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For two weeks, three judges have been at the center of Florida's redistricting lawsuit.
By STEVE BOUSQUET, Times Staff Writer
© St. Petersburg Times, published June 17, 2002
MIAMI -- Three men will soon decide which political party will control Congress for the next decade.
They are federal judges Gerald Tjoflat, Robert Hinkle and Adalberto Jordan. They must rule in a lawsuit brought by Democratic politicians and voter groups that accuses the Republican Legislature of gerrymandering and diluting black voting strength.
The stakes are high. Florida is one of the last states to finish redistricting and Republicans are eager to protect or pad their six-seat cushion in Congress. The U.S. Justice Department has ruled that the 25 new districts do not violate federal voting rights laws, and campaigns are well under way in anticipation that the judges will agree.
For two weeks, the judges have sat through hour after hour of tedious testimony in an eighth-floor courtroom in downtown Miami. They have listened closely through a discussion of census tracts, population demographics and racially polarized voting.
Boxes full of exhibits occupy every available space in the courtroom. Lawyers and experts working for the Legislature, at taxpayer expense, outnumber opponents 4 to 1 and fill two rows of seats.
While the arguments are expected to wrap up this week, there is not set timetable for a ruling.
At the center of the case is the silver-haired, square-jawed Tjoflat (pronounced SHO-flat), the panel's chairman. He was appointed by Republican presidents Nixon and Ford to seats on the federal district court and federal appeals court in the 1970s and, at 72, is the senior member of the Atlanta-based 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
"Tjoflat is an institution. He's an icon of the law in this circuit," said Tallahassee lawyer Barry Richard, a member of the Senate's redistricting legal team who is not directly involved in the Miami case. "He's been around a long time, and is highly regarded."
Tjoflat sits in the center, flanked by two colleagues who look young enough to pass for his sons. In court, he cajoles lawyers to make their points and move on.
"You haven't got a jury in the box," a restless Tjoflat told a lawyer at one point. "You've got three judges up here, and none of us has been sleeping."
Meeting in chambers with lawyers at the end of a frustrating first day of procedural missteps, Tjoflat pleaded with the Democratic lawyers not to waste time by putting minor political figures on the stand.
"We want to hear from the experts," Tjoflat said.
Tjoflat twice was part of majority decisions upholding the right of high school students to lead prayer ceremonies at graduations in Duval County. In a 1993 decision hailed by abortion opponents as a free speech triumph, he wrote the decision that a "buffer zone" around a Melbourne abortion clinic violated the First Amendment.
Tjoflat testified before Congress in 1998 on the subject of perjury and the importance of truth in the dispensing of justice. Congress was considering impeachment charges against President Clinton at the time and Tjoflat was called by the Republican majority on the House Judiciary Committee.
Tjoflat was briefly a Cincinnati Reds pitching prospect before turning to a career in law. A 1957 graduate of the Duke School of Law, he was appointed by Gov. Claude Kirk to a circuit judgeship in Jacksonville in 1968. Two years later President Richard Nixon nominated him to the federal bench. At 41, he was the youngest U.S. District Court judge in the country.
"He wanted to go to a frontier area, and Jacksonville at that time was growing," said Tjoflat's wife, Marcia, a land-use lawyer. "He went to register to vote and the registrar handed him a Democratic card. He said, "But I'm a Republican.' That was the way it was."
Five years later, President Ford promoted Tjoflat to the federal appeals bench for Florida, Georgia and Alabama, a court generally considered moderate-to-conservative in its philosophy. The judge is a long-time Jacksonville resident who has been active for many years in Boy Scouts.
Tjoflat's colleagues, both relative newcomers to the bench, were appointed by President Clinton to the federal district court.
Hinkle, 51, a native of Apalachicola, went to Florida State University and Harvard Law School and worked for many years in private practice in Tallahassee before winning Senate confirmation in 1996.
Hinkle's most prominent case involved Lawrence Lombardi, the so-called "FAMU bomber" who was sentenced to life in prison in 2000 for setting off pipe bombs at the university. County records show that Hinkle is registered to vote with no party affiliation.
Jordan, 40, is a native of Cuba who came to the United States at age 7. He studied law at the University of Miami, clerked for U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, spent five years at the firm of Steel, Hector & Davis, and five more as an assistant U.S. attorney in Miami before Clinton nominated him.
The Senate confirmed Jordan 93-1, with independent Sen. Bob Smith of New Hampshire casting the dissenting vote. Smith's spokesman said the senator had a "pro-life litmus test for judges" and was not satisfied Jordan would always rule in opposition to abortion rights.
The judges are well aware they must rule quickly to avoid disrupting the fall election calendar.
Republican lawyers hope the Legislature's map will be approved, but they can't predict the personal dynamics at work when three judges must reach a group decision. Even Democrats agree the panel has been fair and attentive.
"They were very observant, very engaged," said U.S. Rep. Corrine Brown, D-Jacksonville, who sat through several hours of testimony one morning. "Sometimes when you go into court, you wonder whether the judge is really paying attention, but they were asking very good and very direct questions. I feel like they're listening."
U.S. Rep. Carrie Meek, D-Miami, said she found the judges "inquisitive." U.S. Rep. Alcee Hastings, D-Miramar, whose redrawn district has fewer black voters and is a major part of the Democrats' case, said it's doubtful the Democrats will win the case.
"It doesn't look like we'll be successful. Not because of the panel, but because of the nature of the issues," Hastings said.
-- Times political editor Adam C. Smith and researchers Caryn Baird, Kitty Bennett and John Martin contributed to this report.