort of the point what is the you know for you as a federal judge and being part of the federal system what is that challenge for you in an understanding and keeping that balance between the good of the state and the

government as a whole versus the individual rights that everybody deserves and has is that I'm thinking that's probably an issue and a good percentage of the cases that you do is is that well I don't see their attention there you know a lot of times people think that you know imposing law and prosing federal law and recognizing civil rights are attention with each other but a great deal of what our federal law is that we impose here are the bill of rights and then oftentimes we got a jury over here and I can dress it up with a jury instruction and tell them what excessive force is and don't look at it as 2020 but ultimately they go back in that jury room and they decide was excessive force used or not and they kind of use the fourth amendment well was it excessive or not or probable cause or was there an unreasonable search or seizure in many ways what the federal law brings in the in the in the bill of

rights and other federal laws is a great deal of freedom and a great deal of civil rights many things that we do here is we're protecting against discrimination on the basis of race nationality religion sex and so in many ways I see the federal law that we're bringing as expanding civil rights protecting civil rights and recognizing civil rights that maybe in our country's history not every state recognized we know what occurred in the south those states federal government came in and it brought a lot of civil rights and civil liberties and I think if you look at some of the cases that we've had in our state you would see the same thing some of the recognition of rights that Native Americans have had preventing discrimination of the basis of race and nationality in this state the federal courts played an

important role in making sure those laws are enforced so I don't see them as intention they're just they're just part and parcel of what the federal government does it brings its laws on environmental issues on business issues on commercial issues but it also brings its laws on civil rights on entitled seven on in the bill of rights and in my view that's we recognize more personal liberty and free will in this country and as a result in our state than anyone enjoys in the entire world so it it's a tandem you get you get the laws of the federal government but you also get the freedoms of the federal government when the federal government got here there was still a practice of as professor Hutton says of taking a lot of American Indian children and making them slaves

that ended when we ended slavery in this country and so I think in many ways federal government has expanded and protected the rights rather than restricted and that's been one of the things that we've seen particularly over the last 50 60 years moving from the 20th century to the 21st century okay great anything well let me ask you I mean was it even close to what you wanted Tony I mean yeah I don't know if I'm giving you anything you can work with no if you tell me already noted several if you want me to do something different or say something different I had to do it I want to do you a good job yeah no well again we're I'm asking all the judges sort of to summarize you know where we are where we've come from and where we are today in terms of the judicial system

and the state of the state of New Mexico you know what's what's just from your personal background from your you know your knowledge of the history here and everything what how would you describe that that journey from from Spanish colonial days to to the present day I guess if there's some way to to some that out well I think that having a federal government which implements its laws through a federal judiciary is has been an incredibly unifying thing for our state I mean I think maybe when the country started and maybe even when New Mexico was a territory and coming into the Union it's still thought of itself as New Mexicans and maybe even some people as Mexicans and more American Indians Navajo Apache others thought they were from Kansas or Missouri but I think

when you come to the federal courthouse every day and when you come in and you come into this room with a set of jurors here and you're about to pick a jury and you look over at that jury when it's done all that sort of fades away and we're all Americans and we're all trying to do our best when we come here I mean I those citizens I sat down and read jury questionnaires today about trial we did in June and I was just struck once again about how seriously the people take their tasks they don't get paid much to come in here it's those people serve for a month and they just took their tasks so seriously and I don't think they set there and thought well you know I'm from Farmington I'm from Los Alamos I'm from Scoro I think they thought they were American citizens and they were there to ply federal laws federal securities law as impartially and fairly as they possibly could and I do think that's one thing a building

like this does I think the majesty of the place coming into a courtroom just reminds us that we're we're not just new Mexicans we're not just from our towns and maybe even our particular ethnic group but we're American citizens and when they come here to do their job they take it very seriously how about you Kayon you think anything you want to do?