A New Beginning For Adolescents in Our Criminal Justice System

As I step away from the bench, I am feeling more than ever what Dr. Martin Luther King called “the fierce urgency of now.” Now is the time for all of us who care about justice in this country to roll up our sleeves and get to work. We may be in a moment of crisis, but as the saying goes, a crisis is a terrible thing to waste. We urgently need to change our focus from jails and prisons to treatment, education, job training. So where is the “new beginning”? The “new beginning” is not a search for new ideas. We do not need new ideas. We know what works, and we sure do know what does not work. The “new beginning” is with each of us—new resolve, new enthusiasm, new dedication to the return of America. It is what President Obama described as “a new era of responsibility, a recognition, on the part of every American, that we have duties to ourselves, our nation, and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character, than giving our all to a difficult task.” I hope you will join me in the difficult task of making a difference for adolescents whose lives intersect with the justice system

The U.S Constitution: The Original American Dream

Adapted from Remarks delivered at Law Day ceremonies May 1, 1996, at Court of Appeals Hall, Albany, New York

A Tribute to Hon. George Bundy Smith -- Colleague, Teacher, and Friend

A tribute to Judge George Bundy Smith, discussing his work ethic both as a judge, professor, and mentor, his principles as a jurist, and his personal qualities

A New Beginning For Adolescents in Our Criminal Justice System

As I step away from the bench, I am feeling more than ever what Dr. Martin Luther King called “the fierce urgency of now.” Now is the time for all of us who care about justice in this country to roll up our sleeves and get to work. We may be in a moment of crisis, but as the saying goes, a crisis is a terrible thing to waste. We urgently need to change our focus from jails and prisons to treatment, education, job training. So where is the “new beginning”? The “new beginning” is not a search for new ideas. We do not need new ideas. We know what works, and we sure do know what does not work. The “new beginning” is with each of us—new resolve, new enthusiasm, new dedication to the return of America. It is what President Obama described as “a new era of responsibility, a recognition, on the part of every American, that we have duties to ourselves, our nation, and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character, than giving our all to a difficult task.” I hope you will join me in the difficult task of making a difference for adolescents whose lives intersect with the justice system

Atmospheric water vapor transport: Estimation of continental precipitation recycling and parameterization of a simple climate model

The advective transport of atmospheric water vapor and its role in global hydrology and the water balance of continental regions are discussed and explored. The data set consists of ten years of global wind and humidity observations interpolated onto a regular grid by objective analysis. Atmospheric water vapor fluxes across the boundaries of selected continental regions are displayed graphically. The water vapor flux data are used to investigate the sources of continental precipitation. The total amount of water that precipitates on large continental regions is supplied by two mechanisms: (1) advection from surrounding areas external to the region; and (2) evaporation and transpiration from the land surface recycling of precipitation over the continental area. The degree to which regional precipitation is supplied by recycled moisture is a potentially significant climate feedback mechanism and land surface-atmosphere interaction, which may contribute to the persistence and intensification of droughts. A simplified model of the atmospheric moisture over continents and simultaneous estimates of regional precipitation are employed to estimate, for several large continental regions, the fraction of precipitation that is locally derived. In a separate, but related, study estimates of ocean to land water vapor transport are used to parameterize an existing simple climate model, containing both land and ocean surfaces, that is intended to mimic the dynamics of continental climates