Home -> Law Blog Directory -> Criminal Law Blogs -> Sentencing Law and Policy

Criminal Law

: Sentencing Law and Policy

An op-ed call for a district judge to become a Justice

By Douglas A. Berman

Echoing a point I made in this 2005 post and this 2008 post, US District Judge Ann Aldrich and her law clerks call for President Obama to nominate a trial judge for SCOTUS in this New York Times op-ed, headlined "A Deep Bench." Here are snippets, which not surprisingly make reference to sentencing jurisprudence: To succeed Justice David Souter on the Supreme Court, President Obama should select a nominee with experience that no other sitting justice has ? service as a trial judge on a federal district court. Only 11 of the 110 justices in our history have been federal trial court judges. Since the creation of the modern federal courts of appeals in 1891, only four federal trial court judges have been elevated to the high court.... Why is this an issue?  Most Supreme Court cases are initiated in district courts, and many end up back there when they are remanded for proceedings that are consistent with the high court?s ruling...continue to full post

Full post as published by Sentencing Law and Policy on May 07, 2009 (boomark / email).