The question the court left open

One · What happened

The order that stopped short of the question

Federal supervised release after a tax conviction made Crystal Mason ineligible to vote under Texas law in 2016. She cast a provisional ballot in Tarrant County in that year’s presidential election. The ballot was never counted. In 2018 a Tarrant County district court convicted her of illegal voting and sentenced her to five years in prison. Under the statute the state must prove the voter knew she was ineligible. In March 2024 the Second Court of Appeals ruled that the state had not proved it and reversed the conviction.

The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals took up the reversal at the request of Tarrant County District Attorney Phil Sorrells. On 24 September it took that back in a short unsigned order. The five in the majority wrote only that, having examined the record and the briefs, “our decision to grant review was improvident.” Four judges dissented and would have gone on to decide if the evidence showed that Mason knew. Because the order never addressed what she knew, the reversal from 2024 stands.

Two · What it is doing

Wanting the court to say it

“A lawful vote should never be canceled out by an unlawful one,” Sorrells said after the order. Mason said in a statement that “in all these years, I never lost my faith that justice would be done.” Both lines reached readers whose minds were made up before the order came down. Those who wanted Mason vindicated saw four judges who could not let go. For the rest, the five who dismissed the case had avoided the question it was taken up to answer. By evening the verdict each reader supplied for the court felt like something he knew.

Mason spent nearly ten years with a charge and then a sentence over her head. The state’s highest criminal court closed the file by saying it should not have taken the case. Most of us are carrying a smaller version of that wait. A brother never apologized and a boss was never made to answer for what he did to you. You have argued both cases in the car for years in front of a judge in your head who hears only your side. God put the wish for justice in you. The psalmists ask Him for it again and again.

“The one who states his case first seems right, until the other comes and examines him,” Proverbs 18:17 says. A reader of this ruling has heard from Mason and from Sorrells, who each spoke for a side. The four dissenters wrote out reasons of their own. A reader who has taken in only the two statements picks up a small warmth from being proved right and a small contempt for whoever wanted the other verdict. Feeling righteous about a case he has heard half of is a poor use of a morning. He goes back the next day for more of both.

Three · Where the ground is

Even in the place of justice

In Ecclesiastes the Preacher looked at the seat of judgment and wrote that “in the place of justice, even there was wickedness.” He does not conclude from that observation that justice is a fiction. The next verse gives him something to say to his own heart. He writes in Ecclesiastes 3:17, “I said in my heart, God will judge the righteous and the wicked, for there is a time for every matter and for every work.”

In 1 Corinthians 4 Paul answers a church grading his work as a steward. He says it is “a very small thing that I should be judged by you or by any human court.” He adds that he does not even judge himself and knows of nothing against himself, yet he is “not thereby acquitted.” Since the ruling that counted belonged to the Lord, Paul told the Corinthians to pronounce no judgment before He comes to bring to light “the things now hidden in darkness.”

How long

“How long, O LORD? Will you forget me forever?” The psalmist put that question to God in Psalm 13:1 and God let it stay in the book. A person who has waited years for a ruling may pray the same words. So may somebody whose case is only a family quarrel. The same psalm goes on in verse 5 to say, “But I have trusted in your steadfast love.”

Paul told the church in Rome that one verdict is already in for everybody who belongs to Christ. He asked in Romans 8:33 who would bring any charge against God’s elect and answered, “It is God who justifies.” The basis for the verdict is the death and resurrection of Christ. Verse 34 goes on, “Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died.” Pews on the Sunday after this ruling will hold people who think Mason was treated unfairly and people who think she got off. Others among them are still waiting on a ruling of their own from a boss or a relative. All of them will stand before the same Judge. Their pastor can open the book with any of them and read what He has already said. Believers who disagree about a ballot in Tarrant County can still eat lunch together.

Four · Today

Five things, and none of them are “stay informed”

Nobody has to decide what Crystal Mason knew to do any of these.

1. 01

   Count the cases you are still arguing.

   Take a sheet of paper. List the disputes you have rehearsed in the past month, such as the brother who never apologized for what he said or the boss who blamed you in front of the whole team. Put the year each one started next to it. A case is anything you keep retrying in your head because nobody with authority ever ruled that you were right.

2. 02

   Give the worst one to God, with the name in it.

   Pick the case that costs you the most sleep and tell God the person’s name and what he did, in the words you would use with a friend. If what he did was a crime, the police and a lawyer come first and prayer follows them. Since Romans 12:19 says vengeance is His and that He will repay, ask Him to judge it. Expect to be back at it next week. A case that has run for years rarely closes on one hearing.

3. 03

   Ask what the other person would say happened.

   The next time somebody at your table tells a story in which he was wronged, ask what the other person would say happened. Wait for the answer before you agree with anything. James 1:19 asks for people who are quick to hear and slow to speak. Most friends can take that question in stride. A child who hears you ask it will pick up the habit.

4. 04

   Call the person you know who is waiting on a hearing.

   Somebody you know from church, or one of your neighbors, may have a custody date or a sentencing coming up. Call and ask when it is, then ask if you can drive him or sit with him that day. Put that date in your own calendar and ask how it went.

5. 05

   Bring your pastor the charge you keep filing against yourself.

   Plenty of people carry one, something done years ago that a verdict in their own hearts has never let go of. Sit down with a pastor or a biblical counselor and tell him the charge first, then read Romans 8:33–34 together. Paul says the Lord is the one who judges him (1 Corinthians 4:4). For a person in Christ that Judge is the One who died for him.