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half of Jackson, and we'd go over to Natchez and Vicksburg every now and then just for good measure. So I was at a judges meeting a week or so ago and we were talking about the number of cases that the judges had and how much they had to do, and I kind of thought back to myself, I wish some of these judges had been with Judge Russell and I 25 years ago when we had only two or three judges and one magistrate and then finally two. We had our hands full, and it really didn't change that much when Judge Gex came on. We had 6,000 asbestos cases on top of a 1,000 caseload. So we talk about being caught up these days, well we ought to be caught up we've got three times as many judges, all have two law clerks, pro se law clerks. It's a period in time which it's a lot easier than it was during the late '70's or '70's and '80's.
But Judge Russell handled some very, very difficult cases during that time period. Those are the days of the initial civil rights cases. There were redistricting cases. We had the ever present school
JAMIE L. WETZEL, CSR - CIRCUIT COURT REPORTER