Our Daily Judgments+

'Our Daily Judgments' shows the source of those -- the Los Angeles

Main Superior Court Building (the Superior Court has courthouses and

courtrooms spread throughout greater Los Angeles County. Your

ratings and critiques are invited and most welcome. If you rate

harshly or very critically, please append a helpful and constructive

comment; please share your superior photographic knowledge to help

improve my photography. (no filters; exposure set manually,

underexposed from meter) Thanks! Enjoy! John

I was going through some old chips that wouldn't download properly; but I had used a recovery program to save the images as TIFF files. That was six months ago. I finally reviewed those images, and when I saw this one, I remembered that this one was definitely one I had wanted to post months ago (if it had downloaded properly, which it didn't.) Advice to photographers: Sooner or later, you'll have a flash card refuse to download -- there's recovery software and it's worth its weight in gold, because it works on computer files as well as media, and it'll save and recovery ages-old files as well as the most recent. Buy such a program and run it on an old flash card or sd chip and you'll see what I mean. Formatting, just destroys the file structure; it does not destroy the photos, which remains there until overwritten.

Alfredo, thanks for the recognition.

John (Crosley)

It seems in our modern society that we turn to the courts in the place of the church pastor (priest) now, for resolution dispute, and so the caption/title of this photo 'Our Daily Judgments' is a play on the words 'Give Us This Day Our Daily Bread'.

Instead of bread, we get judgments, delivered daily by the Superior Court (merged now with the Municipal Court) of Los Angeles and all part of the giant Superior Court of California, and just a subdivision of that, separated by county and maintained by county.)

All that really ever comes from this courthouse, besides the maintenance of a very good living for the attorneys who practice or aim cases at this building and others like it spread throughout the greater LA basin (plus a steady living for court staff), is decisions, be they good or bad.

As one federal judge explained to me in all seriousness: Judgments may be right or wrong, but at least they represent someone making a decision and the decision is final in almost all cases. For a few there are appeals, but for the greater part, the trial courts, (whether or not there is a trial or not, or just a ruling on a point of law that results in success or dismissal of a case) represents the last word on a dispute.

After all, more than 'equity', our courts dispense 'finality' -- which is why the courts do not like their judgments overturned and the system is designed to prevent that from happening except in the most limited number of instances.

John (Crosley)

Very well seen and captured.

Luca

when I'm creating a photograph that I'm making something more meaningful than just a 'pretty picture' in a case like this.

I was captivated by the shininess of the court building and the fact it was so reflective the few clouds in the sky reflected off of it, and then I drove around a little bit and an older building (this church) came into view.

I decided it would be a substantially more interesting photo if two buildings (old and new) were in the same photograph, then I lowered the exposure substantially below what was metered (that's why the sky shows so dark blue), because I didn't want to 'blow out' the court building reflections, except the smallest portion in the center, which could be accountable under 'specular highlights'.

As it happens, in old England, there used to be TWO legal systems: The church courts had control of your soul, and they could thus tell you what to do; even to the point where they issued orders under threat of excommunication and also to send your soul to hell. Those developed into the courts of 'equity and good conscious' -- where the court tells you what to do (or not to do) it is said to be a court of equity. Also widows and orphans came under 'equitable' courts, and in Pennsylvania, for instance, they had their 'widows and orphans' court -- meaning juvenile and probate.

But the 'law' courts were run by the state (the country of England) and thus the King was titular head. They were the 'crown courts' which later developed into our 'law' courts. If a court takes something from you or adjudges that someone else can have the sheriff take something from you (including your money, your boat, even your life) it is said to be a 'law' court.

In California, as in many states, the judges of the 'law courts' and the chancellors who staff the 'equity courts' in Eastern jurisdiction are merged into one judge who can do everything.

But the old rules of separation between church and state still remain, so a court acting 'in equity' (the two are merged: equity and law, in California) can tell you what to do (but can't condemn your soul to hell or excommunicate you any longer since they now are separated from the church). But they do issue injunctions and other orders to people. They tell people what to do and how to do it or what not to do, and the punishment is contempt of court, which doesn't entitle one to a jury trial. In fact, in any matter in a court's equitable jurisdiction you don't get a jury trial (except possibly an 'advisory jury') since the U.S. Constitution which guarantees a jury does so only for 'matters of law' and things 'equitable' are different from those 'at law'.

So judgments saying someone can take your property, or others can take yours -- even judgments of imprisonment and ultimately even death, are said to be 'at law' and the Constitution guarantees a jury trial in those cases.

In California a jury verdict can be 8 or 9 jurors (I forget), and needn't be unanimous. But in Federal Court, even in Federal Courts in California, a unanimous jury is required. Thus, defendants, knowing a unanimous jury is required in Federal Court, and not in state court and knowing that in Federal Court one juror can stop a verdict against a defendant, prefer the Federal Courts when they are sued. Conversely, plaintiffs do not like federal court cases for that reason (and numerous others since Federal Judges act like little Gods, since they can only be removed by impeachment, because they are appointed 'for life', even when they 'retire' they are said to 'go senior' and still get their salary (so far as I recall). That doesn't happen in state courts where judges may be elected or appointed (elected in California, except when there is a vacancy, then the gubernator can make an appointment.

Voters almost never vote out incumbent judges, though, so once a judge, and provided no really bad or unpopular decisions, judges stay in place in state courts until they retire, and almost never face serious opposition that will unseat them at election time.

So, here, unbeknownst to you, not only have I created an 'irony' but a more serious 'irony' or juxtaposition than perhaps you know.

These two buildings represent the two parts of the legal system in times past (the church -- equity -- system and the courts of 'law').

Now of course, the judges in the courthouse, right, have all the powers of equity and law combined (and of course the church no longer has any authority -- it's been taken over by the state.)

Thanks for the compliment on the aesthetics -- I tried really hard.

And thanks for noticing the 'irony', but I'll bet you weren't aware (unless you're a law student or attorney) of how great the 'irony' is here.

I hadn't really consciously understood it when taking the photo, but it probably was in the back of my mind in some inchoate place that 'motivates me'.

Best to you, Luca.

(I did not have my camera on a coffee cup, either).

;~)

John (Crosley)

showing together the "earthly" and the "heavenly" justice and mixing them both up. My comment was synthetic, but I saw

a) the Church and the Court

b) the fact that the Court is taller than the Church

c) the message that heavenly justice normally used to be above the earthly one

d) that in this case there is a mix-up, and the eartly justice claims to be superior, being taller and majestically in the foreground, but

e) that there are some heavenly signs in the reflections in the earthly justice: the sun reflections and the clouds which are classical heavenly elements. So there is still heavenly justice in, and maybe above, the earthly one.

Did'nt say this, but meant it. If all that was intentional, please receive my admiration. But also if some elements are there by chance, it is an exceptional take anyway.

Best,

Luca

PS I'm not a lawyer, but a technology consultant with an economic background. But I'm familiar with law.

My admiration.

Excellent critique.

Parts were 'inchoate' and I can't say for sure that I could have articulated all you said, but my inchoate thinking process for such things is quite complex -- just not as complex as seeing 'heaven's reflection' in the reflection on the courthouse, but it's a wonderful 'take', and I will forever wish I had thought it through to that level.

Comparison -- yes.

Understanding the contradiction and comparison yes - but articulating it to that degree, no.

I wish I had.

For then I might be able to do such a thing again in another context without taking so many 'throwaway photos' that clutter my hard drives.

Thanks for an able (extraordinary) critique.

John (Crosley)

and could very well be used as a magazine's cover, even if they would need a portrait format, with maybe an appropriate title.

Excellent, also because it confirms that not everything is under control on our pictures.

Best, Luca

But it certainly could be a postcard of a calendar photo, I think.

It's good enough, I think to withstand the test.

It very well may end up in 'stock photo' when I get going on that.

Thanks again for your wonderful critique(s).

I look forward to them.

John (Crosley)