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Friday, October 22, 2010
Courts - Justice up for retention in Ilinois is the subject of a focused campaign
"Attack ads target Illinois Supreme Court justice: Actors portraying the state's nastiest criminals 'explain' how Thomas Kilbride sided with them over their victims" is the headline to this long story today in the Chicago Tribune, reported by David Kidwell, that concludes:
Records show that since the Feb. 4 decision, JUSTPAC has received nearly $600,000 from doctors, hospitals, insurance companies and corporations. Murnane said all of it will go toward the Kilbride campaign.The group's largest single contributor this year is the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which has long argued that runaway jury verdicts drive up consumer prices on everything from health care to groceries.
The makeup of the Supreme Court — currently four Democrats and three Republicans — is crucial to both major political parties and interest groups because the panel rules on everything from the constitutionality of state law to legislative maps that help decide who controls the General Assembly. And the state's wide-open campaign finance rules allow both sides to spend freely in contests for judges who are supposed to remain above politics.
[Justice Thomas L. Kilbride] was a Rock Island labor attorney for 20 years before being elected to the high court in 2000 with the help of nearly $700,000 from the Democratic Party of Illinois, chaired by longtime House Speaker Michael Madigan, of Chicago. The party has given Kilbride $1.2 million in recent months.
Three justices are up for retention, but only Kilbride is the target of such a focused campaign. Observers say his swing district makes him the most vulnerable.
Justices are elected to 10-year terms and then must stand for retention each decade. They win if they receive 60 percent support from those casting a vote on the issue.
Throughout the state's recorded history, a Supreme Court justice has never lost a retention vote, according to court spokesman Joseph Tybor. If it happens, he said, the court would name an interim replacement until 2012.
Posted by Marcia Oddi on October 22, 2010 09:28 AM
Posted to Courts in general