The Hawaii Supreme Court will be in session on Kauai, hearing oral arguments involving an actual case, Wednesday, April 10, from 10 to 11 a.m. at the Kauai Community College Performing Arts Center.
The case is In the Matter of BCI Coca-Cola Bottling Company of Los Angeles, Inc., and a summary of the case is on the state Judiciary’s website. Look for the Upcoming Events calendar and click on April 10.
This month, some students from Kauai schools are involved in a five-week curriculum developed by the Kamehameha V Judiciary History Center and the Students for Public Outreach and Civic Education of the University of Hawaii at Manoa’s William S. Richardson School of Law.
Volunteer attorneys from the Kauai Bar Association are joining teachers in the classroom to provide overviews of the legal system and the key issues of the case that the high court will hear. The attorneys will also facilitate a moot-court activity where students assume the roles of the parties involved and argue the case themselves.
When they attend the oral arguments in April, they will get to see how the five justices’ approach to the case compares with their own.
This is all part of the Judiciary’s “Courts in the Community” program.
National Judicial Outreach Week was established in 2017 by the American Bar Association to enhance the public’s understanding of the rule of law — the legal principle that everyone is accountable to the law, no one is above the law, and all people are to be treated equally in accordance with the law.
That system of justice works best when serving a well-informed community. Therefore, one of the state Judiciary’s most important functions is providing education about the legal process.
A program that does this is “Courts in the Community,” in which the Hawaii Supreme Court travels throughout the state to hear oral arguments in a real case.
The program educates students and the public about the Judiciary’s role in government by providing opportunities to attend actual Supreme Court hearings. Since the program’s inception in 2012, more than 4,500 students have participated.
Without the support of the Hawaii State Bar Association and Kauai Bar Association, and the attorneys volunteering their time to guide the students, this program would not be possible.
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The Honorable Randal G. Valenciano is chief judge of Hawaii’s Fifth Judicial Circuit.
