Legal Ethics
Dubious Judicial Campaign Attacks Prompt Public Forum on Fair Courts
Posted Jul 14, 2008, 01:08 pm CST
By Martha Neil
A commission appointed by the chief justice of California's supreme court is holding a public forum on fair courts today, in an effort to dial down the rude rhetoric and dubious tactics that has characterized some recent judicial campaigns.
The forum in the state capital, Preserving Impartial Courts in California (PDF), features as panelists two former California governors, Republican Pete Wilson and Democrat Gray Davis.
It is intended to address "a national wave of unfair attacks on the judicial branch" that "threatens to weaken our democracy and jeopardize every individual's right to equal access to justice," the forum program states.
Early warning signs of the problem in Southern California, according to panelist and professor Laurie Levenson of Loyola Law School, include apparent efforts to unseat trial judges with Hispanic-sounding names, reports the National Law Journal.
"In Georgia, former Attorney General John Ashcroft recorded an automated phone call saying an incumbent judge was a 'liberal activist' who would 'stop at nothing to win,' according to a 2007 Brennan Center for Justice report," the article also notes.
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