And now, ladies and gentlemen, it is our distinct pleasure to announce the Quotation of the Week from an Arkansas newsmaker.
The award this week has less to do with candor and profundity than sheer remarkableness.
It goes to a written statement, meaning something presumably resulting from the giving of thought.
The statement was delivered to this newspaper by the special interest-wedded associate justice of the Arkansas Supreme Court, Courtney Goodson. She is running for chief justice because she thinks it would be neat to be chief justice and her special-interest husband, name of John Goodson, has a ton of money to help get her there.
The context for her pronouncement is that this newspaper published a sterling series of articles about an interstate cabal of class-action law firms, prominently including her husband's in Texarkana, that has made the largest donations in recent years to candidates for the state Supreme Court. The firms have fared very well before the court.
The newspaper series kindled long-dormant interest in trying to reform our state appellate court selections. We could do that either by tightening contribution laws and disclosures or, more likely, seeking a constitutional amendment to have our appellate judges--Supreme Court, the Court of Appeals--no longer elected by the people.
They could be chosen instead by merit based on peer review and nominations by the governor from a certified-as-merited pool.
So here is what Justice Goodson said in her winning declaration: "Many in the legal establishment wish we could do away with judicial elections, but I do not. I believe judges should be accountable to the people, not the special interests."
The remarkableness stems from the fact that Goodson professes to oppose justices' accountability to special interests though she herself is a special interest by marriage.
More to the point: The genesis of the entire discussion that led to her being asked to make the statement was that her very rich husband is vested in court rulings and court rules and court procedures.
It might be that Goodson clings to the election process and opposes merit selection because the election process has put her on the Supreme Court while merit selection wouldn't.
She was a law clerk who liked the look of appellate judging and started out early, absent much actual lawyering experience, to work her ever-evolving and ever-enriching political connections.
Goodson's winning comment also offers the superficially pleasant-sounding but inevitably bogus argument that judges answer to the people.
Judges, real ones, answer to the law. They impose the rule of law. They seek to assure order and justice. They serve the people only to the extent that the people seek and benefit from order and justice.
A court that answered directly and only to the people would need no robe, no gavel, no bench, no bailiff, no courtroom. It would need only a public-opinion pollster.
The problem with judicial elections is not that voters are stupid. It is that the field of law is a professional specialty of scholarship and practice, not a matter of political representation like a congressman or state representative.
Any political campaign starts with a computation of a candidate's name identification, which can be purchased. A judicial campaign is likely to end there, with name identification, because judicial candidates typically don't discuss specific cases or how they would rule.
The problem in Arkansas is represented by two names. One is Goodson. The other is Maggio.
The Goodson issue is one of unseemly appearances. But Maggio is the guilty-pleading Faulkner County judge, first name Mike, who reduced a jury's damage award against a nursing home. That happened about the same time the owner of the nursing home made contributions to an array of political action committees set up to get campaign money to Maggio.
Some left-leaning people tell me they wouldn't trust Gov. Asa Hutchinson's nominations to the Supreme Court.
But the issue is a permanent and principled process, not a personality.
Asa actually already has made one Supreme Court appointment, to the position of chief justice to replace the ill and now deceased James Hannah.
Hutchinson appointed Howard Brill, the distinguished UA law professor. Many surely would agree that Brill is a darned sight better than at least five of the other six justices who owe their fancy black robes to voters--or, more specifically, to the money from special interests that scared away any and all opponents or ran up their name identification.
Finally, an example of money in a Supreme Court race: Several lawyers and lobbyists have told me they are donating to Goodson's chief justice campaign because, even if she loses, she stays on the court as an associate justice. They'll have to deal with her either way.
She's got us all snookered.
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John Brummett, whose column appears regularly in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, was inducted into the Arkansas Writers' Hall of Fame in 2014. Email him at [email protected]. Read his @johnbrummett Twitter feed.
Editorial on 01/31/2016