One in a series on local judges.
by Glenn Tschimpke
Staff Writer
L. Haldane Taylor is looking for more patience. After all, he doesn’t “suffer fools kindly.”
The Circuit Court judge says it earnestly. His patience is something his wife Dee has been trying to improve for a while now. But 16 years on the bench — five years as a Duval County Court judge and 11 as a circuit judge — could erode anyone’s patience. Taylor sees people at their lowest point in situations that range from tragic to pathetic. He’s been in every division and seen every type of case. He’s heard every excuse from deadbeat dads and defendants that “didn’t do it.”
“But when you’re dealing with juveniles and delinquency and dependency and family courts, you see some pretty terrific things,” said Taylor. “I think the Lord has worked on me to give me a little more patience and understanding. It’s amazing what we see here.”
“Here” is the Duval County Courthouse, which Taylor likens to a hellish experience for many plaintiffs and defendants alike.
“Abandon hope all ye who enter here.” He borrows the line from Dante’s “Divine Comedy” inscription at the entrance to Hell.
“I think a lot of people who come into the courthouse are totally confused by what’s going on. They’re anxious. They’re upset. If we can just do what we can to try to reduce that stress and make people feel like they’ve been heard and give them an opportunity to say their bit, that’s all we can do.”
If Taylor sounds hard, it could be the Marine in him talking. Sure it’s been 35 years since he donned a set of camouflaged fatigues, but the Marine Corps hasn’t clung to its motto Semper Fidelis, only because it sounds cool. “Always faithful” is ingrained in every recruit worthy of absorbing the verbal and physical lashings of a Marine drill instructor.
Young men have a million different reasons to join the Marines. For Taylor, it was a book.
“I had read, at some point while I was in college, Leon Uris’ book ‘Battle Cry.’ Of course it was his experiences in World War II in the South Pacific. He wrote so well and I enjoyed that book so much that I thought if I ever got drafted I would go in the Marine Corps,” Taylor chuckled. “That’s what I did.”
Taylor was a youngster from rural southern Georgia. When he was 10, his folks moved to Jacksonville. He grew up in Arlington, graduated from Terry Parker High School and headed south to Gainesville to the University of Florida. Like so many of his generation, Vietnam became a mandatory vacation for young men in the 1960s. Instead of gambling on a relatively safe position in the Navy, Taylor opted for a stint in the Marines, albeit with a rare two-year enlistment. In 1966, he found himself sloshing through rice patties and plodding through jungles.
Exciting?
“More boring, I would say. But it was true to the book,” he said, nodding to “Battle Cry.” “It had changed over the years from the 1940s to the 1960s. All in all it was a good experience. I was blessed. I was saved in Vietnam. I went through without any injuries or wounds, physical or psychological. I praise God for that. It was a quite a life-changing experience.
“It’s like they say when you’re an aircraft pilot; it’s hours of boredom interrupted by moments of sheer terror,” he continued. “That’s what it was like. You’ll spend a week or two not doing much of anything, especially during the monsoon season. Then all of a sudden you’ll find yourself in an ambush thinking this may be it.”
Was he scared?
“Oh, yes. Fear is a great motivator,” he said. “It keeps you thinking. You’d spend a lot of time going through rice paddies and jungles and nothing happened. You’d be sweaty and filthy. All of a sudden, you turn a curve and there would be machine guns coming at you.”
After leaving the Marines, Taylor returned to Florida to finish his education, first with a bachelor’s degree in economics and second with a law degree. He said his interest in a law began by hanging around — of all places — the fraternity house.
“We had a number of guys who were in law school,” he said. “They were around the house and I enjoyed listening to them discuss those courses, particularly at that time because there were a lot of civil rights things and marches. In business school, you had to take a lot of business law courses. I took them all. I just seemed to have a natural interest in them.”
Taylor parlayed his legal bent into a lifelong career. Out of law school, he joined Lou Frost in the Public Defender’s Office for two years, followed by several years as a private practitioner and a stint with the Board of Education.
But before there was law, there was Dee, the daughter of a friend of a friend. Taylor happened to notice how attractive that friend of a friend was at a house party in late 1968. She was married, but she had a daughter.
“Give her a call,” Taylor was urged.
Taylor called Dee sight unseen and arranged for a date.
“At first it didn’t go too well,” he recalled. “I think we were both suspicious of each other.”
But Taylor kept at it.
“By July, about six months later, I started thinking this is the one the Lord has in mind,” he said. “So I proposed to her in December 1969. We got married in April 1970 and we’ve been together ever since.”
They have two daughters: Holly, a Tallahassee attorney, and Kelly, a nurse.
In 1968, on April Fool’s Day, Taylor got a call from then-governor Bob Graham.
“Hal, you want to be a judge?”
Taylor had applied for one of two vacant Duval County Court seats. He got one, Al Washington got the other.
“It was a nice April Fool’s Day call,” said Taylor.
Five years later, he got another call from the governor. This time it was Lawton Chiles who broke the news. Taylor made the cut to move to Circuit Court.
At 57, Taylor reasons he has one more judicial term left in him. He’s up for election in 2004, which would put him at 65 when he retires. Although he can work until 70, he wants to get a few good years of leisure. Look for him to retreat to his land in mountains of western North Carolina where he hopes to build a cabin in a few years. It’s still a while away, but it will give him a chance to practice his patience.