« Ind. Decisions - Interesting Supreme Court disciplinary ruling | Main | Ind. Decisions - "The homicide of Bloomington’s Jill Behrman will be TV feature" »
Wednesday, October 27, 2010
Courts - "Evil Men in Black Robes"
Attorneys Richard L. Hasen and Dahlia Lithwick have a feature in Slate, dated Oct. 26, on the five worst judicial election campaign ads. Watch them and make your own decision. Here is the description that accompnaies the first video:
In this Michigan Supreme Court ad—scored, no doubt, by the good people who did The Exorcist—we encounter the terrifying prospect of death by oil. Note the ominous oil drills ready to kill us at any time? Note their frightening use of rhetorical questions? The judge in question so desperately loves oil that he voted to dump it in Michigan rivers, barred environmentalists from cleaning it up, then took campaign contributions from big oil companies, and—judging by all the footage of oily birds—rubbed oil all over endangered species. (This is an Internet-only ad produced by Democrats apparently to counter at least $357,000 in Republican support for the incumbent.)The article itself includes:
Thirty-eight states hold some form of election for their state supreme court justices, and the elections are getting ever nastier and more expensive. Whereas the spending on these races was once infinitesimal and the advertising—to the extent it existed—minimal and usually mild, that's all changing. The reasons are complicated. Judges have been targets in the culture wars, and their elections have attracted the attention of a polarized electorate. But the money behind the campaigns often comes from business, trial lawyers, and labor interests, whose bottom lines are routinely affected by state court rulings.The United States Supreme Court shares some of the blame too. Thanks to a 2002 Supreme Court ruling that removed some restraints on what judicial candidates can say in election campaigns, plus a series of Supreme Court cases culminating in this year's Citizens United case, which removed the possibility of limits on campaign spending even in judicial elections, judicial election campaigns are looking more and more like other elections: They are more expensive, more professional, and much, much scarier. And this is becoming true even in some states (such as Iowa) that merely use "retention" elections, in which voters just vote "yes" or "no" on whether sitting judges should remain in office for the next term.
In short, these are distinctly frightening times—especially for those of us who believe judicial elections should be different from other elections and that it is important to maintain both the appearance and actuality of impartial justice.
Posted by Marcia Oddi on October 27, 2010 09:43 AM
Posted to Courts in general