Hobson’s Choice: Judicial Selection In Alaska
March 16, 2009
The Washington Times had a story yesterday about Alaska Governor Sarah Palin’s most recent appointment to the Alaska Supreme Court earlier this month. The Anchorage Daily News story on the same issue is here.
Here’s an excerpt from the ADN:
“Under the state Constitution, Palin had to select from among the nominees sent to her by the seven-member Alaska Judicial Council, made up of lawyers, public members appointed by governors and the Supreme Court chief justice, currently Dana Fabe.
“Last week, without explaining why, Palin took the unusual step of asking the Judicial Council to send her all information it had on the two finalists, Christen and Palmer Superior Court Judge Eric Smith.
“The council nominated them from a slate of six applicants. It takes four council votes for a candidate to be sent to the governor. None of the other candidates received any votes….”
“…Christen’s application included her membership in several charitable groups, including some from her past, but did not mention that she was on the board of Planned Parenthood in the mid-1990s. The organization, which didn’t provide abortions in Alaska until 2003, is now on the opposite side of a Palin-supported bill to require girls under 17 to get parental consent for an abortion.
“Back in the 1980s, Smith was executive director of the public interest environmental law firm, Trustees for Alaska. The group currently is on the opposite side of Palin over the listing of Cook Inlet beluga whales as endangered.”
So Palin was given a choice between someone who had served on the board of Planned Parenthood which is now on the opposite side of a law that Palin is championing – not something that would naturally appeal to a pro-life leader like Palin – and someone who had long served with a prominent environmental law organization and worked at the EPA as an attorney – also not something that would appeal to Palin given her stance on development of her state.
The ADN story also notes that “The Judicial Council’s bylaws direct them to nominate the ‘most qualified.’” – but again, only they get to interpret this subjective standard. So from the perspective of the judicial council, apparently these two were the only ones who were “most qualified,” which seems odd.
All this sure sounds like an attempt to tie the Governor’s hands.
But back to Governor Palin for a minute. Her Hobson’s choice is the real world of “merit” selection – where a favored few get to make the real pick of judges, even if a state governor formally gets the “choice.” The people may elect whom they will as Governor, but we get to pick the judges, and we’ll tie her hands by claiming that our choices are the “most qualified,” without offering any evidence as to why.
Then again, it shouldn’t matter whether Palin is pro-life or pro-choice or even whether the judges are. What matters is that the people should get to choose the judges whose decisions impact their lives and their state’s economic future.