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2023 Harv. J.L. & Pub. Pol'y Per Curiam 1 (2023)

handle is hein.journals/hpercrm2023 and id is 1 raw text is: Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy Per Curiam EULOGY FOR HOLDEN TANNER JUSTICE JIMMY BLACKLOCK* The following eulogy was delivered at Holden's funeral on Sunday, March 20, 2022, at the First Baptist Church of Pearland, in Pearland, TX. Footage of the funeral service, including this eulogy, can be accessed at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cakUzk3LRyk. I need to begin by expressing my deepest gratitude to Holden's dear wife Stephanie, and to his loving parents, Patty and John, for giving me this opportunity, this great privilege, to be able to share these words with you-in honor of my law clerk, my friend, my brother in Christ, Holden Tanner. I hired Holden to be my law clerk at the Texas Supreme Court without meeting him at all! All I needed to see was his resume. I was partial to Holden's resume because it was so much like mine: raised by a Christian family not far from Houston, an undergraduate degree from a state school in Texas, then Yale Law School, with plans to come back to Texas for a judicial clerkship. On paper, we had a lot in common. Unlike me, Holden had gathered all these credentials after being homeschooled-and that part of his background assured me that he came from parents who sacrificed their own comfort and convenience to try to raise up a faithful and virtuous young man. All of us who knew Holden would agree that, with God's help, his parents did exactly that. We must all thank the Lord first for the blessing of our time with Holden-but we should also give thanks to Holden's parents and his wife Stephanie for helping to make him the man he was. Judges compete with each other to attract the best law clerks, and I knew Holden was the kind of student I needed to scoop up quickly before somebody else beat me to it. So, I hired Holden the day I got his resume-after a quick telephone interview-for a clerkship that wouldn't start for another couple of years. Little did I know when I hired The Holden Tanner of the Sterling Resume, that The Holden Tanner of Flesh and Blood would walk in the door and exceed my wildest dreams! Holden was a brilliant, hard-working, extraordinarily well-read, sensitive, generous, and very principled young man. It does not do him justice merely to say-as is true-that he was as talented as any law clerk I could ever hope to have. To talk of Holden Tanner merely as a law clerk is not nearly enough. Holden was one of the most extraordinary men I have ever known-a talented lawyer, yes, but also a philosopher, a theologian, a political theorist, a writer, an artist at heart - and a far better lawyer because he was also all those other things. More important than all that-Holden Tanner was a man after God's own Heart. Working with him made me a better judge, and knowing him made me a better person. * The Supreme Court of Texas. Holden Tanner clerked for Justice Blacklock in 2021-22. 1 Winter 2023 No. 1

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