A Lesson In Southern History

Georgia’s most powerful Republican politicians are rejecting pro-Donald Trump calls to change the state constitution to give the governor direct authority to pardon those convicted of crimes. #gapol https://t.co/zzJl2VEGg7

— Greg Bluestein (@bluestein) August 17, 2023

Most state constitutions of southern states were written anew after Reconstruction. A wave of populism burned across the South, and most state constitutions severely limited the authority of government, and especially of the executive.  Texas' constitution is the most extreme example:  many state agencies are headed by elected officials, including the Land Comissioner, Agricultural Commissioner, the Board of the Texas Education Agency; and so on.  The Lieutenant Governor runs the Senate, but is elected by the people.  The Attorney General is elected.  The legislature is limited to one six-month session every two years, and special sessions can only take up what the Governor puts on the agenda, and then only for 30 days, unless another session is called. Some of this is unusual, some of it isn't.  I wasn't surprised to learn Georgia's constitution limits the power of the governor to issue pardons; Texas' constitution does the same.  The Texas governor makes appointments to the Board of Pardons and Paroles; but they can, and do, act independelty of the Governor.*

The point is not to belabor the constitutional history of Texas, but to point out many southern states are similarly situated.  

Trump allies have already been pushing assorted schemes to get him out of legal jeopardy in Georgia, which is one of the few states in the country where the governor does not have blanket pardon powers that could theoretically spare Trump from having to serve any jail time.

I can't say for sure, but I'd bet the majority of those states are southern states.  

There's also the matter of Georgia's transparency in criminal procedure.  First, the idea of a "special grand jury" which investigates a major crime (or crimes); and then a second grand jury takes that record and takes more testimony, and issues criminal indictments if it deems them warranted. There's also the matter of making the names of the grand jurors part of the public record, which seems to be one with televising all the court procedures.  If I'm not mistaken, the arrest of Trump (that's what his surrender will be) and the other defendants will be before cameras, as well as the arraignment and any hearings or trials.

Georgia likes transparency.  I don't know why, but I suspect it's from an experience with opacity:  grand juries acting anonymously to punish the poor and the non-white (i.e., the powerless), and court proceedings closed to the public, the better to do as the powerful please.  I don't know this for a fact, and I don't mean to imply Georgia is more corrupt than any other states (hell, we keep re-electing Ken Paxton, and one of his defenses is that the voting public knew he was a scoundrel and elected him over and over anyway, so how can the Senate remove him from office?  And you though Trump had brass balls.).  I mean it seems as if Georgia learned some serious lessons, and decided not to let those things happen again.

Sunlight is a disinfectant, isn't it?

I'm pretty sure the Georgia grand jurors knew what they were getting into when the agreed to be on a gand jury investigating Trump.  That doesn't mean they deserve the harassment coming their way, but Georgia is not at fault for playing by the rules it decided on.  And before all the critics bray that "Georgia should be more like us!," maybe they should consider the benefits of being more like Georgia.

Or just look into the history of why Georgia wrote it's laws this way in the first place.  It may be a product, too, of Reconstruction.  Or it may be a product of history in Georgia since the late 19th century.

Either way, I think the nation is going to get a few lessons in Southern history.  Whether the nation has the wisdom to learn them, is another matter.

*Remember the dust-up when an Austin jury found that right-wing MAGA head guilty of a crime for shooting people on the street during a protest march?  Abbott vowed to pardon him as a sop to MAGA, until the DA released trial testimony that the defendant was soliciting underage girls on-line.  Abbott stopped crowing about that pardon request, and the Board quietly let the matter drop.  Abbott is lucky he didn't have the pardon power of the POTUS.  And even the POTUS usually exercise that power through consultation with the Office of Pardons Attorney (if I have that title right).  If anything needs to change, I think it's the pardon clause in Art. II.