MIKE MASTERSON: In court campaigns

Practice stinks

Call me old-fashioned, even prudish. But I don't believe lawyers and law firms should make campaign contributions to those running for judge--period. Aw, what the heck, make that an exclamation point.

Six law firms who've stood to gain millions in class-action cases for years have been making hefty contributions to members of the Arkansas Supreme Court.

Financial-disclosure filings show contributions totaling nearly $300,000 have been made to the campaign coffers of six of our state's seven justices on the Supreme Court. Most contributions have come since 2009.

While these contributions from lawyers to the state's highest arbiter of justice are not illegal, or perhaps even influencing (cough), they certainly carry an aroma not unlike a hog factory to most citizens without the money to contribute. And I'm not the only one who detects an odor from this practice.

Using campaign-finance disclosure records, reporter Lisa Hammersly knitted together a first-rate enterprise story about this practice. She found that 11 Supreme Court candidates since 2004 have accepted handsome contributions totaling $452,000 from class-action law firms in Oklahoma, Texas and Pennsylvania and in Texarkana, all of which which work as co-counsels and have won numerous cases before the high court.

Current Supreme Court Justices Courtney Goodson, Karen Baker, Robin Wynne, Paul Danielson, Josephine Hart and Rhonda Wood received an estimated $296,000 in campaign contributions from the six firms, Hammersly reported. Goodson received the largest contributions from the six firms: $142,500 during her 2010 campaign.

John Goodson of Texarkana firm Keil & Goodson is the husband of Associate Justice Courtney Goodson.

Apparently, this kind of giving is somewhat of a family affair. Hammersly reports that at least 80 individual lawyers, spouses and other family members at the six firms are reported as being donors to Supreme Court campaigns since 2004. Those contributions supported the same candidates and arrived around the same time.

The story says Keil & Goodson and co-counsels from the five out-of-state firms were involved in at least 17 state Supreme Court class-action appeals or related proceedings between 2006 and 2014.

And the records show that before 2008, the six firms won three Supreme Court proceedings and lost three. Since mid-2008, those firms have been involved in at least nine proceedings and have won eight before the high court.

Hammersly reported that records show "Millions of dollars in attorneys' fees have ridden, and still ride, on those high-court decisions." Exact amounts are difficult, if not impossible, to determine since these decisions have unseen rippling effects.

Three current justices told the Democrat-Gazette their decisions are not influenced by campaign contributions.

There are ethical prohibitions in place to at least try to prevent the appearance of undue influence on the court. Associate Justices Baker, Danielson and Wood told Hammersly they follow an Arkansas Code of Judicial Conduct provision that admonishes judicial candidates to, as much as possible, remain unaware of those who contribute to their campaign. A Wynne campaign spokesman concurred.

In an email, Justice Baker said that "even if I looked at the contribution reports, which I have not done, I would not necessarily know the law firms for which individual contributors worked."

Justice Wood wrote: "Our rules require us to screen off any contributions to avoid knowing who contributes."

I'm not saying these Supremes are being disingenuous, but most folks might find that difficult to swallow. In their position, I'd attend my fundraisers and know who contributed, especially the law firms who I believe would want them to know. That seems like due diligence.

Alice Bannon, senior counsel at New York University's Brennan Center for Justice, made the same argument to Hammersly: "Because public confidence is such an important factor in when judges should be stepping aside from cases, there is reasonable skepticism about how insulated judges really are from their donors, especially when the dollar amounts are very high."

Justices also are required to recuse from cases involving conflicts of interest, or the appearance of one, which Goodson and others say they regularly do. That's as it should be. Yet it doesn't negate the fact in these instances that five other justices also have been receiving contributions from the same law firms whose case is before them.

I'd say Hammersly's presented a strong case for serious reforms in this practice in order to erase any doubts created by turning the spotlight on a problem that, while legal, sure smells bad to we the people.

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Mike Masterson's column appears regularly in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. Email him at [email protected].

Editorial on 01/26/2016

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