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Bernstein was first elected to the Michigan Supreme Court in 2015 (Photo Source: Michigan Supreme Court)<\/em><\/p>\n\u201cEverything with me is very spiritual,\u201d Bernstein said. \u201cEverything has a kind of spiritual, kind of religious component that goes with it. And when I was in Law School, it was an immense trouble, like, you have no idea. There were days, you know, as a blind person going through this, that I just wondered if I was going to finish. It was really challenging. And there were days where I was like, you know what, I\u2019m gonna get through this.\u201d<\/p>\n
It\u2019s been said that he spent 13 hours each day, that\u2019s seven days a week, memorizing the material for his classes. Someone would repeatedly read the questions and fact patterns to him until he could memorize the answers well enough for his exams.<\/p>\n
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Turning Struggle into Triumph<\/p>\n
After giving his commencement speech for the graduating students of Hamtramck, Bernstein told the Yemeni American News of the importance of Hamtramck\u2019s students, their education and the future that will be defined by the students of Hamtramck.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey have an understanding and appreciation of the world that the vast majority of people will never know,\u201d Bernstein said about the graduating students. \u201cJust because they\u2019ve had to work so hard for everything they\u2019ve got\u2026 and as a result, they will use those experiences and they will literally transform the world. That\u2019s why this place is so important. That\u2019s why the school is so important. And that\u2019s why this commencement is so important.\u201d<\/p>\n
Bernstein has had his whole life to make sense of his visual disability. And from that, he\u2019s developed an ethos of using it to fight for people with disabilities. In a famous case against the city of Detroit, he set the national standard for how public transportation is brought into ADA compliance.<\/p>\n
The lawsuit was against the Detroit Department of Transportation. Alleging that the majority of buses in Detroit were out of compliance for transporting disabled veterans, Bernstein found that 60% of Detroit\u2019s buses had broken chairlifts, forcing people with physical disabilities to wait at transfer stations for a bus that often wouldn\u2019t come.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat this case ultimately did – which is why I love being a lawyer – What the case ultimately did was it set all of the standards for public transit providers all across the country,\u201d Bernstein said. \u201cSo if you travel the country, and you see those new buses with the low floor buses, right, that lean when the bus pulls over, that all came out of this lawsuit, because this suit set for all the standards for public transportation.\u201d<\/p>\n
All of this has been a product of his experiences as a blind person, Bernstein says.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf I didn\u2019t have my experiences and my challenges and hardships, I wouldn\u2019t be doing this kind of work,\u201d Bernstein said. \u201cAnd that\u2019s why I became a judge, was just because I\u2019ve done that for 15 years, worked as a professor at Michigan. I was chairman at the Wayne State University Board of Governors, because I decided that, you know what, the courts have to become more accommodating, more accessible.\u201d<\/p>\n
By the end of Bernstein\u2019s commencement speech, there was a sense that he truly believed in the students he was speaking to. Hamtramck has its fair share of struggles for anyone who grows up here. But with any challenge in life that can define a person, there\u2019s just as much a sense that those definitions can be fought against.<\/p>\n
Bernstein saw his struggles with blindness as something that defined his experience and provided a sense of purpose for how he guided his efforts. And just like his struggle, he wanted the students to know that their hardships are what\u2019s going to change the world.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou get used to it,\u201d Bernstein said. \u201cYou\u2019re used to people being prejudiced, you\u2019re used to people discriminating. You\u2019re used to people, you know, treating you unfairly. And then you\u2019re accustomed to it to such an extent that you basically learn how to fight it. You just become a warrior. And that\u2019s what\u2019s nice about these students who just graduated today. They\u2019re going to be the same way. They\u2019re warriors. They understand it. They get it.\u201d<\/p>\n