Last report - final word

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welcome

My previous reports have been pretty much about facts, what was said and so on. Even when I told you my opinions I was commenting on facts.

This report is different.

I have been very moved by the spiritual unity of the support given at this trial, which has been more apparent to me here than at some of the other trials I have supported for TP2000. And this report therefore is a spiritual summary of the trial, not a factual one. Some of our supporters will not find it useful, but I offer it for those of you who do.

We the supporters present at this trial have included Catholics, Buddhists, Quakers, Methodists, Marxists, Atheists, Agnostics -- and perhaps other faiths too. In a circle before the trial started each day we remembered those dead due to nuclear weapons, and those in prison following acts of actual or attempted disarmament. We remembered the Scottish trial.

And after remembering together, there were short presentations each day from our own beliefs. We heard and shared thoughts about nuclear disarmament and about peacemaking that came from our own faiths and from none. We were united spiritually even though elsewhere I am sure we could debate our differences.

We each see the world differently yet we are united in believing that the verdict that was finally reached is out of step with the demands of morality as made in our own consciences and as tested by the due process of international law.

So it is easy therefore to blame the judge: perhaps if he had ruled differently at various stages, perhaps if he had allowed certain evidence, perhaps if he had summed up differently the result would have been different.

This is all the more tempting given that another judge in another country inside the United Kingdom on the same day was saying something different.

And I have been thinking about the last eight words of the trial, spoken not by the judge but by the usher. The last eight words of every day in every English crown court

God save the Queen and Her Majesty's judges.

This phrase "God save" comes from the Christian faith, and for a Christian being saved is the most precious thing that can be wished for somebody.

But it is precious exactly because each of us is infallible - a perfect person would not need to be saved.

When we hear these words maybe we should notice that the System itself knows it is imperfect, that the Queen who is the the legal Head of our State is herself imperfect, and that her judges are acknowledged, at the end of every day in court, as being fallible human beings like ourselves.

On a day where we have two judges who are both loyal to the same Queen saying opposite things, it is more clear than ever that the system is made of fallible human beings, for it is clear from simple logic that both judges cannot be right. Even though domestic law is different in different parts of the United Kingdom it is obvious by the same simple logic that international law cannot be different in different places.

Yet should we accuse one judge of a lack of integrity because he has disagreed with us and with another judge? Maybe we see a fellow human being who has a sincere desire for Justice even while interpreting the demands of Justice too narrowly. Change happened today in Scotland and will need to be followed up as that change is challenged in higher courts, as we believe it will be. That change has yet to start in the English courts, but is it surprising that a radical and welcome change does not start in two places at exactly the same time. Did each of us join the Peace movement at the same time, or start to support these defendants at the same time?

We have several hopes for change in England: and one of them was referred to by this Judge when summing up. "If I am wrong, as he [ie Stellan] thinks I am, then a higher court will correct me". Another possibility is that in some other trial a jury will go beyond the judge's direction. Other possibilities are that Parliament and the Government will change their minds, or be replaced by another Government that thinks differently.

In this trial our biggest hope was also the hardest thing to expect of another human being. We had a judge who has been taught to believe that consistency is an important part of justice, a judge who has already in a previous trial said that in his understanding of English law these defendants did not have a legal defence.

We dared to bring with us the hope that he might rule differently this time, and we were right to hope. We tried to give him every chance and every excuse to change, and he did listen to the arguments put forward by our legal expert. It was obvious from the interactions with Professor Grief that the Judge was listening seriously and was considering what was being said.

We were bitterly disappointed that he was not convinced by the arguments we put.

We were right to hope, and we are right to give space for our disappointment, and yet in my opinion we are wrong if we blame the judge for that disappointment.

But surely the judge is responsible for his own actions? Can we not be angry when he fails to act responsibly?

Ploughshares activists gave two judges an opportunity that not many people have had. A particular example of responsibility that most people have not been faced with. Our movement created that opportunity. We did deliberately choose to face judges with the special responsibility of stepping beyond the policy of the State and of ruling that the State in this matter is being illegal.

And yes, Judge Openshaw is personally responsible for the decisions he made, but we must not target only him with blame when we asked more of him that is asked of many people. And if he has missed an opportunity, perhaps before we blame him we need to think about the times when we, too, have missed an opportunity for disarmament and for justice.

While I was a student Britain had Polaris nuclear submarines, and students from my University went to Faslane and painted Rag slogans on the side of a Polaris submarine as a practical joke. They proved how easy in those days it was to get into Faslane, yet for 20 years I never took the opportunity to go there with my hammer. I did not think of it till someone else had planted a Seed of Hope in my mind that such an action could achieve something. I waited for someone else to go first.

So if I blame him and only him am I partly trying to ignore the times when I have not done everything I can?

We can take our hope and our disappointment, our joy and our anger from the different rulings that different judges gave when we gave both of them the same opportunity.

We can take the responsibility these verdicts give us: we now know *we* *can* *succeed* and it is now our very special responsibility to extend that success until all judges in every country are able and willing to declare nuclear weapons illegal.

And in Preston cannot ignore the testimony of the two defendants: we need to acknowledge the deep link between the aspirations of our particular society and the poverty in other parts of the world, to acknowledge that with or without nuclear weapons these aspirations are criminal in their intent as they ignore the humanity of the majority of those on our planet. This of course goes beyond the Nuremberg principles and beyond our treasured Opinion from the ICJ, and is a wider still call for Justice and Humanity.

Some of us think this will need radical changes inside the existing world order, others like me are even more radical and would replace this system by another. Well the jury is still out on that question, but:

if we do not take every opportunity to work for radical change,

if we have not taken every opportunity in the past however little or large it was,

if sometimes what we were doing right now seemed more important than Global Justice,

then maybe our anger now at this one Judge, the Judge who missed a glorious opportunity, maybe this anger can also remind us to work for every part of our world to know Justice and Humanity, and to remember that Humanitarian principles mean more than simply removing the nukes

maybe the energy that our anger gives us can be worked out physically with our hammers on the sides of Vengeance, or perhaps in finding different tactics or different arguments next time,

and certainly our anger tells us that there must be a next time,

but it is certainly not, I feel, helpful to stir up each other to demonize this one judge in our hearts. It is the policy of a whole system we are seeking to change. That change will start somewhere, as it already has in Scotland.

Let us use our anger while we have it as a source of power to help us move on and to help us find the place and time where that change will start.