Jan 10 2012
Tennessee Leads the Way in Judicial Recusal Rule Reform
Tennessee is leading the fight against corruption in judicial elections. The state’s Supreme Court has issued a new rule requiring judges to recuse themselves from cases involving campaign supporters. Judges must now disqualify themselves from any proceeding in which their “impartiality might reasonably be questioned” including when they know or learn that a party or the party’s lawyer have contributed to that judge’s campaign.
This rule shows the growing national awareness of the dangers of money politics in judicial elections. As the Brennan Center for Justice’s Maria da Silva stated:
The Tennessee Supreme Court should be applauded for taking this important step forward… [The] new, forward-looking rules will help ensure public faith in the court
system, and provide a model for the rest of the nation to follow. As spending on high court elections continues to skyrocket, judges and litigants need a clear way to address recusal questions related to campaign contributions.
That the Tennessee Supreme Court even had to consider the new rule is another example of how judicial elections are increasingly at risk for corruption or the appearance of corruption which undermine public trust and the rule of law. The new rule is a good attempt, but the best way to deal with the money problem is to get judges out of the fundraising business.
Entries RSS
[...] out that the legislature could act now to reform the current recusal rules, as recently happened in Tennessee. Tennessee recently introduced a rule prohibiting judges from hearing a case if campaign spending [...]