Remember the infamous Lady Justice TV commercial portraying a justice peeking from under her blindfold to see bags of cash being dumped on her desk? Then-Ohio Supreme Court Justice Alice Robie Resnick, a Democrat, managed to win a third six-year term in 2000 despite the ad. Eleventh District Court of...
"I never felt so much like a hooker down by the bus station … as I did in a judicial race. Everyone interested in contributing has very specific interests. They mean to be buying a vote."
Paul Pfeifer, Ohio Supreme Court justice
Paul Pfeifer, Ohio Supreme Court justice
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Michigan is one of the top spenders when it comes to judicial elections, according to a Justice at Stake report released earlier this month. In the 2008 Michigan Supreme Court election, television advertising spending reached $3.6 million - more than four times the amount spent in 2006. Michigan ranked third...
Perhaps it was the foreword written by retired U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day OConnor that made it a top story last week around the country. But regardless of the reason, the study detailing the influence of special interest campaign spending in state supreme court races is noteworthy. Heres the...
Our courts are only as good as our confidence that judges are beholden to the law -- and only the law -- and not to the corporations and special-interest groups that spend the big bucks to get them on the bench. It's hard to keep the faith, though, when one...
Washington had competitive races for two state Supreme Court positions on this summer's primary ballot. If a new study of campaign fundraising for judicial elections is any guide, those races are likely to have attracted more special interest money than any before them. The study, released last week, found that...
POLITICAL CAMPAIGNS are often vicious and expensive endeavors, featuring partisans who promise the heavens to win votes. The credibility of institutions sometimes suffers. The nation's state courts suffer more than most. A report by a trio of public-interest groups documents how the most distasteful elements of campaigns have gained a...
HUNTSVILLE, Ala. _ This week the Brennan Center issued a report highlighting the costs of judicial races in Alabama. That is a subject with which our editorial boards in Alabama have seemed infatuated for a number of years - especially since Republicans took over the Alabama Supreme Court. And there...
Alabama Justice Tom Parker's Aug. 18 guest column raises some interesting points about judges and accountability. He paints a rather rosy and misleading picture of Alabama judicial politics, however, and completely mischaracterizes the judicial role. Judges with general jurisdiction have always had the power and the responsibility to make law...
Something is badly out of kilter when Alabama makes it to the top of a list of spending on judicial campaigns yet remains not far from the bottom economically. How in the world can candidates for the Supreme Court in Alabama spend more than candidates in any other state from...
In just one year, candidates for the Texas Supreme Court raised and spent more than $2.8 million. And that's just the eight Republicans involved in two primary races for the state's highest civil court. It doesn't count what will have been raised and spent from July through the November general...
News that Alabama's Supreme Court elections easily were the nation's most expensive over the past decade raises an obvious question: Why? How can high court elections in the 23rd most populous state, with 4.7 million people, cost so much more than those in the next closest states, Ohio, with 11.5...
WASHINGTON (Legal Newsline) - The firm of heavyweight Alabama plaintiffs attorney Jere Beasley gave more than $600,000 to a candidate for the state Supreme Court in 2008 without appearing on a list of her contributors, a recent report shows. The six partners at Beasley's firm wrote a total of 52...
According to a new report, spending on state Supreme Court elections has doubled in the last decade. According to polls, three in four Americans believe money spent on campaigns for judgeships can affect later courtroom decisions; some states are calling for methods to protect the court system from special-interest money...
The Justice at Stake Campaign, The Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law and the National Institute on Money and State Politics examined a decade of high-court contests to see how justices are influenced by special interests during elections. The report includes special-interest super spenders. For 29 elections...
THE ISSUE Alabama, one of the poorest states in the nation, has the most expensive Supreme Court races. What do the individuals and corporations who made Alabama the top state in the nation for Supreme Court campaign contributions expect for their money? Do they expect a fair shake in court?...
