Monday, October 13, 2014 | 11:34 p.m. CDT
COLUMBIA — About four or five years ago, the U.S. Supreme Court invited South African judge Albie Sachs to lunch.
"The cuisine was not very good, but, the conversation was marvelous," he said.
During the dinner, one of the justices asked Sachs if the court he served on, the Constitutional Court of South Africa, was an "activist court."
Of course, he said, not only is it an activist court, but South Africa upholds an activist constitution.
Sachs, who survived a 1988 assassination attempt by South African security services before Nelson Mandela appointed him to South Africa's highest court in 1994, said he has a proud legacy of being an "activist judge." He struck down voting restrictions, capital punishment and, most recently, laws barring same-sex marriage.
Speaking Monday night at Busch Auditorium, Sachs said people shouldn't "throw out (the word) 'activists' as a term of abuse. That is putting pressure on someone for having that kind of thinking."
He bristles when he hears "activist" used as an insult because he thinks activist judges helped lead South Africa away from apartheid. Judges are uniquely positioned to uphold dignity and fundamental rights in the face of systematic inequality, he said.
Sachs also played a large role in drafting the South African constitution. He thinks it's a unique document because most constitutions preserve the status quo; South Africa's upended it.
"We in South Africa, we are very proud of our constitutional court," Sachs said.
Sachs said much remains broken in his home country.
"There's hundreds of thousands of people walking around barefoot because they can't afford shoes," Sachs said. "There's maybe twelve million people living in shacks."
These enormous disparities, he said, are activists' next task.