Ronald M George

Education and early career

Ron George grew up in Beverly Hills, the son of a Hungarian immigrant mother and French immigrant father. A 1957 graduate of Beverly Hills High School, George earned his B.A. from Princeton University in 1961 and his J.D. from Stanford Law School in 1964.

Upon graduating from Stanford, George was a Deputy California Attorney General from 1965–1972. As a Deputy Attorney General, he argued unsuccessfully on behalf of the State of California before the United States Supreme Court in Chimel v. California in 1969. The following year, he again represented California before the U.S. Supreme Court, this time successfully defending the death penalty in McGautha v. California. In 1971, he represented California as an amicus curiae in support of the successful argument of the State of Illinois in Kirby v. Illinois.

In 1972, his final year as a Deputy Attorney General, George unsuccessfully argued in favor of the death penalty before the California Supreme Court in California v. Anderson but was successful in defending the conviction of Sirhan Sirhan in the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy, a U.S. Senator and 1968 presidential candidate. The ruling in California v. Anderson resulted in the dismissal of Aikens v. California as moot; George was to have represented the State of California in this case.

Early judicial career

Governor Ronald Reagan appointed George as a Judge of the Los Angeles Municipal Court on April 20, 1972. George was elected to a full six-year term on November 2, 1976. Governor Jerry Brown appointed him to the Los Angeles County Superior Court on December 23, 1977; George was elected to a full six-year term on November 7, 1978, and re-elected on November 6, 1984.

As a Superior Court judge, George presided over the trial of Hillside Strangler Angelo Buono in 1981–1983. George also presided over the trial of Marvin Gay, Sr. for the slaying of Gay's son, the singer Marvin Gaye. George was lauded for his extremely unusual decision to deny the motion by Los Angeles County District Attorney's office to dismiss all 10 counts of murder against Buono. However, his unusual decision was speculated to be a result of his earlier decision to separate crucial counts of rape and sodomy, which in themselves would serve as evidence against the defendant, from the murder charges. The prosecutors felt the evidence against Buono was so weak that it did not justify even an attempt to win at trial. Judges rarely second-guess the prosecutors' judgment on such a matter (and George stated that he was "loath" to do so). However, George's review of the evidence in the case caused him to feel so strongly that the prosecutors were in error that he did exactly that. George reassigned the case to the California Attorney General's office, and that office successfully convicted Buono on nine of the 10 counts. Thus, it was recognized that the judge, through his action to deny the earlier motion to dismiss, had ultimately prevented a serial killer from going free. Oddly, Los Angeles County District Attorney John Van de Kamp had been elected California Attorney General in the middle of the lengthy trial, so a Van de Kamp-led District Attorney's office attempted to dismiss the unwinnable case only to have a Van de Kamp-led Attorney General's office win nine convictions in the case.

Governor George Deukmejian appointed him to the California Second District Court of Appeal on July 23, 1987. George was confirmed and sworn in on August 27, 1987, and was elected to a full twelve-year term on November 6, 1990.

Supreme Court

Governor Pete Wilson appointed Justice Ron George to the California Supreme Court on July 29, 1991. George was confirmed and sworn in as an Associate Justice on September 3, 1991. California voters elected him to a full twelve-year term on November 8, 1994. Wilson appointed George as the 27th Chief Justice of California on March 28, 1996. George was confirmed and sworn into office on May 1, 1996. He was elected to a full twelve-year term on November 3, 1998, with 75.5% percent of the vote.

George was occasionally floated as a candidate for justice of the United States Supreme Court as a conservative acceptable to Democrats, such as when Democratic United States Senator Barbara Boxer suggested George as a potential nominee for the seat on the Court vacated by Sandra Day O'Connor's retirement. Boxer described both George and his fellow California Supreme Court Justice Kathryn Werdegar, as Republicans who "reflect the spirit of Sandra Day O'Connor's tenure—independent and nonideological."

In 2008, Justice George authored the opinion in the Supreme Court's 4-3 ruling in In re Marriage Cases legalizing same-sex marriage in California. Citing the court's 1948 decision legalizing interracial marriages, George's opinion found that sexual orientation is a protected class like race and gender, meaning that attempts to ban same-sex marriage would be subject to strict scrutiny under the Equal Protection Clause of the California Constitution. It was the first state high court in the country to do so. Voters would overturn the decision less than six months later by passing Proposition 8 in the November 2008 elections. However, Proposition 8 would itself be later overturned by a federal court in Perry v. Schwarzenegger, and thus In Re Marriage Cases was reinstated as valid constitutional law in California.

On July 14, 2010, Justice George announced he would not seek to be re-elected in 2010 and would therefore retire at the end of his term: January 2, 2011. He was succeeded by Tani Cantil-Sakauye.

In 2013, after his retirement, he published a book of memoirs, Chief: the quest for justice in California, about his term on the Supreme Court.

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