Court Opinion

ID: 9486209
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 11:41:05.010453+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:51:34.990059
License: Public Domain

BAUER, Circuit Judge,
concurring in the opinion and judgment of the court.
I yield to no one in my admiration for Judge Kocoras. And to the extent the dissent praises the motives of Judge Kocoras, I join it. On the other hand, simply to say that he sought to protect the children of Chicago is not enough to confer jurisdiction on his or any other federal court on the issues raised in this appeal.
Nor do I think that this court can assume jurisdiction by a reflection, however accurate or noble, on the history of the Civil War and its aftermath or on speculation that had the majority of the children involved been white the issue would have been settled long since. As the dissent states, not one word of racial animus was introduced in this ease until that suggestion was penned. Indeed “Judges are not Kings.” Nor can we create jurisdiction where none exists.
Judge Kocoras acted, I am sure, with what he believed to be legally appropriate orders. And in so doing, he acted in the “finest tradition of the federal judiciary.” It is worthy of note that as long as the restraining order remained in effect, no solution seemed possible. Two days after it was dissolved, the state agencies solved the problem.
*675I believe this panel also acted in the finest tradition of the federal judiciary: ruling on the case before it in what the majority considers to be the law on the issues.