With the June primary behind us, fresh in my mind is how hard it is to elect people to be a judge in their county, especially large counties where the cost to campaign is prohibitive. Because of this, I am even more attuned to the fact that when some liberal gets appointed to the bench, it’s almost impossible to get rid of them, and it represents a missed opportunity to have someone on the bench whose values reflect those Republicans would like to see in a Judge.
I remembered that last month the Governor made a slew of judicial appointments but with the primaries in full-gear, I didn’t have time to review them. Today, I took a few minutes to do so, and frankly wished that I had not. Once again (this is becoming a trend), a majority of the Governor’s judicial appointments were NOT from the party of Reagan (or the party of Schwarzenegger, for that matter). Instead, out of twenty new judges appointed around California, only nine are Republicans. You can see the details below.
It is not lost on me that we got the raw end of the deal. You can be sure that if Phil Angelides were Governor, virtually ALL of his picks for the bench would be Democrats. But we get our "post-partisan" Governor, and see what it gets us…
I will work this fall to elect my good friend Kermit Marsh, a staunch Republican, to be a judge in Orange County. But how many Kermits will it take to offset the eight new Democrats appointed by the Governor last month?
TOTAL APPOINTED: 20
9 REPUBLICAN
8 DEMOCRAT
PLUS TWO DECLINE TO STATE AND ONE INDEPENDENT
THE NEW JUDGES (AND JUSTICES) ARE…
- Michael E. Dellostritto (D), John S. Somers (R) and Louie L. Vega (D) to judgeships in Kern County
- Thomas W. Wills (D) to a judgeship in Monterey County
- Jacki C. Brown (R), Donald F. Gaffney (DTS), Bob Gannon (R), Kim R. Hubbard (R) and James L. Waltz (R) to judgeships in Orange County
- Elena J. Duarte (D) to a judgeship in Sacramento County
- Jacqueline M. Arroyo (D) and L. Michael Clark (DTS) to judgeships in Santa Clara CountyTimothy R. Volkmann (I) to a judgeship in Santa Cruz County
- Kevin G. DeNoce (D) and David R. Worley (R) to judgeships in Ventura County
- Janet Gaard (D) and Paul K. Richardson (R) to judgeships in Yolo County.
- Judge Patricia A. Bigelow (R) associate justice to Division Eight, Judge Frank Y. Jackson (R) associate justice to Division Seven and Justice Robert M. Mallano (D) presiding justice to Division One of the Second District Court of Appeal.
If you are from a county not represented here, time to start lobbying hard for conservative judges — appointments in your neck of the woods may be coming next!
I will close this post by reminding FR readers that someone’s voluntary party registration is a great indicator, generally, of their view towards the proper role for government…
June 5th, 2008 at 12:00 am
Justice Robert Mallano is not a new appointment to the bench – he was already sitting as a Justice on the Court of Appeal. Presiding Justice is the one who is placed in charge of administrative matters for that court. The vacancy on that court was filled by a Republican.
June 5th, 2008 at 12:00 am
I will say that Judge Frank Jackson is an excellent jurist from our area with top-notch reputation. He will make a great appelate judge