Legislative Update XVII

After lots of arm-twisting on anti-war Democrats in the House of Representatives, Congress voted to approve funding for the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan in an emergency supplemental. This is supposed to be the last time such funds will be provided for outside of the normal budget. IMF funding and the "cash for clunkers" program made it into the final bill, but it does not include the $80 million the White House requested to start effort to close Gitmo. The bill also prohibits detainees from being released in the United States and allows the transfer of detainees for prosecution only after Congress receives a plan detailing the risks.

The Senate passed a separate bill to block the release of detainee abuse photos. President Obama had given his formal word to classify the photos to placate those who wanted to put the prohibition in the war funding bill, which would have further weakened its chances of passing. If and when it will come up for a vote in the House is unknown.

Senate Republicans blocked a resolution condemning violence against women's health-care providers. The Senate did pass a formal apology for slavery, and will be followed by the House next week. It's hard to believe this hasn't happened already. The House did pass a resolution knocking Tehran's crackdown on protesters, with Rep. Ron Paul being the only "nay" vote.

Lastly, on the health care front, House Dems presented a plan that does have a public option, but that was left out of the Senate version. What ultimate comes out of Congress is anyone's guess at this point, assuming that something does that is. The only thing we know for sure is that it appears it's a long road ahead...

UPDATE: For the first time in 20 years, the House unanimously approved four article of impeachment against U.S. District Judge Samuel Kent of Texas accusing him of sexually assaulting two female employees and lying to judicial investigators and Justice Department officials. This now sets up a trial in the Senate.

Judicial Corruption Watch

Former Senator Trent Lott's name surfaces in the indictment of Mississippi state judge Bobby DeLaughter on allegations that he ruled favorably for a defendant in exchange for the defendant-noted attorney "Dickie" Scruggs"-using his connection to Lott to get DeLaughter a seat on the federal bench:

Scruggs, through the help of then-Sen. Trent Lott, Scruggs’s brother-in-law, promised to have DeLaughter considered for a federal judgeship in exchange for the favorable ruling.

Lott called DeLaughter, but ultimately tapped someone else for the open judgeship seat. Lott has not been charged in the case and has repeatedly denied wrongding, though his name does surface in the DeLaughter indictment.

From the indictment unsealed on Thursday:

On or about March 29, 2006, in order to exploit Judge DeLaughter’s aspirations to become a federal judge, Richard F. “Dickie” Scruggs caused his brother-in-law, then a United States Senator from Mississippi, to offer Judge DeLaughter consideration for appointment to a federal judgeship then open in the Southern District of Mississippi.

Scruggs, who was sentenced to last summer to five years in prison for his part in a scheme to bribe another state judge, has already pleaded guilty for his part in this case. Scruggs was one of the attorneys involved in the massive tobacco lawsuit portrayed in the film "The Insider". Lott's connection to the case had already surfaced last week in a complaint filed by a former partner of Scruggs, who's original lawsuit was decided by DeLaughter in Scruggs' favor. I imagine we'll hear more about this case and Lott's involvement in it, as federal investigators appear to be working on that aspect of the case.

But that's just run-of-the-mill corruption compared to this next story:

Eastern Pennsylvania has a terrible reputation for judicial corruption and venality -- the stories one hears from practitioners and others around Philadelphia are truly awful, with bags full of money and all the rest. But a story in the NY Times today breaks new, and more nauseating, ground. Two judges in the Wilkes-Barre area have pleaded guilty to taking kickbacks -- $2.6 million worth -- from local juvenile detention centers for sentencing young offenders to time in the facility (the facilities were reimbursed by the state on a per-prisoner basis, so the more kids they had, the more money they earned). So dozens and dozens of kids who would ordinarily have expected to get a slap on the wrist -- for writing nasty things about their high school principals on Facebook, for starting fights in the playground, that sort of thing -- received sentences of several months in the detention facility instead, all, it turns out, to line the pockets of the judges.

According to the NY Times, one of the judges ordered the closure of the state-run juvenile facility, forcing county officials to send juveniles to newly built private facilities. They then received kickbacks for sending youth to the centers, in the form of payments to a shell corporation that the judges owned. According to the timeline I link to above one of the judges even ordered the sealing of a trade secrets suit initiated by the owners of the detention facilities so as to prevent the release of state audit results that revealed that the private facilities were a bad deal for Luzerne County, a ruling that was overturned by the State Superior court as “nothing more than a ruse to prevent public exposure.” In short, these were two nasty and corrupt individuals who abused their power to wrongfully deprive kids of their liberty. They both agreed to a plea deal that would send them to prison for 87 months, but the stocks sounds too good for them.

Electing Judges is Moronic

And this is why:

Six months ago, California's highest court discarded its reputation for caution and ended the state's ban on same-sex marriage.

Now the moderately conservative state Supreme Court is being asked to take an even riskier step -- to overturn the November voter initiative that reinstated the gay-marriage ban and possibly provoke a voter revolt that could eject one or more of the justices from the bench.

The court is under intense pressure from all sides. Its first response to the challenges may come today, when the justices meet privately in a weekly conference to decide which cases to accept for review.

Legal scholars say case law does not give the court a clear path for overturning the voter-approved measure. The state high court -- six Republicans and one moderate Democrat -- generally defers to the will of the people. Only twice has the court rejected initiatives on the legal grounds cited by opponents of Proposition 8.

Civil rights groups, churches and local governments have filed six lawsuits asking the court to declare the measure an illegal constitutional revision. Letters also have poured into the court pleading for urgent action, and anti-Proposition 8 rallies have attracted large crowds statewide.

At the same time, opponents of gay marriage have warned that they will work to oust any justice who votes against Proposition 8, a threat particularly palpable in a year when voters in other states have booted six state high court justices after campaigns by special interest groups.

"It is a time of lots of crocodiles in the bathtub," said Santa Clara University law professor Gerald Uelmen, who has followed the court for decades. "Their oath requires them to ignore these kinds of political threats. But the threat of having to face a contested election is a significant one."

So, opposition to the one of these judges will have nothing to do with whether or not the matter is decided in accordance with state law, and everything to do with whether the judge decides the "right" way for these opponents of Proposition 8. Even if most of these voters understood the intricacies of state ballot initiative law (they don't) and the question was a close one that could go either way, it wouldn't matter to them. Whatever the law says, they'll be furious with these "activist judges" because they will have ignored the "will of the people." They will work to oust them, even if the judge makes the decision in accordance with what he earnestly believes the law requires and not out of his or her own personal preferences. And these judges will most certainly be thinking about that as they consider this case, making their impartiality-a requirement of their office-necessarily suspect.

The election of judges is a farce. In a contest between what the law requires and what the people want, the people will win and the law will lose, either because the judge will be swayed by the prospect of voter ire or because the people will vote that judge out. To satisfy the silly requirements of those who think that judges should be accountable to the public for their decisions on questions of law that the public can't even understand is ridiculous, and should not be permitted in a country that values the rule of law as highly as we supposedly do.