Paxton lacks decency

Regarding “Supreme Court strikes down Roe v. Wade, ending constitutional protection of abortion rights,” (June 24): If you are ever on a jury, watch the lawyers at the end of the trial. One has won. One has lost. Yet at the end they typically exchange pleasantries.

This does not mean that the winner is not happy and the loser is not disappointed. Believe me. I know. I have experienced both. So why conclude with decency? Because it characterizes true professionals.

It is even nobility, what Edmund Burke called “a graceful ornament to the civil order.”

Where am I going with this? The reversal of Roe v. Wade is seen as a win to many people, yet it is a loss bringing anxiety and even fear to many others.

Attorney General Ken Paxton seems to see himself as a winner on this issue. He is supposed to be an official for all the people of Texas.

Does he deal with the Roe v. Wade reversal in a dignified way, sensitive to the impact on those who are losers? No. He declares a holiday for members of his office.

This brings to mind the powerful rhetorical statement by Joseph N. Welch in the McCarthy hearings. “Have you no sense of decency, sir?” Those words brought to an end Joseph McCarthy’s Senate career, a career based on a big lie. No, not a lie claiming a fraudulent election. His was a claim that the U.S. government was infested by communists. Hopefully, regardless of how we view a Supreme Court decision, we still desire decency of our public officials.

Stanley P. Santire, Houston

So, Attorney General Ken Paxton declared June 24 an agency holiday to celebrate the overturning of Roe v. Wade and a woman’s right to choose. Are we, the taxpayers, going to pay his employees’ salaries while they spend the day away from work? Let Paxton pay his staff ’s salaries out of his own corrupt pocket.

Linda Rehm, Houston