judgesonmerit.org

An editorial in the Austin American-Statesman minces no words in pointing out a major problem caused by electing judges:

Elections mean money. Money means problems. Elections and money and judges mean, at the least, a damaging perception of big problems. . . .

[The campaign contributions involved in Caperton] seem[ed] like a prudent investment. But we don’t think judicial races should attract investments. The American Bar Association’s Model Code of Judicial Conduct, cited in the U.S. Supreme Court opinion, says “A judge shall avoid impropriety and the appearance of impropriety.”

How do you do that when you have to raise money. . . to run for judge in Texas?

This is a good question, and it’s one we all should be asking in Pennsylvania.  Of course, the answer to that question raises another pressing question:  if the electoral process is itself undermining public confidence in the courts and the judiciary, what can we do about it?

The editorial notes that there is something we can do:

The U.S. Supreme Court ruling does not force Texas to do anything about picking judges. But it’s another reminder that the system warrants review.

“It will be on litigants’ minds,” former Texas Supreme Court Chief Justice Tom Phillips said of the decision. “They’ll ask their lawyer, ‘Did the other side give money to the judge? I read in the paper you can do something about that.’ ”

And now you’re reading in the paper that there is something we all should do about that. Texas’ judicial selection system should be changed.

Voters in Pennsylvania can do something, too.  Legislation has been introduced to change the state constitution to implement Merit Selection for the appellate courts. This would get appellate court judges out of the fundraising business.  We can only amend the constitution if the legislature twice passes the amendment and the public votes for it.  So, there is something we can do.  Let’s do it.

Stories out of Texas and New York reveal new twists on the old problem of contributions to judicial election campaigns.  We’ve written repeatedly about the inherent disconnect between the independence of the judiciary and using a judicial selection system that requires campaigns to raise huge sums of money.  Here are two reports of judges getting in trouble related to their campaign finances.

The Wall Street Journal’s Law Blog reports that a recently elected judge in Manhattan Surrogates Court has now been indicted and may face judicial misconduct charges based on a loan she received for her campaign.  Because the loan was not repaid by the time of the primary election, it converted into a gift and significantly exceeded campaign contribution limits.

Meanwhile, in Texas, Supreme Court Justice Nathan Hecht was just fined for violating campaign finance laws by failing to report discounted legal fees.  An editorial in the Austin American-Statesman argues:

Hecht didn’t list the discount on his campaign contribution report, though he’d written in a fundraising letter that he was getting in-kind legal help. He couldn’t report it because it was far more than the $30,000 limit on donations from one law firm. So he was hit with the rather minor fine for not reporting an illegal political contribution.

It was smelly enough that Hecht took the $168,000 discount from a firm with business before his court. Just as offensive was his letter to the state’s law firms, which have cases before his court, asking them to pay his legal bill. Hecht also had asked the state Legislature to pay the bill, but his support foundered when lawmakers learned that he had asked lawyers to pay it, too.

Hecht raked in $447,000 in political contributions after his letter went out to the state’s top law firms. While there is nothing illegal about that — lamentably — it is still unseemly for this state’s top judges to be begging money from the lawyers with cases before them.

Add to this the recent experience in Pennsylvania, where Philadelphia Traffic Court Judge Willie F. Singletary has just been found to have violated the Code of Judicial Conduct by directly soliciting funds for his election campaign and by promising improper conduct on the bench in return for donations.  It all leads to one conclusion: money should not be involved in the process of selecting judges.