단상斷想

Since the declaration of martial law on December 3rd last year, Korean politics seems to be wandering in a fog where you really can't see an inch ahead. Yoon Seok-yeol shook the country up and down, and now it's the Supreme Court. It's like a whack-a-mole game, when you knock one down, another pops up.

With the 6.3 early presidential election just over a month away, this time the Supreme Court is putting on a 'sudden appearance' performance. On the 1st, the Supreme Court overturned the appellate court's acquittal in the case of Lee Jae-myung, the Democratic Party of Korea's presidential candidate, under the Public Official Election Act, and sent it back to the Seoul High Court with the intention of finding him guilty. Since there is absolutely not enough physical time to conclude the Seoul High Court's retrial and the Supreme Court's final appeal, it is expected that Lee Jae-myung's candidacy for the 6.3 presidential election will not be affected.

In particular, it is not a fatal result for candidate Lee Jae-myung because the Supreme Court made a legally guilty judgment on candidate Lee Jae-myung, but did not make a final judgment (reversal judgment) and did not participate in the Seoul High Court trial schedule. Nevertheless, with only 33 days left before the June 3 presidential election, candidate Lee is in a position to squeeze himself back into the shackles of judicial risk.

There is one thing that is most bizarre and questionable in this Supreme Court's 'judicial turmoil'. Why did the Supreme Court rush the trial so rapidly, even giving the impression that it was unreasonably rushing only the trial for candidate Lee Jae-myung's violation of the election law?

The fact that the Supreme Court en banc held the first hearing on April 22 and then another hearing just two days later on the 24th was considered unprecedented and highly unusual. Accordingly, there was speculation that it reflected the intention of Chief Justice Cho Hee-dae to deliver a verdict before the 6.3 general election. One progressive figure even said, "Seeing Chief Justice Cho Hee-dae rushing to set a new record for speedy trials, I had a strange feeling."

But even at this time, the feeling wasn't that strong. Around the Democratic Party, positive predictions were dominant, saying, "The Supreme Court is publicly confirming the innocence of leading candidate Lee in order to line up behind him and hold an 'Lee Jae-myung coronation'." At this time, when the desire for a change of government was higher than ever due to former President Yoon Seok-yeol's martial law and impeachment, almost no one predicted that the Supreme Court would be so oblivious as to overturn the guilty verdict and send it back for review, thus spoiling the atmosphere.

In particular, there was a 'super positive' interpretation that the Supreme Court Chief Justice Cho, who is a 'principled person,' intended to uphold the election law '6·3·3 (first trial within 6 months after indictment, second and third trials within 3 months after the original trial)' principle, which he emphasized from the beginning of his inauguration, and to prevent political and social confusion by concluding the judicial risks of leading presidential candidates before the presidential election, while demonstrating the independence and trust of the judiciary, so the Supreme Court's 'innocence' was taken for granted.

However, the Democratic Party and the people are still naive. Some progressive figures warned that the conservative tendencies of the judiciary and the 'stubbornness' of the legal vested interest cartel should never be overlooked, but they could not control the positive mindset of candidate Lee Jae-myung's camp, which was entering the mainstream.

Today (May 1, 2025), we are witnessing that the vested interests are still in place since the liberation, when a large number of people who served Japan as lower-level legal managers during the Japanese colonial period were appointed as judges. When Democratic Party and progressive figures shouted 'The Supreme Court is on our side' on YouTube, Cho Hee-dae and his Supreme Court justices secretly smiled, saying, 'We'll see,' and the result came out guilty today.

Cho Hee-dae and the 10 guilty-minded Supreme Court justices, though they didn't outwardly express it, likely approached this trial with arrogance and a sense of superiority, believing, "We can change the president with our own hands." Therefore, they must have been secretly delighted that they were able to protect the vested interests of their legal seniors, which had been passed down since the Japanese colonial period.

Furthermore, the Supreme Court justices likely solidified their belief that they are superior to politicians by delivering a counterpunch to candidate Lee Jae-myung this time, thereby showing off the judiciary's presence. In particular, the Supreme Court must have been very satisfied with checking the Constitutional Court's surge in "political status," which had skyrocketed due to the presidential impeachment ruling, and imprinting their own presence along with it.

As the Constitutional Court made a significant contribution to the 'impeachment' of former President Yoon Seok-yeol and received national support and approval, the status and presence of the Supreme Court, the highest representative body of the judiciary, were relatively diminished. In that situation, the prey called 'Lee Jae-myung' was caught in their radar.

Regarding the impression that the Supreme Court was 'pushed back' by the Constitutional Court, an atmosphere was formed that the Supreme Court, with the highest pride of judges, could not stand still. Unusually, just before the biggest political event of the presidential election, the most promising presidential candidate was framed with a 'guilty frame', and the essence of this guilty verdict is virtually judicial lynching. The Democratic Party must never condone this 'violence' of the judiciary. We must strongly resist and fight against the political bias and selective justice of the Supreme Court.

Law is more than just clauses. It is the minimum common sense shared by society, and above all, it must be the product of a temporal and political consensus. However, the Supreme Court's decision in the recent Lee Jae-myung candidate case ignored both of these criteria. When the law is divorced from the common sense of citizens and detached from political reality, legal judgment is reduced to a tool of judicial power, not justice.

In light of these facts, this Supreme Court's 'fastest record-breaking trial' is nothing more or less than political intervention. The voices of the two Supreme Court justices who, with minimal conscience, expressed dissenting opinions against the Supreme Court's ruling, calling it 'judicialization of politics,' were buried by the coercion of 10 vested legal interests and remained an empty echo.

The fact that the Supreme Court announced that it would broadcast the verdict live for the third time in history is also a part that raises strong suspicion that it is a 'Lee Jae-myung killing' by vested legal interests. In fact, some conservatives have been talking about analyzing the hidden intentions of the Supreme Court's live broadcast.

The reason is that if Chief Justice Cho makes a decision to overturn and remand Lee Jae-myung's guilty verdict, the progressive camp will be greatly shocked and resistance will reach its peak, so if the Chief Justice stands in front of the camera and explains Lee Jae-myung's 'crime' in detail and logically, the antipathy will subside somewhat.

However, the Supreme Court's live broadcast is having the effect of solidifying a negative frame of Lee Jae-myung, a candidate ahead of the presidential election, as committing illegal acts. The grounds for guilt pointed out by Chief Justice Cho became a mechanism for demonizing candidate Lee. This also solidifies the conservative's confirmation bias of 'Lee Jae-myung the devil' and may have the effect of giving 'blind votes' to conservative candidates among the moderates.

This seems to be modeled after the learning effect of the Constitutional Court's live broadcast of the presidential impeachment. The public was moved by acting Chief Justice Moon Hyung-bae's 'ruling,' 'immersed' in its legal logic, and sympathized with it, which greatly raised the status of the Constitutional Court. The Supreme Court probably had the expectation that if it logically explained Lee Jae-myung's wrongdoings to the public with a logical yardstick, their 'legal status' would also be evaluated.

However, the Supreme Court justices and judicial vested interests we are witnessing now are living comfortably in their own league, completely detached from the political public sentiment. Most of the judicial vested interests who tasted wealth and power after passing the bar exam never want to let go of their superior position, which is alienated from public sentiment. The cartel of conservative politics and the legal profession, which has taken root in Korean society since the Japanese colonial period, will never give up its vested interests.

Therefore, paradoxically, Lee Jae-myung's rise to power is even more necessary. Cho Hee-dae's 'framing Lee Jae-myung as guilty' will fail. And it will only further solidify the desperation and sense of historical mission that the people must punish and reform the judicial vested interests that have taken root like cancer in our society through the ballot box.