Libertarian way with judge jim gray. The author judge james gray. Judge how did you get the title of judge . Well, actually, i was in i was a military criminal defense attorney in the navy and i was a federal prosecutor in, los angeles. And i was in private practice for a while, got involved in some political activity with the Republican Party and was in the end of 1983 by governor deukmejian as a Trial Court Judge in the municipal court, the lower courts, and then was elevated a few years thereafter court where i actually served for 25 years and im proud of that and i think i made some contributions learned a lot and was able to help people on occasion some of the contributions that youre most proud of. Well, we started a peer court where we tried to help keep young people out of trouble mentoring etc. Thats going on quite well. Proud of that. We go into 14 high schools now in Orange County and take real criminal juvenile delinquency cases. An Important Panel they jury of High School Kids and then they ask questions of the kid as well as the parents parents. Learn things like, hey, youre the your childs friends. Youre their parent, something different, that sort of thing. And then we eventually have the jury come up with a sentence imposed by a real judge, usually downward, because these students can be pretty tough sometimes. And then if the subject completes within four months, they got the charges are dismissed. They dont have a record. Its a diversion program, works pretty well and im not involved with that whatsoever anymore. And theyre doing real well. When did you retire and what have you been doing since . Well, i retired after 25 years, so beginning in 2009. And then ive been working as a private judge thereafter. So doing arbitrations, mediations, volunteering myself to the court sometimes, to discovery, referee things challenging, interesting, very. And i get the craziest cases, but as i say, peter, if they werent crazy, probably wouldnt need me. But keep me busy. What about politics . You still a republican . No, im a libertarian. I was a republican. The passage of the socalled patriot and i could not be involved with any that would assist or any of that attack our civil liberties. So literally took me 13 seconds to realize that im a libertarian and will be forever. I was the libertarian candidate for Vice President back in 2012. So along with governor johnson, im proud of that. But now, at my age, im running away from politics instead of toward it. In fact i tell people, actually, peter, i ran for congress as a republican back in 1998 ran as a libertarian u. S. Senate not deterred ran then for u. S. Senate in 2004, ran for Vice President 2012, didnt win any them. So i tell people im not a politician and i have the votes to prove it. I so what exactly is libertarian way when it comes . You know, it basically means that, of course we need government, but a reduced government we need individual responsibility corporate governmental responsibility as well as of course liberty and ive written a musical its called convention the birth of america its about the constitutional convention. And in my research, peter, i found out there were 55 delegates to the Constitution Convention and they bickered, they fought, they complained about everything except, each one to a male believed the most important function of government is our liberties from the encroachment government. How far away from if weve come since by the way, number two thing of interest of of import was keeping us safe. So thats how they believed our liberties and so important and its true it works in your book all rise you talk about people having a vested interest in criminal Justice System who are people and what are their interests. You know, theres a great deal of money in the criminal Justice System what is the probably the strongest lobby in california today, which is where im from, the Prison Guards union and. Its kind of obscene to have them imprisoned. Their economic status by taking away more peoples liberties for longer periods of time. And again, you know, i get the war on drugs and, you know, as a sitting judge. Back in 1992, i held a press conference saying our nations policy, drug prohibition is not working. Heck, you interviewed me after my first book about that wire. Drug lords have failed us, but you say police departments, for example, are bureaucracies and they brag about how they feel. All these different cases, you know, these the number of crimes in our community and there is a thousand of them. But we closed successfully 7200 of some 7720. But if you take away the drugs lost because when you are arrested for possession of cocaine or use that of thing over the case, at the same time you close it so the increase is there a great deal if youre to take away the war on drugs their success rate would go down maybe from 72 to 42 . So thats one reason why they want to keep up. Its just bureaucratic. Its a terrible thing to see if people naturally respond to the bureaucracy and to trying to increase their fiefdoms. Are drug courts successful . Yes. In fact, im pleased to say that back within six months of my appointment, i started First Drug Court in the country with regard to alcohol abuse, and it was successful where you work with the people. You know, if you just punish they all, youll get their attention a month. But then soon as theyre released, theyll go back to well, first of all, now they have a record. Secondly, they cant get a job. So what is somebody this drug addicted do if they get discouraged depressed and cant get a job they go back to using drugs or or stealing or whatever. So theyre back in the prison system. Its a revolving door. You take them off drugs and give them some help. The skills. All of a sudden, the recidivism goes down from 90 to like 20 . Drug courts really works. And in fact, ive seen numbers arresting Police Officers come to the graduation of the people that they arrested. And theyre almost in tears and they hug each other. Thank you for the arresting officer that of thing because judges are pretty much the most important social workers in our country today. Because i can put where you dont want to go, i can put you in jail for a weekend or whatever and so i can get your attention and start having you focus on whats important. You have to have people and medical professionals and the rest that can help with that that assisting and in getting that diagnosis judge a reason over incarcerating, in your view flat out. Yes, we have many, too many people in prison that should not be there. For example, mandatory minimum sentences. I can tell you, nobody, congress, nobody anywhere in the of the correct sentence prior to it even happening in advance. You cant do so without knowing who subject is, what the offense was, how badly the the victims were, if at all. You know, the circuit stances. But if you have those sentences where a judge must sentence you to ten years minimum. There have been there have been in the federal system i know very conservative judges appointed nixon or reagan or whatever in tears because they were forced to sentence somebody to something that was just not right. And then we have people that are incarcerated that basically, you know, that theyre elderly, they could hurt you by throwing their walker at you of you know, Charles Manson said ive never been released from prison, but there are other people that, you know, 15 years is a long time in prison and maybe particularly if you committed an offence when youre 18, 19 years of age and, youre sentenced to prison for ten years. That really affects your job, your excuse me, your lifetime enormously. And by the way, we use the term correctional. Theres nothing to do with correctional in most prisons. Its just incarceration and its not a good thing to see. So were a judge during the three strikes youre out law enactment in california, correct . Yes. What was that how did that affect you as a judge . You know, you look for ways of trying. First of all, prosecutors use that as an encouragement to plead guilty. That reduced the charge so some people have actually guilty whether factually innocent. But you have a snitch or you have somebody against you. And so you plead guilty and well give you three years in prison. Do you go to trial in your and youre convicted will be 25 years in prison. Thats lot of coercion. Thats its not should not be a part of our system but it is and thats not to say i coddle criminal right. Im pretty tough dude and im in the responsible business. But peter, i still remember when i was on a formal probation violation on calendar, i would have got people coming back every month or, two to report back to me and i get reports from the Probation Department and if you got three stars, for example, that youre kind of taking it seriously. But going through the motions for stars you really are taking it seriously for yourself. And five stars means youre taking it seriously and youre also helping your confederates. And i had a procedure where if somebody got five stars, i call them up. First, i would congratulate tell everybody in the audience who are the other offenders how they had been successful or get off the bench and shake their hands. And on two occasions, i young men, i dont know, early twenties maybe break down in tears. Your honor, no man is ever commended me for anything ive ever done in my life. You know, people need mentoring. People need help. And in fact, the first case i prosecuted for the dea drug handtohand sale, the for the dea said he was the thats going to make the buy and then they were going to arrest everybody in sight just at the very end, you saw the guy who was going to sell it to the illegal drug. Oh, wait a minute. I know that guy. I went to high school with bring in somebody else so they did and they and arrested everybody and i said well agent tell me about that guy and he said, judge thats actually mr. Gray back. We were friends, but i was mentored by our basketball coach. He was mentored by a drug dealer, but for the grace of god, it would have been reversed. Mentoring is huge. Judges can do that and so can others. I tell you somebody is going to mentor our children. Its not the parents. Its not the basketball. Its not the assistant. You know, itll be the drug dealers, itll be the the street gangs. Charles manson. What you will is very good at mentoring family. Theyre always people out there looking to mentor our children. Were not doing a particularly good job of that. The judges are in a great position to, really assist judge gray and. All right. Also talk about mental and the criminal. And i would venture to say that at any one moment in the Orange County jail or any other jail, the country for 35 to 40 of them have a mental illness. And for another 20 have drug addictions. And these are that you can put them in jail all you want to. Youre causing damage. What you want to do in the criminal Justice System is not to incarcerate you. You have to use that as a vehicle you want to reduce. And the way you reduce crime with regard to drug addicted people so that dont steal from you or the rest of that is to help them address their addiction. If theyre mentally ill, you help them address those Mental Illnesses to help them live at the highest ability that able. And there are groups that can do that but putting them in jail i remember still sometimes id have to the defendants criminal defendants in my jury boxes thered be some people kind of saying to themselves and you can tell theyre just spaced out. That doesnt help. Thats not appropriate thing to do. We need to address the root these problems. Same thing with homelessness, by the way. Most of them are either mentally ill or drug addicted, and you can put them in houses or whatever that isnt going to help. You need to address their fundamental problems. And were only beginning to do that. Drug courts are a big step in, right, in that regard. And in fact, i would tell people in our drug court, were all on the team. We want this subject to be able to live a productive life. But as soon as you start, you know, youve got to get them off their alcohol or whatever it is that theyre the third take. So besides drug, whats another libertarian is fixing some sports, you know, compassion. All right. Responsibility again, you dont have liberty without response ability. They go hand in hand. So you did something. You have to be held accountable it. But overincarceration is not the answer. We have many too many people in in our country today the United States of america based upon the drug and mandatory minimum sentences. The rest the United States of america has 5 of the worlds population and 25 of its prisons. There was a federal u. S. Senator named jim webb from virginia, i believe it was see through accounts. He was faced with those statistics and said either were the most oriented people in the world or were doing something wrong. Which do you think it is . I know what i think that we just much to over incarcerate judge tim gray. Final question what is what is the goal of this court . The goal of the book really is to show people that Liberty Works and you put it into a concrete examples. For example, education. Now, look, ive gotten into the constitution, the constitution was we the people will delegate the federal government certain empowered. You can look in vain the constitution for anything that allows the federal government to be involved in education it isnt there for health care. What works is choice, School Choice. In fact, id like to talk my my second book in a minute because School Choice the failing of so many Public Schools of our children, of our students is the biggest unnecessary problem in the United States of america today. If you empower, which is exactly the word i mean, to use you empower the parents to choose where their government moneys going to be spent, the education of their children, the parents will choose excellence, and they will receive it if look at the Public School system, peter, the only area in our economy in which the supplier, the provider chooses what the customer will purchase. So they dont need to compete. They dont need to get better. But you bring in choice. Now competition comes into the equation and all of a sudden the Public Schools either get better or they start losing their customers name the students as well as the funding. So theyll either out of business and be replaced by somebody else or theyll get better. Its a natural thing to happen right now. Arizona has adopted school and school vouchers. Its a hooray that. And so in other states around country we talk about this in my in my new book that ive written actually my wife, dr. Grace walker. Grace and its a novel and its about the basis of School Choice. And were just trying to show people so that they can be empowered to assist in making their childrens lives education better. Do you bring in your perspective as judge and in the book, yeah. In the 2030 kids in the prologue i talk about what ive just just mentioned here but then its a its a its a novel so its a story about a single parent katie, who had her husband died in an automobile collision. She has one third grade son and hes just not enjoying school and before covid, during covid, he was floundering and then covid ended and he didnt get anything out of his school. So she started bringing together other parents, telling them, look, we can help. This is critically important for lifetime of our education, of our its really important to their future. So she got a group of parents together. They found a disenchanted third grade teacher at the school and they convinced izzy and they convinced him to be able they convinced the administration to allow to change the whole pattern of the education. In the fourth grade. So he called his fourth graders. So i cut researchers so that they can be investigated so they would learn how to construct the table. But then you have to measure and you have to sort get things right. So they started getting involved in education and in their education made it more fun. And of course you can imagine, but it was successful. But that is something that really is important for parents to understand. You are in much better position to decide where and how your child to be educated than government. Its not every child to be a mechanical engineer. Maybe they just want to be a maid. They to be a mechanic, maybe they want to be a electrician. Maybe they should go to vocational schools. Maybe theyre interested in the arts. You know, the parents will know and if they can choose where that money going to be spent and everything will work well, except for teachers that cannot teach. And right now, of course, the teachers unions support them. You cant a public teacher. So there are some places new york city is the worst i understand there were so teachers that have been found to be harmful to be in the classroom in new york city. But they cant fire them. So they put them in a gymnasium and they read them. They play games and they read the internet and stuff and theyre still paid full salary because they they cant be fired. That stupid. But if you bring in School Choice, all of sudden things will get a lot better. Its an unnecessary tragedy in our country today, mostly for lower economic children, which in many ways, unfortunately happen to be african american, hispanics, africanamerican and hispanic parents are realizing School Choice will help our children and their gravett over the School Choice and libertarians are leading the way out of this third book that you have out. Just want to bring up the voters. Hannah yes. After i ran congress, as i told you earlier, i didnt win, but i just wanted to be a part of the discussion. So i wrote a column in a local newspaper every sunday and then eventually after a couple of years, took to the letters in the columns, merged them together, talked about all of these various drug policy and School Education and health care and and the rest declaration of war, for heavens sake, if we were and thats in these books as well. Our founders would be absolutely at our throats if they knew that congress had delegated the power to declare war a president by his war powers, actions. I swear to you, going into iraq was the biggest mistake of my lifetime. Have we required congress to a declaration of war . They have had to discuss it. Discuss what our what the benefits are, what the goals are who the enemy is. It never would have passed congress nor it have probably the same thing with vietnam and somalia and the rest of these things. So we bring all of these things together and its in a manageable form. You can read these things in a fairly short period of time and then generate discussion. I ask people for feedback. I dont have all answers. I prove that pretty much with regularity, but you know, discuss these things and then people are interested. Go to them, come to my website judge jim gray dot com and you can communicate with me through that but there are a lot of things there that we want to discuss them in our world. And i think its important, by the way. Let me ask you a question. Why did the scarecrow grow . Why was the scarecrow given an award award . Because he was found to be outstanding, his field. You know you got to have a little. There you go. A little louder with that. But, you know, you got to have some fun in this when we get into that in our books as well. But you know, its were all in this together. I saw a cartoon recently where this mixed couple were talking, walking each other, and they were saying, what colors are we. And the answer is red and blue. We are we should recognize that yes, we can be disagreeing disagreement but not be disagreeable about it and discuss things. And you know, i can learn from you. You learn from me and we can all learn from each other and understand if im in even in office, just. You didnt vote for me. Doesnt mean youre my kind out my constituents. You are somebody i care about. Ill health care, you know, bring the Free Enterprise system back. We talk about this and all of my books, bring the Health Care System back into, the Free Enterprise system. When i was growing up 1560s, we had the best Health Care System in the world. Good modest prices, good quality. And then the government started getting more and more involved. Get the government out of our health care. In fact, peter, if you the equivalent of the department of Motor Vehicles to run your health care, thats exactly the direction were going. But what about the poor. What about the people that cannot afford it . Give them provide them on a sliding scale that they can use in the free market to Purchase HealthCare Insurance to help pay for copays. As long as they still have a modest. At some point you make a free people take advantage of it. You pay 3, 5 to go see the doctor. Still only when you need to. It rings in again. Accountability and participation. And by the way, who is in a better position to decide what you need . You with your doctor and get the government out of this stuff thats so what we talk about in our books as libertarians leading the way with regard to these things and im proud to be a libertarian and its nice to be able to discuss these things with you. Author judge jim gray, thank you for your time. We appreciate it here on book tv. Its a pleasure its always good please help me welcome in sequence jason kander, author of the invisible storm, and steve caskey of npr. [applause]