Justice Jones ditches robe, finds keyboard

Jim Jones was such a quiet fellow — at least during his 12 years on the Idaho Supreme Court and two years as the chief justice.

He wrote volumes of mind-numbing legal opinions during his judicial career, but didn’t say a peep about the issues of the day. Then after he retired in 2017, everything changed. He took up political column-writing, where he is widely loved or hated by newspaper readers throughout the Gem State.

“I suppose it all got bottled up,” he said jokingly. “Steam started to build up and it came uncorked like Mount Vesuvius.”

In general, if you like Donald Trump, then you’d hate what Jones has been writing about his presidency. And if you are a fan of Idaho Sens. Mike Crapo and Jim Risch, then you probably wouldn’t care what Jones has to say. But Jones stands by his view that the senators were wrong to acquit Trump after two impeachment trials.

“These are two accomplished lawyers — very smart people — and they should have spoken out,” Jones says. “We don’t have much leadership on today’s stage. We see followership and people who are petrified to say what’s the truth because they are afraid they won’t win the next election.”

Jones, a Twin Falls native, saw a different approach when he worked for Sen. Len Jordan in the 1970s.

“Senator Jordan was my ideal. He said you can’t always do what people say in their letters. He voted for the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and the Gun Control Act of 1968. He voted against two Nixon appointees to the Supreme Court. His attitude was that you have an obligation to exercise leadership and do what you think is right. If people don’t like it, they can vote you out,” Jones said.

“With the current state of the Republican Party, it’s not the party I belonged to. It left me behind,” Jones says. He calls himself an independent, but acknowledges that he’s more aligned with Democrats than Republicans at the moment.

Recently, Jones announced his involvement with a new venture, working with former Attorney General Tony Park and a former longtime deputy, Clive Strong, to call attention the Legislature’s constitutional violations. Twelve years as a Supreme Court justice certainly gives him some expertise in that area.

“I started looking at the bills, one on initiatives. I’ve always thought these restrictive bills were in violation of the constitution,” he said. “Then you have bills that take the attorney general out of the picture in advice for state agencies.”

As Jones sees it, legislators make a big mistake by not paying attention to Attorney General Lawrence Wasden’s constitutional advice on issues such as the governor’s authority during emergencies. Rep. Heather Scott of Blanchard, for one, has suggested that the attorney general’s office is filled with lawyers who can’t find a job with private firms. Jones, of course, disagrees.

“I’ve looked at the people I have hired over the years either as deputy AGs or law clerks of the Supreme Court. We didn’t hire just anybody who walked down the pike. Many of them were at the top of their classes,” Jones said. “Most of these positions put young people on the front line from Day 1. They didn’t have to sit around doing second bench for some old stuffed lawyer who had been around forever. They would come into that office and might be in court the next day, representing the state. And they loved it.”

Jones says Wasden offers sound advice, and he usually ends up being correct. The problem is that legislators often have a mind-set in another direction and are willing to spend taxpayer money to fight losing court battles.

“They don’t care,” Jones says. “We have these people in the Legislature who claim to be constitutionalists. They wrap themselves around the constitution, but yet they are doing their best to undermine it.”

If Jones stays true to form, he won’t hesitate to call out the Legislature when he sees constitutional violations. And his efforts may go beyond the newspaper opinion pages.

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Chuck Malloy, a longtime Idaho journalist and Silver Valley native, is a columnist with Idaho Politics Weekly. He may be reached at ctmalloy@outlook.com.