USA Today Reports on Judicial Elections
March 31, 2010
USA Today has published a front page story about state judicial selection and the efforts to scrap elections in favor of “merit” boards, retention elections and so on. Yours truly is quoted in the article.
So, too, is Ciara Torres-Spelliscy of The Brennan Center of Justice who bemoans judicial campaign spending:
”It looks like justice is for sale.”
I emphasize “looks” to point out - once again - that the entire campaign to ban democratic judicial elections is based upon appearances, not actual evidence.
And, as with so many other reporters, USA Today’s Fredreka Schouten fell for the line that Justice at Stake and The Brennan Center are “non-partisan” judicial watchdogs. Readers of American Courthouse know that Justice at Stake and The Brennan Center are waging a full-bore, highly-coordinated, well-financed campaign to abolish democratic judicial elections across America and turn the judicial selection process over to a single special interest: lawyers. Standing behind the campaign with his checkbook in hand is billionaire hedge fund kingpin George Soros.
Watchdog groups are supposed to bring to light government actions that take place behind closed doors. Too bad these “watchdogs” are dedicated to ending public scrutiny and accountibility of one-third of our state governments by turning over the process to legal elites operating in secret.
Maryland Black Caucus Blocks “Merit” Selection
March 30, 2010
Doug Gansler, call your office. In a blow to the Maryland AG, the state’s legislative black caucus has blocked Gansler’s proposal to scrap democratic judicial elections of circuit court judges in favor of so-called “merit selection.” (Read my previous post on the proposal here.)
The Baltimore Sun reports that the proposal is “languishing in key committees” and that ”the Legislative Black Caucus’ strong opposition has doomed Gansler’s bill.”
Apparently the black caucus didn’t buy Gansler’s argument that “merit” selection is necessary because minority judges are often thrown off courts for reasons of “outright bias” in “predominantly white counties.”
Perhaps these legislators had heard of the problems “merit” selection has caused in Florida, where Governor Crist frequently complained that the state “merit” board failed to submit qualified minority candidates. The problem grew so bad in Florida that the state’s NAACP filed an amicus brief with the state Supreme Court charging that “the specter of racial discrimination has been raised” by the commission’s actions.
Time to Enact Legal Reforms in Louisiana
March 30, 2010
This week marked the start of the Louisiana state legislative session. Before the doors to the state house opened, dueling pro-legal reform and pro-plaintiffs’ bar bills were being announced. The Hayride has a good overview here (hat tip, PointofLaw).
Louisiana has long suffered from lawsuit abuse and plaintiff-friendly juries. As The Hayride points out, Gov. Jindal’s efforts to attract businesses to the state will continue to face long odds until the governor and his legislative supporters “make the state’s businesses safe from rapacious plaintiff lawyers.”
ACORN’s Candidate in Ohio
March 26, 2010
While ACORN has imploded amidst allegations of fraud and corruption, its allies continue to hold powerful posts – including Ohio Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner, who is in a neck-and-neck race with Rob Portman to fill the U.S. Senate seat of retiring George Voinovich.
Brunner came to office with the help of the Secretary of State Project (SOS Project) – another campaign group bankrolled by hedge fund billionaire George Soros. Secretaries of State typically serve as the state’s chief election official, putting them in prime position to tip close elections toward ultra-liberal allies of the SOS Project. Exhibit A: Minnesota, where Secretary of State Mark Ritchie was elected with SOS Project $$ and went on to block an investigation of ACORN’s registration of dead voters and convicted felons. Ritchie also played a crucial role in Al Franken’s tainted Senate victory.
An American Spectator article raises interesting questions about some funny business involving Brunner and a prospective Tea Party candidate for Ohio Attorney General.
The People v. The Elites in Missouri
March 26, 2010
James Harris of ShowMe Better Courts has a great piece in the Missouri Record that lifts the rock on the supposedly non-partisan Missouri Plan for picking judges. According to Harris:
“Wealth and well-connected lawyers, particularly those who are members of the Missouri Association of Trial Attorneys, are allowed carte-blanche access to the selection process while ordinary citizens are shut out by a commission that meets behind closed doors.”
Rather than picking judges according to “merit” – as supporters of the Missouri Plan assure us – the commission chooses nominees “based on political friendships as well as ideological and financial considerations.” Harris pulls the curtain on the selection process for the last two Supreme Court nominees, where well-qualified legal scholars and law professors were bypassed for commission cronies.
Like all other states with “merit” selection systems, the question boils down to who should have the power to choose our public servants on the bench – the people or legal elites? Harris comes down firmly on the side of the people.
“Our courts are here to serve the people, not just well-connected attorneys. A system of direct involvement and democratic legitimacy will give us an impartial judiciary. The current system is marked by corruption and voter apathy.”
Trial Bar Payback in Congress
March 25, 2010
Jim Copland, who directs the Center for Legal Policy at the Manhattan Institute, has a great piece in National Review Online tracking the trial bar’s payback for financing Democratic congressional campaigns. As I’ve posted before, lawyers/law firms funneled a staggering $178 million to Democratic campaign coffers in the last election (thanks, opensecrets.org) and Copland reports they’re busy greasing the palms again for 2010. Among the facts:
- “Senator Reid’s campaign and leadership committees have raked in over $2 million from non-lobbyist lawyers, more than twice as much as he received from any other industry or profession.”
- “Four of Reid’s seven largest campaign-donors are law firms, and these aren’t corporate law firms [in Nevada], but rather out-of-state plaintiffs’ firms, including asbestos firms in New York, Maryland, and Illinois, as well as a toxic tort firm in California.”
Copland also documents how the Congress has fed the litigation mill with legislative goodies for its funders. These include provisions to allow state attorneys’ general to hire trial lawyers to sue toy manufacturers on behalf of states and a bill that will open the floodgates on phony employment-discrimination claims.
And that’s just the beginning. Copland predicts the trial lawyer lobby will also push for limits on out-of-court settlements, legal pleading standards that make trial lawyer fishing expeditions easier, and “show trials” against Toyota that will encourage endless lawsuits against the automaker.
The Final Score on Medical Liability Reform and Health Care
March 24, 2010
The Wall Street Journal Law Blog has a nice little summary of how medical liability reform fared in the giant, trillion-dollar health care bill President Obama signed yesterday. In the final analysis, $50 million will be made available to states that want to launch “demonstration projects” to develop alternative dispute resolution procedures and promote a reduction of health care errors. But of course there’s a catch.
“… if a state does go the alternative-dispute resolution route – and sets up, say an arbitration system presided over by a panel of medical experts – there’s a huge loophole. The law allows any plaintiff to ‘opt out’ of a program he or she doesn’t like, and pursue his or her claims in state court.”
That’s what “tort reform” looks like when the majority party in Congress is beholden to the trail bar for over $178 million in campaign contributions during the last election.
ACORN, R.I.P.
March 23, 2010
ACORN announced yesterday it is closing its doors six months after video tape was aired showing ACORN employees handing out advice to investigators posing as a pimp and a prostitute on how to evade paying taxes on a bordello. ACORN honcho Bertha Lewis lashed out at – well, at nearly everyone, including Congress, the media and the vast right-wing conspiracy:
“ACORN has faced a series of well-orchestrated, relentless, well-funded right wing attacks that are unprecedented since the McCarthy era. The videos were a manufactured, sensational story that led to a rush to judgment and an unconstitutional act by Congress.”
It says something about the delusional mentality among the radical left that one of its leader seems to believe ACORN has a constitutional right to taxpayer funds so the group can go out and register “Mickey Mouse” and other cartoon characters as voters, as it did in several states.
Kudos to filmmaker James O’Keefe and his partner Hanna Giles for getting the goods on ACORN that shamed the political establishment to action. But the MVP in this entire drama surely goes to Andrew Breitbart (link) and his BigGovernment.com for pushing the story when the mainstream media sat on its hands.
Update in West Virginia
March 22, 2010
The New York Times ran an editorial last week praising West Virginia’s state legislature for adopting a pilot plan providing for voluntary public financing of state Supreme Court races. The Times believes hard-hit West Virginia taxpayers should foot the bill for these campaigns because “judicial neutrality and the appearance of neutrality is under severe threat across the country….”
States already have more than adequate power to discipline or remove judges who, by selling rulings for campaign cash, are truly a real threat to “judicial neutrality.” Such corrupt judges can be dealt with quite effectively through statutes, rules, bar codes, etc. So all we’re really left with is an “appearance” of a problem – unless the Times is sitting on some blockbuster story about mass numbers of state judges trading their judicial decisions for campaign contributions.
Strangely enough, the Times’ moral righteousness didn’t prevent the paper from endorsing the man who, for all practical purposes, destroyed public financing of presidential campaigns: Barack Obama.
Ten Years Worth of Spending on Judicial Campaigns = 4 Months Interest For George Soros
March 19, 2010
Justice at Stake – the political organization funded by hedge fund titan George Soros (net worth $13 billion) – will soon issue a study that says state judicial candidates raised $206 million over the past decade, which is more than double the $83 million raised in the 1990s. Sounds ominous – until you consider what has happened in other major elections. Here are a few tidbits, courtesy of the invaluable people at the Center for Responsive Politics and their website opensecrets.org:
- In 2008, Barack Obama raised more than $745 million – about $50 million more than George W. Bush and John Kerry raised in 2004 combined.
- The $3.16 billion spent on the three presidential elections in this decade (2000, 2004, 2008) is nearly triple the $1.08 billion spent on the three previous elections (1996, 1992, 1998) and nearly double the $1.6 billion spent on the last six presidential elections dating back to 1976.
- Barack Obama himself spent nearly as much to win the presidency in 2008 as all candidates did in the two presidential elections of the 1990s.
- In 2008, the average winner of a House seat spent $1.37 million – more than double the amount of the average winner a decade ago ($650,000 in 1998).
- The total amount Americans contributed to judicial candidates over the entire last decade represents about 4 months worth of interest on George Soros’ fortune. That’s not from opensecrets.org – I did the calculation myself; $13 billion at 4.59% interest (current 30-year T-bill rate).
Ramped up spending on judicial elections isn’t “a grave and growing challenge” to our courts, it’s merely mirroring the spending increases in other races. To put it in perspective, the $5.3 billion Americans contributed to all federal candidates in 2008 represents about one-third of what we’ve spent on bottled water.