While assembling our judicial election website, I noticed that several challengers are running because of their distaste for the governor's selection process. For these folks, yesterday's news must've been particularly bitter.
To fill two vacancies in the 4th Judicial District, the Commission on Judicial Selection named Gov. Tim Pawlenty's own counsel, Karen A. Janisch, as one of four finalists.
Kinda makes you wonder why someone would bother spending all that time and money on a campaign — and on another level — why we bother with judicial elections in the first place.
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18 comments:
Is there a list of Pawlenty appointees? How many sitting judges were once part of the Rider Bennett firm? How many were former clients or involved with campaign contributions? Records on these issues should be more transparent. Disappointing to say the least.
You will get no response here Anon (1). This is a pro-republican, pro-Pawlenty blog.
Anon(2) is an idiot. Try reading before you comment. This post is obviously making fun of Pawenty's proclivity to appoint friends. If anything, it's anti-Pawlenty. But I suppose sarcasm is lost on people like Anon(2).
Let's see, Chief Justice Magnuson was Pawlenty's former law partner.
Justice Dietzen, who helped Gov. Tim Pawlenty’s first gubernatorial campaign, was appointed to the bench.
Judge Bjorkman was just appointed to the court of appeals. Former law partner of Pawlenty.
Judge Halbrooks was a former partner at Rider Bennet. Does anyone know about her relationship with pawlenty?
Hello -- has anyone thought about the fact that the Rider Bennett firm was full of some of the most extraordinary trial and appellate lawyers that ever walked the face of this earth? You aren't suggesting, are you, that those extremely well qualified judicial candidates should be disqualified from consideration simply because one of the lawyers they used to practice with happened to become the governor?
WOW! "some of the most extraordinary trial and appellate lawyers that ever walked the face of this earth." Such an amazing statement. As though they walked across water, turned water into wine, oh, and happened to know the guy elected governor. I don't claim to know the legal backgrounds of the governor's pals, but if anyone is aware of any literature which could possibly back up such an extraordinary statement, I would love to read it. I am skeptical that such talented people could find themselves partners of a firm that failed and subjects of a substantial lawsuit.
I think 4:21 p.m. was being sarcastic, although sarcasm does not carry well in emails let alone blog posts. With the exception of E. Magnuson, I have never heard anyone say the Rider peeps are the most extraordinary and talented lawyers that ever walked the face of the earth. I think you'd get a different characterization from many.
Can anyone respond to the first post? I wonder too if there is a list of Pawlenty appointees somewhere.
This is addressed to 4:21 p.m. If what you say is accurate (I certainly don't know the backgrounds of former Rider attorneys) wouldn't it be better to have the best lawyers that walked the face of the earth be elected rather than appointed by a former law partner? Does anyone have any thoughts on whether being appointed by a former law partner implicates Canon 2 of the Judicial Code of Conduct? While it certainly does not violate any of the specific provisions, would appointing a disproportionate number of former law partners (assuming this occurred) leave the general public with the appearance of impropriety? Just a thought...
From the original post on, this entire thread is an example of people taking a short-cut to bypass getting snagged by things that are relevant in order to get right to their political statements. So you don't like the governor or his party, fine we get it - but the key question here should be whether the governor’s appointees are qualified do to the jobs that they have been tasked to do. A history of some connection to the governor is just not relevant WITHOUT the addition of incompetency on the part of the appointee! So unless any of you can support accusations of said incompetency......then what exactly is your point?
That the governor is not picking the most qualified people, but the "arguably qualified" who happen to be his friends. The more qualified get short shrift -- as do ethnic groups that the governor doesn't happen to pal around with.
1:51 p.m. exposed the "problem" and drives the point home. What is in place to "check" the appointment process? Part of the issue raised by the first post and reiterated by 12:55. There simply is not enough information (or at least it is not readily available) for one to arrive at a reasoned conclusion as to whether the people chosen by the governor are people best qualified to be judges. Without that information it looks like the good ol' boy network. For those of us in the legal profession, it would be nice to see the work-product of the appointees before making a decision as to whether the process is being abused. I am not, however, aware of anything that would allow us to reach any type of conclusion. I would like to see (1) who these people represent; (2) what judicial opinions / academic articles they have written; (3) what issues they tackle as part of daily practice; (4) where the worked; (5) what their political affiliation is, so on and so forth....
Pawlenty is following the same appointment process that the governors since Carlson have used. The judicial selection committee reviews the applications and it conducts interviews of the candidates. It then recommends the three best qualified candidates to the governor and the governor then selects from those three. Given this process, I do not see that Pawlenty is picking his former partners because they happened to have worked together at Rider Bennett but he is picking them because the judicial selection committee decided the individual was one of the three most qualified.
Half the people on that commission were appointed by the governor, including the chair. The prior chair, whom Pawlenty appointed at the start of his administration, stepped down earlier this year to take an appointment as chief justice of the state Supreme Court. Incidentally, he was from Rider Bennett.
I don't think Carlson appointed business associates to the bench.
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