“Constitutional Crisis”, Defended

Happy New Year!!! 2007 is already shaping up as a banner year. Well, that is for you fellow Penn State, USC, Auburn, Boise State or Wisconsin fans out there.

Let us begin 2007 with a nod to Chief Justice John Roberts’ new report on judicial pay. For those of you unaware, here here is a link to a “biased” report from today’s WSJ blog.

Let me preface my opinion by saying that I was fortunate enough to attend a breakfast seminar last month with Associate Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia and heard a parallel lecture by the former lawyer and law professor, followed by a thoughtful defense and somewhat worrisome forecast that is thoroughly neglected in the linked blog.

To sum the report by the Chief Justice, there is a need for pay increases in the judicial branch in order to compete for the best and brightest legal minds. The objective is to recruit thoughtful professionals to sit on the bench and give us an unbiased approach in the duties of legal interpretation.

Even though there are obvious opinions levied in the WSJ piece, I highly doubt Mr. Roberts’ report was created out of greed. In fact, I would argue that the Chief Justice is financially “okay” and far from needing a handout. Therefore, rather than selfish motivations, Mr. Roberts is illustrating effective corporate forecasting. He understands the marketplace trends and is presenting a logical approach to correct market imbalances. Mr. Roberts does not use personal citations in his report; nor is it an indictment on existing judges and their ability to perform. It is, rather, a thoughtful social exercise that assumes trends based on capital market philosophies. In order to assume the best interpretation of law is being made, we would want the best legal minds responsible to issue those interpretations. In our capitalistic society, compensation is a barometer for achievement, and while the argument is not to compete entirely to scale with private sector firms, there should be some attempts to correct the gross imbalance and make the honor of Judge a notable achievement again.

Currently, salaries for District Judges are fractionally higher than those of other state legal positions such as associate attorneys at the state and local levels, but significantly lower than counterparts from the private sector. Again, I do not (and neither do Justices Roberts or Scalia) advocate matching salaries, but at least increase the pay to allow for some of these legal minds to entertain the possibility of serving on the bench without the penalty of departure from their current lifestyle.

The fear here is that we are encouraging the process of promoting a prosecutor whose only career experience is that of a state employee to become a judge whose job it is to mediate cases directed against the state. To me, that sounds a little too socialistic for my tastes. As a business owner, I want my judges to have a firm understanding of the private sector and what it means to defend us from the oft-times overbearing nature of government. Of course, if you don’t believe Justice Roberts or Scalia and want to view a case study of this process yourself, simply analyze corporate law in the European Union.