Filling the court with future lawyers: El Portal students go to courthouse

“Why don’t you have a gavel?” a student asked Mariposa County Superior Court Judge Anita Starchman Bryant.

“Well, because I have these two guys to keep the order,” Bryant said, referring to the court officers beside her.

Second through sixth graders from El Portal Elementary School visited the Mariposa County Courthouse on Thursday, Oct. 22 for a field trip.

Two teachers led the trip, one being Matthew Marcis who teaches fifth and sixth graders and the other Laura Ouburg, teaching second, third and fourth.

Before the trip inside, they ran off their energy on the grass outside, doing cartwheels and front flips.

After getting scanned, up the stairs they went into the second floor where the main courtroom lays.

Once seated in the courtroom, they had questions. Bryant tested them on the two presidents framed behind the judge’s chair.

“On the left is Abraham Lincoln,” Bryant said. “Can anyone tell me who’s on the right?”

“Thomas Jefferson!” answered a student holding a gavel a relative had lent her for the day.

Bryant went over the roles in a courtroom, from the judge to the prosecutor, the defense attorney to the jury, the court officers to the defendant.

“Who here wants to be a lawyer?” she asked.

More than half the room raised their hands and shouted, “Me!”

Not everyone could be the lawyer, but little by little the students filled every seat.

The judge’s desk was made from trees about a mile away, she told them, and some screws keep it “from falling apart,” like other old furnishings in the courthouse.

From a window on the right, she told the class she used to live in the house next door.

There was no time for a mock trial, but every student got a taste of what their seat represents and the history of the 172-year-old courthouse.

Bryant then led the class out of the courtroom, past the stairs to the clock tower, where the clock is wound by hand.

Students got a peek at her office and the bathroom right next to it, which still seems to never run with warm water, before heading into the law library.

Inside, they looked up at the shelves, which hold historical legal logs and record books much older than the visitors.

Bryant said the room is where attorneys meet before a hearing and where judges prepare their research.

“Don’t touch the book!” one student called out.

They traced the pages of the fragile volumes carefully.

With wondering eyes, they listened as Bryant described the room and the information held on its four walls.

When the tour ended, a family had wandered in with a little boy. Bryant crouched until she was at his eye level and gave him her full attention, the same way she had for 30 students a few minutes earlier.