MANSFIELD — Ohio Supreme Court Justice Sharon Kennedy, a candidate for the court’s chief justice in November’s general election, recently sat down for an interview with Richland Source City Editor Carl Hunnell.
Kennedy met with Hunnell at Idea Works, the home of Richland Source in downtown Mansfield.
The two discussed a variety of issues, using some of the questions developed by author and reporter Amanda Ripley as a way of cutting through conflict with questions that “complicate the narrative.”
Ripley’s work is aimed at helping reporters and editors dig beneath people’s positions and get to their motivations, to cover conflict more thoughtfully, to “revive complexity in a time of false simplicity.”
Two current Ohio Supreme Court justices seek to become the next chief justice on the court during November’s general election.
Justice Sharon Kennedy (R) first joined the court in 2012, having been elected to fill an unexpired term. She was elected to her first full term in November 2014. Her term expires in 2026.
Justice Jennifer Brunner (D) was elected to the court in 2020, a term that doesn’t expire until 2027.
One of them will replace Maureen O’Connor, the 10th Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Ohio and the first woman to lead the state judicial branch of government.
Below is that conversation, which has been edited for brevity and clarity.
Hunnell: Thank you for taking time to meet with me, Justice Kennedy. Let’s start with this. What issues do you think are dividing Ohioans most these days?
Justice Kennedy: I don’t know if they’re dividing Ohioans in the audiences that I am walking into. There are three issues that Ohioans are talking about on a regular basis.
One is their God-given constitutional rights … concern about government overreach, loss of individual liberty, and freedom.
Secondly is always the economy and it could come up as the number one topic in each conversation. I think that they’re really feeling the concern over the inflation … gas prices, rising food costs. When the cheaper proteins are gone from the grocery store the minute they hit the shelves, a lot of people cannot afford what steak or hamburger or even chicken costs right now. So they’re trying to manage a budget, but then you also not only have meat costs, but you also have just ordinary staples of groceries. And the shrinkage is what they call inflation … shrink inflation, as well, because packages of food are smaller, obviously for companies because they’re also trying to make ends meet.
I think the growing concern of an ever-growing workforce shortage, which people do not understand. Everywhere they turn, someone is looking to hire. So it’s not as if you’ve lost all of these individuals. The question is why aren’t they working?
I don’t have answers for people when they ask that. I think they also look at the Court … as when the court in the 1990s was not predictable, the economy and Ohio suffered. And they can see in the sense of urgency that if the court turns again, that that could have a negative impact on the economy.
And the last thing they always talk about is community safety. It wasn’t so long ago, they were all sitting at home, watching American cities burn. They are concerned. Can that come back? What happens? They can see and witness all of the law enforcement agencies who are trying to hire now … massive number of law enforcement officers leaving service.
You can see the billboards … Ohio State Patrol Academy. I travel Ohio’s highways. I’ve seen five of them now. You have Akron, Cleveland, Cincinnati, all of them are trying to hire new officers … Columbus.
So I think for everyday Ohioans, those are the three topics that really you are hearing from them with a sense of urgency.
Hunnell: These are fairly common concerns and issues in north central Ohio. The next question is, where do you turn for reliable information on these topics? Where do you, as a citizen, get information you can trust?
Justice Kennedy: I think you have to read a variety of sources. To me, you can no longer trust one source. When I grew up in the greater Cincinnati area, my parents (and I) watched Al Schottelkotte in the local television market. And then you watched Walter Cronkite. There was never a question of whether or not you trusted those men and what they were saying and that they were delivering the news, not opinion, not a spin, but just the facts of an event or situation.
To me, that has turned in the last 10 years. For me, I think you have to read a variety of sources and then you start paying attention to who the authors of those articles are. And then you have to start shaping your own opinion as to whether or not it’s really opinion or really whether it’s fact-based. I think that there is a huge market out there for anybody who returns to traditional journalism and just gives what the facts are and let the individual reader decide what it means.
Hunnell: Are there things, are there issues that are out there, when you talk to people, or when you think about your work on the court, that are being oversimplified?
Justice Kennedy: Sure. I think that anyone who says that you can solve the issues in the criminal justice system easily by X, Y, or Z … they’re not easily solved. I think the criminal justice system is one of the most complex aspects of our society and that there are a variety of actors within that system.
Judges are not the sole body politic involved. And the issues that are in the criminal justice system require different actors to address what they perceive, or what they are faced with, with real issues. And that’s not just something that the judiciary can fix.
So when I stand in audiences and they say, ‘You’re a former police officer, you’re a former criminal defense attorney, you’re a trial court judge, now you’re a (Supreme Court) justice. How do you fix all this?’ Well, I don’t really control what the prosecutor does in his effects … in his work.
You know, he affects his caseload. He makes the decision, he or she makes the decision of what to charge and how to charge and what to offer as a plea deal — whether or not when you’re dealing with co-defendants, whether the first person that turns on the other ones gets the best deal. Those are some of the complaints in the system, but that is not something that judges can fix.
That is an individual separation of powers — same with law enforcement decisions. Sure, Miranda makes me, when I’m going to interrogate an individual, read them their rights. But so many people confuse that to asking a simple book-in question, ‘What’s your name? Where do you live?’ (They claim), ‘You didn’t read me my Miranda rights (so) the case is gonna get thrown out.’
I wasn’t really interrogating you. I wasn’t asking you about the facts of the crime and your role in it. So I think law enforcement has another set. I think within the judicial system, I do think there are things that we can improve. And certainly the things that I in my future path, because I’m a believer, as the next chief justice of Ohio, I’m going to work on.
Ohio Supreme Court Justice — 2012 to present
Butler County Court of Common Pleas, Domestic Relations Division judge — 1999-2012
Attorney at Law — 1991-1998
Butler County Court of Common Pleas, director of victim/witness division and law clerk — 1989-1991
City of Hamilton police officer — 1985-1989
Education — Bachelor’s degree in social work, University of Cincinnati (1984); Law degree, University of Cincinnati (1991)
Hunnell: You are the Republican Party candidate for chief justice. You clearly have differences in opinion with your opponent. Is there any middle ground … are there areas or positions taken by Democrats that make sense to you?
Justice Kennedy: So I’ll go back to the criminal justice system and how complex it is and that simple answers don’t necessarily come. You have to remember the overlay that the General Assembly has on the criminal justice system, as well. The General Assembly decides which behavior’s going to be criminalized, and then what is the grade of misdemeanor or felony, and then what is the appropriate punishment for that crime.
So when you have those discussions at the General Assembly and you have proponents and opponents who are coming in and really giving both sides of that story … to me, that’s the best of when our society works together as Republicans and Democrats or for any body politic.
Because to me, it’s not about who’s sitting at the table, as long as we’re all listening to one another and trying to look at it from someone else’s perspective.
So when I was in the trial court, I worked with a lot of people on solving some complex problems, some easy problems. And I don’t know what their political makeup was. All I know is they were a group of people sitting around a table trying to solve a particular problem. And everybody had an equal voice. And for us, when we were addressing those problems, it always started from the premise of ‘Will it be better for the people we serve?’
And to me, as long as we are working from that platform, I think there’s always common ground and we can always work together to do better for Ohioans.
Hunnell: When Democratic voters go to the polls in November, what would you want them to know about you that they may not know now?
Justice Kennedy: I want them to look beyond the ‘R.’ To me, this is the difficulty of putting Rs and Ds behind judges’ names. Because then you have a response to that based on what you think Republicans or Democrats are.
Instead, I would want them to know who I am, not only in my judicial philosophy, because I think most people agree — judges should say what the law says, not what (they think) it should be. What it should be happens in the General Assembly. That’s the separation of powers.
And I would think I would want them to know about my background … educated as a social worker. The work that I’ve done helping people solve life problems, whether I was in law enforcement, whether I was in private practice and they were my clients, and or whether I was on the trial court bench.
To me, that compassionate side of justice is who I want them to see and understand. Whether it was juvenile court coming to me because young women were either going to leave a status offense being truant and go into delinquency … or a juvenile delinquent who was committing misdemeanors was gonna take that next step to that felony … and working with juvenile court to create a life skills program to help break the cycle of recidivism for those young girls.
I didn’t have to do that. I didn’t get paid for that. I did it on my own time. I would want people to know about that.
I would want them to know that while in the trial court, in Butler County, during the economic downturn, when you had so many individuals lose their jobs through no fault of their own, who were then standing in front of me for a contempt for non-payment of support … that I was the person who reached out to Jobs and Family Services to create a position where we had a counselor work with every individual on the non-support docket.
So Jobs and Family Services paid for the time of that individual, if that person was receiving benefits from the government, and that they had children that they were caring for because of the non-support issue. And then the court picked up the other part of the individual’s time of this jobs assistant when (the defendant wasn’t) on government assistance.
So when you see that interplay of us working together for a common goal, just trying to help people get back on their feet through a difficult time.
Sometimes it was an easy fix for that job counselor to help them get a car fixed. Sometimes it was helping them create a new resume. Sometimes it was just giving them a place to use a phone and make those calls. Sometimes it was workforce development and sometimes they didn’t read or write.
So they really needed online assistance and filling out forms. So we sent them to the workforce development tool center. Sometimes they were living that second life after having been incarcerated. Back then in 2008-2009, it was really difficult for someone with a felony conviction to find a job. So we partnered with somebody in Hamilton County.
Did I have to do all that? No, my job was, ‘You’re not paying your obligation of support. I find you in contempt. To purge your contempt, you do X, Y, and Z.’
But it’s not enough. It’s not enough when you see people struggling to say, ‘That’s all I’m gonna do. I’m not gonna do anything else.’ Because you are empathetic, because you do have compassion for your fellow man, you do the next step and say, ‘What can I do to improve this situation?’
I don’t want them on my docket anymore than they want to be there. It’s a terrible struggle for individuals. And when you’re looking at those struggles, if you can’t see yourself in the eyes of those individuals, then I don’t know what you’re doing.
I would want voters to look behind the ‘R’ to see who I am. Look at the work that I’ve done since coming to the Supreme Court of Ohio and my work with veterans in the ‘Lean Forward’ initiative and the annual summit that I do.
Look at the calls that I take and the problems that I’ve solved for those who are running a re-entry hub in Cleveland, who are trying to get services for the formerly incarcerated.
And I didn’t do much. I listened to their problem and started making calls to say, ‘These are the services that you offer. Have you met this gentleman and the individuals that he’s working with?’ and then putting them together.
That’s what I want people to know.
Hunnell: You have worked with Justice (Jennifer) Brunner as colleagues on the Ohio Supreme Court. What do you think she gets right?
Justice Kennedy: I think we are diametrically opposed in judicial philosophy. I don’t think we see the role of the chief justice the same.
Hunnell: Are there any things that the two of you see eye-to-eye on? You work with her … there is more to the work than just writing decisions on cases.
Justice Kennedy: I think both of us see problem-solving courts as an answer forward for Ohioans, whether they’re suffering from mental illness or whether they’re suffering from substance-abuse issues. To me, the strengthening of those dockets and growing those, I think that’s common ground.
I think that’s almost the no brainer. How you strengthen them might be a difference. I’m not certain how she would address that. That’s a question you would have to ask her.
I look at the role of creating task forces to help the judiciary solve some of the problems. I spent 11 years on the road talking to judges and I believe local control (and) local problems require local solutions.
So for me, I would continue being on the road and really trying to help judges answer the problems of their communities based on what they see is their problem, how they think it’s best solved in a collaborative process and then helping them achieve that.
Hunnell: You obviously do a lot of interviews with media and also spend a lot of time talking to people. What’s the one question thus far in the campaign that nobody’s asked you that you really wish they would?
Justice Kennedy: I think the one that you just asked. About, ‘What would you want them to see about you?’ And to me, that’s always the one that really no one’s ever asked.
Hunnell: Is there anything about the media’s portrayal of you and its reporting of you that just feels really inaccurate?
Justice Kennedy: I think some past stories have been factually wrong. Look, to me, I’m past it. I don’t focus on the rearview mirror. I focus on the windshield. You cannot change how someone’s going to choose to write a story, if they have a particular view of you. It’s not a fight worth having.
Hunnell: I just mean, if there’s one single glaring misperception someone got from reading a story about you … if you had a chance to wave a wand and say, ‘This was wrong and I am going to make sure you understand why.’ What would it be?
Justice Kennedy: It’s hard for me to answer that because I’m not gonna talk about past things that have been written and and recycle that. To me, I think that when you are painting people with a broad brush and saying things like ultra conservative or conservative without giving credit for the compassionate side of what I’ve done in the justice system for 37 years, I think it’s wrong.
Hunnell: Do we get the same thing wrong when we paint someone as liberal or ultraliberal?
Justice Kennedy: Absolutely. I think labels, especially in today’s climate, really invoke some personal and visceral responses. Maybe that’s the purpose of using them.
I would like to think that we should be beyond that or above that, and that to really understand who a person is, that you would really seek to know who they are in order to be fair.
Let’s be honest, newspapers buy ink by the barrel. So to me, I think they should be respectful. And careful when they’re using those brushes.
Hunnell: What are the primary, or earliest, life events that helped to shape your views as an adult?
Justice Kennedy: There’s a saying that I always tell young people when I have that chance to be in a school audience or in an after-school audience, ‘Never say what if?’
For me, that ‘never say what if’ has really guided my life. And I say that came from my parents when I was probably about 10. My father told me I could do anything I wanted to do. And there were only three rules to this life. Deciding to commit, work hard, have fortitude.
If you get knocked down or you don’t achieve it the first time you get up and you dust yourself off and you try again. And to me that has really set my life for the journey that I’ve had … being the first to go to college.
Uh, I think from age 4, till high school, my dad grew up in public housing in Cincinnati. My mom’s family, during the Great Depression, obviously, she was raised in a three-room cottage and they kind of lived off the land. They had a rabbit hutch and chickens, and they had a huge garden and all of the canning and preserving things that you would do.
To me, they really set that bar of you can overcome circumstances in life, as long as you continue to try being the first to go to college and always having their support of whatever I wanted to do.
Law enforcement was not something that my parents wanted me to do. They did not want me to be a police officer in the City of Hamilton. For them, the City of Hamilton earned its nickname of ‘Little Chicago’ for a reason. My mother did not want her youngest daughter to be any situation where she may lose her life serving in the line of duty, but they never stood in my way. They fully supported all those decisions. She was probably happiest when I said I was gonna go to law school.
I think my father would’ve been so proud to have seen me graduate law school, to be in private practice, to serve the needs of the less fortunate. And he would’ve been proud of me to see me become a judge and a justice.
I was grateful that my mom got to see it and to see really the journey that they set by those principles come to fruition. But also that ability to ask for help, never being afraid to ask for help, finding great mentors in my journey. Something else I tell young people all the time — never be afraid to ask somebody for a cup of coffee or to ask somebody for their advice.
There are so many people that love to help young people achieve what they want to achieve. And they are so grateful that somebody asked them for their advice.
Hunnell: You have different legal opinions with your opponent on the role of the chief justice on the Ohio Supreme Court. What is the chief justice’s role, in your opinion?
Justice Kennedy: The Ohio Constitution enumerates what those powers are when the seven of us sit there. It’s an equal vote amongst the other seven. So that to me is a non-starter. That’s the same power.
Where you see the chief justice has power, is that if there’s a judge unable to serve on a case under the Ohio Constitution, (the chief justice) has the exclusive authority to appoint a judge to to hear those cases. They have the ability to set the direction by creating those task forces and those committees. They have the power to work with local courts on those issues that are important.
Some have in the past, I’ll use Chief Justice (Thomas) Moyer as an example, sometimes they set about, as he did with doing treatment courts, which really came in vogue in the 1990s with Justice (Evelyn) Stratton, doing mental health, a mental health focus.
And then the drug courts came into being, and that was something that Chief Justice Moyer launched. And then you could see with the veterans’ treatment courts with Iraq and Afghanistan, and that growth in 2015, which is the piece that I picked up.
But you have the ability to help courts meet those issues. I’ve seen the task force that Chief Justice Moyer did. I served on his guardian ad litem task force, and really how to improve the delivery of services in that. Are there guiding principles that all 88 counties could learn from or create, and they make recommendations to the court?
Are there things that the court can implement? Are there things that require local implementation? Since COVID, I still hear the number one issue for most courts is the backlog of cases. Getting judges to come in and actually hear the cases, I’ve heard from so many lawyers and families of their frustration with some of the courts that will not operate on a full-time basis.
Hunnell: There has been so much debate, discussion and disagreement this year about redistricting in Ohio after the 2020 U.S. Census. State Senate President Matt Huffman recently said he is thinking about appealing the current legal dispute to the U.S. Supreme Court. Is it the role of the federal courts to get involved in an Ohio election issue?
Justice Kennedy: Well, we have redistricting cases in front of us, so I’ll tread very lightly here. It’s up to the federal court. If they decide to appeal the congressional map to the federal court, it’s gonna be up to the federal court, whether or not they feel that they have (jurisdiction).
Hunnell: Let’s back up for one question. This general election cycle will be the first time Ohio Supreme Court candidates will have an ‘R’ or a ‘D’ beside their name on the ballot. Would you have preferred the General Assembly not done that?
Justice Kennedy: I think everybody knows my view on the R and D question. I was not in favor of it. For me, it politicizes the judiciary more than we’re already politicized.
I don’t decide cases based on a Republican philosophy. I’m not an advocate for the Republican Party. My job is to say what the law says, not what it should be. And I think that if you read my decisions from a sense of neutrality, you see that I’m really talking about the text of a provision of the constitution or a statute or even a contract. And I’m simply applying what I say the law says to the facts of the case.
To me, we’ve already crossed that line. The experiment that they’re going to try, believing that this being quote, unquote, honest with the voter of who this person’s endorsed by. If that’s what we’re really doing, then I would think that every judge would have a designation behind their name because we wouldn’t want to just be honest with only some of the races. We want to be honest with all races.
For those who have told me, this is all about ballot fall off, that because there will be an R or D, the ballot bleed will end. I’m not sure I believe that based on the primary results. Twenty-five percent of the people still, if they pulled a Republican ballot, didn’t vote for me and the falloff increased for justices Fischer and DeWine.
People have the ability to choose to vote or not to vote. I know people who only go in and vote for the president and leave. Who am I to tell them that they’re wrong? So that ballot fall is going to happen, whether you do something or not.
For many, the R and D question, many are really upset because they feel like the institution is now going to be politicized. I’m not sure if it wasn’t being politicized, anyway. So I’m not really sure how that pans out.
Hunnell: I have been covering politics in Ohio for 40 years. I can’t recall media coverage of a single major Ohio Supreme Court decision that didn’t include which Republican justices voted way one and which Democratic justices voted the other way.
Justice Kennedy: I think it’s unfortunate because that begins the political conversation. And like I say, I hope if you read my decisions that you say, ‘OK, Sharon thinks that this sentence means this and is applied to these facts. It means ‘Y.’ And that’s as simply … that’s as simple as it is.
Richland Source is inviting all statewide candidates on the November ballot to visit our offices at Idea Works in downtown Mansfield to have on-the-record interviews with our local journalists.
Our plan is to interview all of the major candidates for statewide races. Our goal is not to write the political “horse race” stories. We want to dig a little deeper and find a way to perhaps complicate the narrative.
Today’s story is based on a recent interview with Ohio Supreme Court Justice Sharon Kennedy, a candidate to become the court’s next chief justice.
