JAS Commentary

Justice at Stake hailed the appointment of Steven Gonzalez to the Washington Supreme Court, where he has become the first Mexican American justice to serve in the state’s history. Read Gavel Grab for more. 

Justice at Stake and the Brennan Center for Justice have praised the Tennessee Supreme Court’s decision to strengthen that state’s judicial recusal rules. See Gavel Grab for details.

In a Chicago Tribune op-ed today, JAS Executive Director Bert Brandenburg called for more rigorous rules on judicial recusal to protect fair and impartial courts. See Gavel Grab for details.

Bert Brandenburg, JAS executive director, decried an explosion of assaults on merit selection, and also efforts to impeach judges over controversial rulings. See details in Gavel Grab.

Justice at Stake applauded on Friday the apparent death of an effort to impeach four Iowa Supreme Court justices. See Gavel Grab for more.

The mud-slinging, special-interest dominated 2011 battle for the Wisconsin Supreme Court represented the latest assault on the high court’s credibility, the Justice at Stake Campaign said today. See Gavel Grab for more.

For 200 years, a safety barrier has protected our nation's courts and our democracy. No matter how controversial the case or unpopular the ruling, no state or federal judge has been impeached for an opinion issued from the bench. In the next few months, that may change. Last fall, Iowa...

For more than 200 years, a safety barrier has protected our nation's courts and our democracy. No matter how controversial the case or unpopular the ruling, no state or federal judge has been impeached for an opinion issued from the bench. In the next few months, that may change. The...

A commentary on the looming Iowa impeachment crisis in Iowa, by JAS Executive Director Bert Brandenburg, appears in the Washington Post. Learn more. JAS also issued this statement criticizing political impeachments.

Given a new round of special interest campaign cash, attack advertising and wedge-issue politics in the 2010 judicial elections, "pressure on impartial justice is growing," said Bert Brandenburg, executive director of the Justice at Stake Campaign. For details, see Gavel Grab.

At Fox News, Glenn Beck has been taken in by a conspiracy theory about $45 million in spending to end competitive judicial elections in the United States. For details, see Gavel Grab.

Working the ref is a time-honored tradition. This election season, America's referees—judges—are coming in for a serious round of partisan hazing. The latest target is Sandra Day O'Connor. The immediate goal is to shut her up. The broader goals are more ominous. Since she left the Supreme Court in 2005,...

Her detractors ought to 'Lay Off Sandra Day O'Connor," Bert Brandenburg, the executive director of Justice at Stake, writes in a Slate commentary today. Read details in Gavel Grab.

When should a judge be thrown out of office? This year, Coloradans will join voters in 15 states when they engage in a special type of ballot known as a retention election. Voters must choose "yes" or "no" on whether to grant another term to Supreme Court justices and local...

The Justice at Stake Campaign and a partner, the Brennan Center for Justice, have unveiled a new website featuring data on national TV spending, candidate fundraising and key political players in 2010 state high-court elections, which may be unprecedented in their character. State Supreme Court retention (up-or-down) elections in four...

Former Colorado Supreme Court Justice Jean Dubofsky and Democratic Party lawyer Mark Grueskin are forming a nonprofit group to educate voters about the judicial performance evaluation process in light of an anti-retention campaigned led by Clear The Bench. Click here to read more .

"Has the Citizens United whirlwind begun with a small dust devil down in Texas? When the Supreme Court issued its controversial ruling, it seemed to have a sanguine view of what it means to let corporations and unions spend freely on political elections."

"In the end, what did this winter’s Obama-Alito confrontation amount to? When a hot Supreme Court case comes along, intertwined with high-stakes politics, interbranch tempers have a way of boiling over. And testiness between courts and the elected branches is part of Beltway life. But the State of the Union spat sucked Washington into one of its favorite games—the kind where no one really wins."

"In the wake of the release of Justice Department memos about detainee treatment, MSNBC host Rachel Maddow was the latest to talk about impeaching Judge Jay Bybee, a former Assistant Attorney General, Office of Legal Counsel who wrote some of them. An excerpt, which begins at 7:30 of this video,...

"In Slate last week, Yale professor Bruce Ackerman called for the impeachment of federal appeals judge Jay Bybee. The rationale would be to provide an opportunity for a legislative investigation of Bybee's previous work as a Justice Department attorney, where he helped produce the “torture memos” that green-lighted conduct that included abuses of prisoners at Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo and elsewhere."

"Michigan's voters delivered a small but telling electoral shock on Nov. 4. Chief Justice Cliff Taylor, a heavy favorite, got thumped by 100,000 votes by Circuit Judge Diane Hathaway, who was nominated just 59 days before the election. "

"The Beltway betting pool over Harriet Miers' views on abortion has gone national, as a 1989 questionnaire was released yesterday showing Dallas City Council candidate Miers scoring a perfect 10 with a Texas anti-abortion group. The president's spokesman tried to wave it away: "

"Was Terri Schiavo's piteous ordeal a victory for the rule of law? After all, interest groups and the politicians they pressured were trumped by the courts. The macabre circus that arose around Mrs. Schiavo's case counted for nothing: Pinellas County Judge George W. Greer issued a steady series of rulings despite being targeted for electoral defeat and impeachment, compared to Joseph Mengele and other Nazis, and even threatened with death."