News
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June 4th, 2010
Missouri Bar will protect judicial integrity
St. Louis Post Dispatch
Regarding "Missouri’s judicial selection process is in need of reform" (June 1): The Missouri Bar Board of Governors disagrees strongly with James Harris’ dismal and misinformed assessment of Missouri’s court system. So do most Missourians. An analysis by Missourians for Fair and Impartial Courts Action Fund of the petitions submitted to the Missouri secretary of state revealed that the group fell far short of the required number of signatures to earn the initiative a place on the ballot. Full Story » -
June 2, 2010
GUEST COMMENTARY: No need to change the Missouri Court Plan
Columbia Missourian
I grow weary of James Harris and his insulting attempts to mislead the public regarding changes to the Non-Partisan Court Plan.I am a proud member of the Missouri Association of Trial Attorneys, and I have yet to see a hint of evidence from Mr. Harris or his still-undisclosed donors that corruption exists on any level in the state and judicial system since the adoption of the Missouri Plan in 1940. The Missouri Plan, by the way, was crafted with the assistance of Rush Limbaugh Sr., hardly a liberal. Full Story » -
May 27th, 2010
MISSOURIANS APPARENTLY REJECT PROPOSAL TO INJECT PARTISANSHIP AND POLITICS INTO MISSOURI COURTS
Missourians for Fair and Impartial Courts
Jefferson City, MO – Missourians for Fair and Impartial Courts Action Fund today announced that according to an analysis of signatures submitted to the Secretary of State by ShowMe Better Courts, a group proposing a constitutional amendment to dismantle Missouri’s Non-Partisan Court plan, it appears that insufficient signatures were collected to qualify the amendment and send it to the voters. Full Story » -
May 24th, 2010
Missouri governor promises to fight for Nonpartisan Court Plan
Missouri Lawyers Weekly
Gov. Jay Nixon recognized a lot of familiar faces when he scanned the crowd of Kansas City lawyers.Maybe a little too familiar, he said while making the keynote address Friday night at the Kansas City Metropolitan Bar Association’s Bench-Bar & Boardroom conference in Lake Ozark.The three-day annual event began Thursday at the Lodge of Four Seasons.Nixon opened the conference’s formal dinner with a pledge to oppose any plans that attempt to undermine or weaken Missouri’s Nonpartisan Court Plan. Full Story » -
May 27th, 2010
Court petitions may be short on signatures
Jefferson City News Tribune
The group seeking to require the direct election of all Missouri judges didn’t get enough signatures to put their issue on the November ballot, supporters of the current court system said Wednesday. Full Story » -
May 26th, 2010
Mo. judicial ballot question has failed, opponents say
KWMU St. Louis Public Radio
EFFERSON CITY, MO. (ST. LOUIS PUBLIC RADIO) - Opponents of a ballot question to scrap Missouri’s non-partisan court plan say its backers have not gathered enough signatures to place it on the November ballot. Full Story » -
May 26th, 2010
UPDATE: Opponents: Signatures for anti-Missouri Plan initiative fall short
St. Louis Post Dispatch - Political Fix Blog
An analyis of the signatures submitted to the Secretary of State’s office by the group seeking to make all judges in Missouri elected fell short of statutory minimums, says a group opposing the effort.Earlier this month, a group called ShowMe Better Courts submitted what it said was more than 250,000 signatures in its effort to do away with the state’s method for choosing many of its top judges, the Missouri Nonpartisan Court Plan. Full Story » -
May 21st, 2010
Take Justice Off the Ballot
New York Times - Opinion Editorial Sandra Day O’Connor
ALTHOUGH our attention as a nation is focused on the selection of a new justice to the Supreme Court, another judicial process that is also extremely important is happening across the country: the selection of state court judges. But in too many states, citizens are being shortchanged by the way these judges are chosen. Full Story » -
May 17th, 2010
Letters to the editor, May 17
St. Louis Post Dispatch
Partisanship should play no role in judicial selection, whether elected or appointedAs an elected judge, I was interested to read the editorial "No quarter" (May 10), regarding Missouri’s method of selecting judges. We should not scrap the Nonpartisan Court Plan, but we must remember that most communities in Missouri are well-served by elected judges. The problem is partisanship, not whether judges are appointed or elected. We must support an independent and nonpartisan judiciary everywhere in Missouri. Full Story » -
May 10, 2010
Missourians must bring fight to those who would corrupt our courts
St. Louis Post Dispatch
The impartial administration of justice in Missouri’s courts is under the greatest threat in the state’s modern history.Forty-two boxes of petitions allegedly containing signatures of more than 200,000 voters were delivered to Missouri Secretary of State Robin Carnahan’s office by the May 2 deadline for voter initiatives. If the signatures check out, a statewide vote will be held in November. Voters will decide whether to repeal Missouri’s non-partisan court plan. Full Story » -
May 14th, 2010
Money shouldn’t make our judges
Springfield News Leader
Larry Russell, in his letter to the editor on May 10, maintains that we are better off with judges who are elected. Russell, as Treasurer of Showme Better Courts Committee, raises money to destroy the Missouri Non-Partisan Court Plan through an election to change the Missouri Constitution.The nonpartisan plan was established by a statewide election in 1940 to secure appellate judges based on merit and not on politics. The plan was adopted partially in response to the abuses and corruption of the Pendergast machine in the Kansas City area whose money and power controlled that political environment in the early part of the 20th century. Full Story » -
May 10th, 2010
Anti-Missouri Plan petition carriers claim they haven’t been paid
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
JEFFERSON CITY — A group of black St. Louis residents who helped pass petitions for the ShowMe Better Courts ballot drive to call for the direct election of all judges in the state say they haven’t been paid, and they aren’t happy about it.They also suggest that one of the culprits might be a former House Republican — Nathan Cooper — who was convicted of immigration fraud in 2007. Full Story » -
May 2nd, 2010
Court merit system best for Missouri
Columbia New Tribune
In the 1930s, Missouri judges were hand-picked by Tom Pendergast, the head of the corrupt political machine in Kansas City. Pendergast wanted judges who would rule as he wished. If they failed in that regard, he replaced them. Elections didn’t work because Pendergast committed widespread voter fraud, but our citizens voted in 1940 to abandon elections and instead adopt the country’s very first merit selection system for judges. Full Story » -
Mar 30. 2010
States act to revise judicial selection
USA Today
A growing number of states are rewriting their rules on selecting judges to curb the influence of special interests on judicial contests. Thirty-nine states elect at least some of their judges, and judicial candidates for high courts raised $206.4 million for campaigns from 2000 through 2009, according to Justice at Stake, a non-partisan coalition that promotes impartial courts. That’s up from $83.3 million the previous decade. Full Story » -
Mar 13, 2010
Campaign Contributors and the Pennsylvania Supreme Court
American Judicature Society
Since the late 1980s, an organization called Pennsylvanians for Modern Courts (PMC) has been working to improve the process for selecting Pennsylvania’s judges, among other judiciary reforms. The Pennsylvania General Assembly is currently considering legislation that would establish a merit selection system for the state’s appellate judges. Full Story » -
Dec. 23, 2009
The worst way of selecting judges — except all the others that have been tried
32 Northern Kentucky Law Review 267
We all know the defects of judicial elections. The public is too ignorant of the legal system, the candidates, and the law to make wise choices; consequently, judges are elected often because of their famous names, ethnicities, position on the ballot, party affiliation, and the like, rather than through an assessment of merit. Full Story » -
Dec. 23, 2009
Finalists’ names to be made public prior to selection
News Tribune.com
Applicants for judges’ jobs under Missouri’s Nonpartisan Court Plan have a new rule to note: The Judicial Commission will make their names public if they are chosen as finalists. Full Story » -
Dec. 23, 2009
Experience in Missouri with Judicial Selection under the Non-Partisan Plan
HeinOnline
The Missouri Plan for non-partisan selection of judges has now been in effect nineteen years. Mr. Gershenson describes the plan and its success in Missouri. Full Story » -
Dec. 23, 2009
Missouri’s Court Plan Faces Ballot Challenge
Gavel Grab
Critics of Missouri’s merit selection system are pursuing a new political strategy to change it, saying they plan a statewide petition drive to send a ballot measure directly to voters. Full Story » -
Dec. 23, 2009
Names of those seeking bench to be publicized by Missouri Supreme Court
Missouri Lawyers Media
For the first time, the Missouri Supreme Court will release the names of those interviewed for judicial vacancies in the courts falling under the Nonpartisan Court Plan. Full Story » -
Dec. 23, 2009
Strongly opposing opinions shape ’activist’ judge debate
Jefferson News Tribune Online Edition
Gov. Matt Blunt has promised Missourians he won’t appoint any ’activist’ judges to the state’s courts. Full Story » -
Dec. 23, 2009
The Missouri Supreme Court: from Dred Scott to Nancy Cruzan
Gerald T. Dunne
The Missouri Plan Full Story » -
Dec. 23, 2009
Objections aplenty
Vox Magazine
It’s a hung jury for the Missouri judicial selection process Full Story » -
Dec. 23, 2009
Public defender ruling proves why independent judges matter
StlToday.com
A unanimous Missouri Supreme Court demonstrated the best kind of judicial decision-making in a ruling handed down Tuesday — and once again demonstrated the importance of the state’s non-partisan method of selecting appellate judges. Full Story » -
Dec. 23, 2009
Justice for Sale?
Gary Toohey
New revelations regarding possible violations Full Story » -
Dec. 22, 2009
Bill would create a screening committee for magistrate selection
GoUpstate.com
State Rep. Harold Mitchell says the state’s magistrate selection process is broken, and he wants to be the repairman. Full Story » -
Nov. 2, 2009
Snagging a judicial appointment
HattiesburgAmerican.com
There’s a midterm Mississippi judicial vacancy and you think you’d be just the guy or gal to fill the robe. With Republican Haley Barbour as governor, there are several smart ways to put yourself in contention for that spiffy political appointment. Full Story » -
Nov. 2, 2009
Nixon names Gaertner to Court of Appeals
St. Louis Business Journal
Gov. Jay Nixon has appointed St. Louis County Circuit Judge Gary Gaertner Jr. to the Missouri Court of Appeals, Eastern District. Full Story » -
Nov. 2, 2009
Supreme Court race tops Pa.’s 2009 election ballot
Philly.com
The battle for a single open seat between Democrat Jack Panella and Republican Joan Orie Melvin tops Tuesday’s statewide election ballot that also features contests for four openings on the state Superior Court and two on the Commonwealth Court. Full Story » -
Oct. 19, 2009
House for sale? A lot of money surrounds Rod Jetton’s political consulting work
Kansas City Star
When a Republican candidate in Missouri wants money, he hires Rod Jetton. When a corporation wants to defeat legislation, it hires Jetton. Full Story » -
Oct. 11, 2009
16 ballot petitions ready for circulation in Missouri
Southeast Missourian by Rudi Keller
Voters beware: Over the next seven months, people with clipboards will be asking for your signature. It may be for a simple idea, such as limiting statewide officials to two terms in office. Or it may be complex, with major consequences, such as eliminating the taxing power of cities and school districts, taking away the power of local governments to condemn private property for redevelopment or scrapping a method of choosing judges that for 64 years has been a model for the nation. Full Story »