Other writers of these pages have already quoted extensively from Mr. Kılıç's 16-page-long speech. Therefore I won't report it extensively. But there were a few crucial points worth underlining. One was the top judge's emphasis on the impartiality of the judiciary. After wisely noting, “Rule of law does not mean rule of the judicator,” he reminded: “Justice must be impartial, and lack of impartiality means lack of justice.”

Impartiality of The Judiciary

This is a crucial point, because in Turkey what is often emphasized is the “independence” of judges, not their impartiality. In fact, their impartiality is disapproved, because it is always argued that judges must protect “the founding principles of the Republic,” which constitute, in fact, the political ideology of the Republican People's Party (CHP).

This is a well-established tradition. In the 70's Bülent Ecevit, the then leader of the CHP, had proudly declared, “The judiciary is at the hand of the revolutionaries.” The revolutionaries, a.k.a. the Kemalists, are, of course, only a faction of Turkish society. Therefore the judiciary is not neutral; it supports one group of the society against the others.

Thus the impartiality that Mr. Kılıç argued for is in fact against the very nature of the Turkish judiciary, and, actually, the Turkish Republic itself.

In an even more striking comment, Mr. Kılıç turned the basic logic of the Turkish state upside down. “The fundamental duty of the Constitutional Court,” he said, “is to protect the rights and liberties of the individuals from institutions that exercise state power.” This is the exact opposite of the orthodox Ankara mindset, which is all about protecting state institutions from the rights and liberties of the individuals.

(In case you haven't noticed, all the guardians of the regime, from CHP leader Deniz Baykal to Chief Prosecutor Abdurrahman Yalçınkaya, are constantly speaking about the need to “protect the Republic.” Protecting from whom, you might ask. From the citizens, of course!)

Another notable emphasis in Mr. Kılıç's speech was the way he described human dignity. “The respect to human honor,” he said, “requires that the human being should be able to decide what he will be, and how he will be so.” This is again a heretical thought for Turkey's official ideology, which claims to have the authority to decide what the Turkish citizens will be and how they will be so.

That is actually the basic idea of the whole republican project. The famous 10th Anniversary March, which is a sort of Kemalist anthem, includes the famous line, “We have created 15 million youngsters in 10 years.” 15 million was the roughly the population of Turkey at the time, i.e., 1933. So the idea was that the whole nation was “recreated” by the state. And all these newborns were “young” regardless of their age, because they, supposedly, had been cleansed from the values and judgments of the Ottoman "ancien régime". The ones who proved to be indoctrinated would soon be defined as “internal enemies.”

Therefore what Mr. Kılıç seems to suggest is that all citizens – including the “internal enemies” who constitute at least half of the nation – has the right to decide “what they will be how they will be so.” This is, for sure, a very strange idea in these lands.

The Guardians Strike Back

It is of course very refreshing to know that Mr. Kılıç is the head of the Constitutional Court, a key institution that will soon decide upon the fate of the government. But, unfortunately, this liberal judge represents the minority view there. Over the past years, and months, the court proved to be dominated by the illiberal judges. The ratio is 3 to 8, or 4 to 7 at best.

On the other hand, the self-appointed guardians of the republic wasted no time to take on Mr. Kılıç. Vural Savaş, the former Chief Prosecutor of the Court of Appeals, spoke the other day at a panel held at the Akdeniz University, whose rector, like Mr. Savaş himself, is a die-hard Kemalist. In his speech, Mr. Savaş severely criticized Haşim Kılıç for his liberal speech. He especially disagreed with the notion of impartiality. “Judges can't be impartial when it comes to the secular Republic,” he reminded. “The impartiality mentioned in this speech,” Mr. Savaş underlined, “is not acceptable for the judges of the Turkish Republic.”

With their opposing points of view, the two men, Mr. Kılıç and Mr. Savaş, seem to be the icons of two contradictory schools of thought. For the former, the people have sovereignty over their lives, and over the state. For the former, the sovereignty rests with the state, and its ruling elite, who can dictate to the people how they shall live.

I find the first view righteous, and the second one unrighteous, and I know that these are normative, value-loaded terms. So be it. I do judge people, and systems, based on values such as justice, rights, and freedoms. I think these are the first things, and second things – such as the state, the republic, or secularism – are worthy of respect only when they serve the first things. But for others, second things are come first.

At the core of Turkey's political wars, there lies this clash of values. And when you have such opposing values, it is really hard to find common ground.