Justice for sale
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MASSACHUSETTS'S good sense in being one of just 11 states that do not elect judges was on vivid display last Monday. The US Supreme Court ruled against a West Virginia judge who had decided in favor of a coal-mining magnate after the businessman contributed to his election. A 5-to-4 majority of the Supreme Court found that there was an unconstitutional risk of bias, or the appearance of bias, if one party in a case has dug deep into his pockets to elect a judge.
"Just as no man is allowed to be the judge of his own cause," wrote Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, no one should be allowed to "choose the judge in his own cause." It was the first time the court had required recusal as a result of campaign financing.
In the West Virginia case, the owner of a small mining company won a $50 million award from a jury that found a bigger company had driven it into bankruptcy illegally. The chief executive of the bigger company, Don Blankenship, appealed to the state's highest court but first spent $3 million on an ad campaign to replace an incumbent judge with a new one - Brent D. Benjamin - who proceeded to cast the deciding vote in Blankenship's favor.
Judge Benjamin should have recused himself from the case, as he would have been obliged to do under the West Virginia code if, for instance, he owned stock in either side's mining company.
Dissenting justices faulted the decision for not establishing a clear rule for disqualification in future cases. But states, which already have rules governing conflicts like stock ownership, should be able to devise regulations for campaign-funding conflicts. In fact, drawing such lines might just get some states to rethink the wisdom of elected judges. Not a bad outcome.
