Litigation

Editorial: A ?Recipe for Corruption? in Alabama

By Peter Hardin

The Birmingham News editorial board has firmly embraced a Justice at Stake-commissioned poll showing that solid bipartisan majorities believe elected judges deliver favored treatment to their campaign backers.

The board urged a switch in Alabama to a system of appointment and retention (up-or-down) elections in an editorial with this self-explanatory headline: “OUR VIEW: It’s no surprise that voters in both parties are suspicious about the connection between campaign donations and judicial rulings.”

Stopping just short of declaring corruption exists in the Alabama courts, where state Supreme Court elections are the most costly in the nation, the editorial speculated what the poll would have shown had the survey focused on Alabama:

“Voters elsewhere may have reason to be skeptical about the corrupting influence of campaign money on courts in their states. Alabama voters have reason to be pretty sure.”

Not only is there high spending, but Alabama law enables special interest groups to conceal the campaign cash they pump into judicial races, the editorial said:

“It’s a recipe for corruption in any arena, but it’s particularly corrosive when it comes to courts that are supposed to be impartial arbiters of justice. Even a decision with a firm basis in the law looks shady when the winning party bankrolled the judge.”

Although an appointment-and-retention system could not eliminate politics from judicial selection, it would protect judges from some of the “entanglements” of raising large campaign sums, the editorial added. It concluded:

“As it stands, voters believe there’s a connection between those dollars and the decisions coming out of our courts. In Alabama, especially, who can blame them?”

Solid bipartisan majorities als0 support reforms to curb the perception that justice is for sale, according to the poll (see Gavel Grab). To learn more about the debate over competitive elections of judges versus appointment, check out the Justice at Stake issues page on the topic.

Full post as published by The Gavel on September 16, 2010 (boomark / email).