On Civility podcast: Judge Thomas Logue talks bias, 'sweet reason,' and zealous advocacy
Judge Thomas Logue
“I’m not here to do what I want,” says Third DCA Judge Thomas Logue, saying a judge must be careful of bias, conscious and unconscious, in applying the law. “And I think a really good judge is constantly making decisions they don’t like.”
Logue shares his experiences and thoughts about what makes a good judge, a zealous advocate, the levels of civility and “sweet reason” in the latest episode of the podcast, “On Civility with Magie Ozarowski,” produced by The Florida Bar Center for Professionalism.
Getting his start in the law as a paralegal between graduating cum laude from Dickinson University and earning his J.D. from Duke University, Logue joined the Miami-Dade County Attorney’s Office in 1982 and was appointed to the bench in 2012 by Gov. Rick Scott.
During his 30 years as an assistant county attorney for Miami-Dade, Judge Logue litigated hundreds of cases in state and federal courts, including the Florida Supreme Court, the United States 11th Circuit Court of Appeals, and the Third District Court of Appeal. His cases ranged from constitutional law and civil rights, to copyrights, contracts, and torts, to taxes, real estate valuation, zoning, and bonds.
One of the many law articles he has written was cited by the Florida Supreme Court in adopting the new Florida Summary Judgment standard in 2020 and clarifying it in 2021.
Logue describes the unexpected path of his career, from corporate law in North Carolina to what he intended to be a one-year stint to get the lay of the land at the Miami-Dade County Attorney’s Office, which grew to last 30 years. He says he stayed because he enjoyed the practice of law there, finding he loved where he worked and the people he worked with. He found his calling in appellate cases and says being a judge on the Third District Court of Appeal is his “dream job. I pinch myself every day.”
Judge Logue, who formerly served as chief judge of the Third DCA, says being a judge is a surprising amount of work. When he was a lawyer, he thought trial judges had an easy job, but now he realizes “they have hundreds of issues they have to decide.” He says he has it easier, in some respects, as an appellate judge but “it’s a lot of work.”
To be a good judge, he says there are two requirements: you must do the work and keep an open mind throughout the entire process.
Responding directly and incisively to Ozarowski’s questions, he answers one about whether he finds it hard to maintain his impartiality with a simple “no” before expounding that a judge has to sort out the lawyers’ arguments and the decisions aren’t always clear.
“We always want to write it up as if it’s clear, but if it gets to this level, there’s usually a pretty decent dispute there,” he says.
It often isn’t pleasant, either. He says his job isn’t to second-guess the consequences, but to look at what the law is, and whether the trial judge followed the law.
“It’s not like, ‘This was done legally’ [and] I’m tickled pink and happy that someone’s being evicted. You’re constantly seeing tragedies.”
Civility, he says, has different levels, and he began to realize this early in his career when he ran afoul of then-sitting Chief Judge Alan Schwartz, whom he referred to as “brilliant,” and a “legendary curmudgeon.” When opposing counsel made a sixth request for an extension of time, Logue was incensed and objected, even though it would not impact his client. Judge Schwarz threatened Logue with contempt.
Schwartz was pushing him to think deeper, and Logue took the signal. He says it was the start of his path toward the bench.
Logue says he now thinks there are “levels of civility.”
The first, which he thought was the only level as a young lawyer, was to make pleasant small talk and shake hands with opposing counsel. He prided himself that he was a civil lawyer because he did these things.
The second level consists of being prepared and reasonable, not pounding the opposition into humiliation unnecessarily.
“Never let yourself be provoked into bad conduct, and that’s where I erred in that objection to the extension of time,” says Logue. “I fell short there because I had won a judgment below — it was in a tort case, my clients were out of the case, it was a final judgment — there was no prejudice to my client whatsoever in agreeing to an extension of time.”
Then there’s what President Abraham Lincoln called, “sweet reason,” and a concept called “interpretive generosity.” Sweet reason makes you aware of what is non-essential and helps you focus on the critical point, and Judge Logue references President Lincoln’s First Inaugural Address as a classic example. Interpretive generosity asks you to attribute to your opponent the highest motives that align with their words and actions, so that you can address their best argument.
Logue says this is the highest level of civility; it allows you to “detach from the outcome, not the effort.” It takes maturity as a lawyer to accept that, if you have done the work to prepare, then your highest aspiration is to “let justice be done,” and not just pray “let me win.”
Ozarowski, as law clerk coordinator at Ausley McMullen, says the younger generation of lawyers she works with have observed that people are getting “meaner, in a societal sense,” which plays into the inherent adversarial system of the law. And while detachment is great advice when you are meditating, it doesn’t seem possible when your livelihood depends on your clients and your record of wins. But Logue is firm.
“If you are tied totally to the result — A — you might get pushed to an ethical place you don’t want to be. And then — B — even if you don’t, you’ll put yourself into conniptions because you don’t have total control of the result,” he says. “Focus on what you control: your preparation and your behavior.”
Asked if there is a conflict between representing clients with zealous advocacy and practicing with civility, Logue’s solution is simple.
“Be fierce in your goodness; be zealous in your advocacy — which is not making personal attacks,” he says. He explains, “To persuade other people, you have to believe what you’re saying…Zealous advocacy is working the file until you come up with an argument that you believe in. It is not being nasty or mean to people, it’s working the file.”
Judge Logue says it’s very important for young lawyers to come up with techniques to deal with stress, which he says is energy — like electricity. His tip is “use it, so the battery can recharge.” He says to put the stress into the work, not family members. And exercise.
The infractions on civility he has seen have tempted him to take Judge Schwartz’ cue and hold a lawyer in contempt, at times. He has seen lawyers viciously attack the trial judge and opposing counsel. He says if someone is nit-picking a laundry list of procedural errors, it better relate to the legal argument. But if they are merely “painting the other side as a rascal,” generally it doesn’t come off well.
Voluntary bar associations play an important part in civility in his opinion, and he shares his own experience.
During his first year out of law school, he came up against Karen Gievers, whom he learned a lot from, albeit not in a pleasant way. She “thumped” him, and he thought, “This person – she never quits, always coming up with surprises, always one step ahead of me; I hate her.” Later, he worked with her on a Bar matter related to hurricanes and he thought, “She never quits, always coming up with surprises, always one step ahead of the other side. She’s fabulous! She’s wonderful.…Boy, she would prepare a file.”
Judge Logue speaks with humble admiration about his legal mentors among whom were: Bob Ginsberg, who was the county attorney at Miami-Dade County (“extremely ethical, extremely competent, clear-thinking”), Murray Greenberg (who impressed upon Logue as a new lawyer the imperative to treat everyone with the same respect), the late Judge William Hoeveler, Gerald Wetherington (both great human beings and great lawyers), and Joni Armstrong Coffey (a Florida constitutional law expert who is “the most brilliant big-picture legal thinker I have ever known”).
“All of them are better lawyers than I could ever imagine being,” he says. “So, I don’t automatically assume I’m smarter than [lawyers] are. I listen.”
He closes with two pieces of advice. First, write and work your lists. The last piece of advice he prefaces with a personal story.
To become a judge, he had to reach out to other people as part of the application process, but he is shy and would sit for an hour working up the courage to make a phone call.
“If there’s something you don’t want to do, do that first,” he says. “Sometimes you’ve been catastrophizing — like me, calling up people — and sometimes they are wonderful.”
