Judgement Day

Statewide there are 78 judges seeking another term.

3 on the Court of Appeals and 75 at the District Court level. These Judges serve 6 year terms.

There are no Judges up for retention on the Supreme Court. These Judges serve 8 year terms.

The Iowa State Bar Association released its ratings on Judges on the ballot for retention. The ISBA and the Judicial Branch of Iowa promote this as an evaluation of Judges for the voters.

This years evaluation is based on 2,240 survey forms completed by members of the ISBA. I have asked the ISBA how many total members they have and have yet to receive a response.

The ISBA members who responded ranked Judges on a scale of 1 (Strongly Disagree) to 5 (Strongly Agree) on 10 questions. The 11th was if the Judge should be retained.

1) Knowledge and application of the law
2) Perception of factual issues
3) Attentiveness to arguments and testimony
4) Temperament and demeanor
5) Clarity and quality of written opinions
6) Promptness of rulings and decisions
7) Avoids undue personal observations or criticisms of litigants, judges and lawyers from bench or in written opinions
8) Decides cases on basis of applicable law and fact, not affected by outside influence
9) Is courteous and patient with litigants, lawyers and court personnel
10) Treats people equally regardless of race, gender, age, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, socio-economic status or disability
11) Retention

At the Court of Appeals level John C. Miller received 96% on the question of retention, Anuradha Vaitheswaran received 95% and Van D. Zimmer 97%.

What I find interesting is that only 162 responded to the retention question for Miller, 191 for Vaitheswaran and 207 for Zimmer.

In my 5a District; Darrell Goodhue received 98% for retention, Peter A. Keller 95%, Richard Clogg, 96%, Virginia Cobb 93%, Thomas W. Mott 73% and Kevin A. Parker 100%.

The number of repsondents to the retention question for Goodhue 124, Keller, 110, Clogg 51, Cobb 42, Mott 63 and Parker 36.

The Ragister ran the press release, regarding this survey, with the headline "Bar association gives high marks to judges".

They need to put in a few minutes work and give the whole story!

As for me, I go with the advice my Dad gave me about voting....Vote NO on all the Judges.


**********UPDATE**********


I did hear back from the ISBA about their membership...

The Iowa State Bar Association is a voluntary Bar Association. Current
membership count for both in and out of state is 8,071.

Mary Hill
Iowa State Bar Association
Membership Director / Foundation Liaison

I've asked her how many in state members there are and have yet to receive a response.

Don't Judge Me

Once again, the elitists of this state don't like having power in the hands of the people.

Iowa Supreme Court Justice Wiggins (sounds like a Carol Burnett sketch and the scientific community is united in that fact) authored a letter campaigning for his job as he bemoaned political campaigning.

Judges in Iowa are allowed to form campaign committees and raise money, but they'd rather do it subtly using state funds for a Iowa Voters Judicial Directory or by traveling the state on the taxpayers nickel.

The Iowa State Bar Association (ISBA) put out a video listing the criteria that voters should look for in a judge or justice.

Lawyers lawyering up for Lawyers.

The ISBA didn't feel a need to educate voters when most voters didn't vote on judges and those judges easily retained the peoples seats.

The issue of money, some out of state, in the judicial campaign process has been raised again.

Incoming Iowa State Bar Association President Guy Cook calls money and politics a “cancer that will kill the system”, yet the ISBA charges a membership fee and has out of state members.

Keep in mind, it's the ISBA who rates judges for retention.

The CEO of a major Iowa employer was critical of outside interests and their spending in Iowa, yet this CEO is okay with his company doing national and international business.

This CEO also lectured Iowans that removing judges on the basis of one decision was not what Iowans intended when they amended the state’s constitution in 1962.

The Iowa Constitution  --

Terms — judicial elections.  SEC. 17.  Members of all courts shall have such tenure in office as may be fixed by law, but terms of supreme court judges shall be not less than eight years and terms of district court judges shall be not less than six years.  Judges shall serve for one year after appointment and until the first day of January following the next judicial election after the expiration of such year.  They shall at such judicial election stand for retention in office on a separate ballot which shall submit the question of whether such judge shall be retained in office for the tenure prescribed for such office and when such tenure is a term of years, on their request, they shall, at the judicial election next before the end of each term, stand again for retention on such ballot.  Present supreme court and district court judges, at the expiration of their respective terms, may be retained in office in like manner for the tenure prescribed for such office.  The general assembly shall prescribe the time for holding judicial elections.

It states they MAY BE RETAINED IN OFFICE, it doesn't say they're guaranteed retention and it doesn't spell out any criteria for voting yes or no.

As I stated two years ago --

For me this has never been about one ruling, I've been voting NO on judges since I first voted in 1976.

Most judges I've encountered come across as pompous asses who believe they are the law, or above the law.

For me it is part of the checks of the system and utilizing the no retention may keep the scales of justice balanced and the judges centered in reality. 

Legal Man

The president-elect of the Iowa State Bar Association needs to try and relax his habeas corpus and the scientific community is united in that fact.

Brother of new Supreme Court justice slams retention vote that threw out judges

Robert Waterman made his not so brief remarks amidst the installation ceremony of his brother, Thomas, onto the court.

Not sure if it's sibling rivalry, or just a case of a lawyer being a lawyer, but learn to relax and enjoy the moment.

There was no need to go all corpus delicti.

Both Waterman's have been a part of a firm that's been practicing since 1854.

That's a long time to practice.

Practice?

You Be The Judge

The Ragister doesn't support removing judges, unless...

87-year-old judge is on ballot; how old is too old for job?

Why, he wrote sarcastically (and the scientific community is united in that fact), would anyone vote not to retain a judge for one reason?

This judge, Ruth Klotz, passed muster of the unimpeachable sacred process that the state of Iowa has in place --

In a pre-election report card recently released by the Iowa Bar Association, lawyers gave Klotz a 96.9 percent approval rating. She scored highest among the 13 District 5C judges for her knowledge of the law, the promptness of her rulings, punctuality for court proceedings, and evenhandedness regardless of race, gender, age, religion, sexual orientation and other factors.

Is there some other reason the Ragister singled out this judge?

She's old and the Ragister seems to have issues with older Iowans.