JUDGES FOR SALE [View all]

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http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/comment/2012/08/judges-for-sale.html

Campaign-finance discussions tend to focus on a) the Presidential race and b) the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision, but the biggest outrage concerning money in politics has little to do with either. It involves elections that rarely receive the attention they deserve: those for judgeships.

Thirty-nine states elect judges to their highest courts. (Fortunately, New York does not, though many lower-court judges in the state stand for election.) State courts decide about ninety-five per cent of the cases in American courts. The federal courts, where the judges are nominated by the President and confirmed by the Senate, hear only about five per cent, though those appointments get far more attention. Criminal prosecutions, civil lawsuits, child-custody matters, personal injuries—almost all are decided in state courts, under rules established by each state supreme court.

For many years, these contests were rather sleepy affairs, followed mostly by lawyers (and not many of them). The big changes began in the nineteen-eighties, and the partisan lines were clear. Plaintiffs’ lawyers in personal-injury cases funded Democratic candidates for judgeships; defense lawyers in these cases—especially those representing insurance companies and large corporations—supported Republicans. For a time, the battle was something of standoff, but Republicans gained the upper hand in the nineties, especially in the South, where they were making big gains across the board. (Karl Rove first became famous because of his victories in Texas judicial elections.)

A new report, issued yesterday by the left-leaning Center for American Progress, shows that the race for control of state judiciaries has become a rout. The report, entitled “Big Business Taking over State Supreme Courts,” found that,
'Fueled by money from corporate interests and lobbyists, spending on judicial campaigns has exploded in the last two decades. In 1990 candidates for state supreme courts only raised around $3 million, but by the mid-nineties, campaigns were raking in more than five times that amount, fueled by extremely costly races in Alabama and Texas. The 2000 race saw high-court candidates raise more than $45 million.'


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