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Thursday, March 02, 2006
Courts - Judges in Texas and California in news
Texas. Thanks to How Appealing, here is a story from this morning's Dallas Morning News headlined "Opponent says justice copied books." Some quotes:
AUSTIN – Texas Supreme Court Justice Don Willett's job application to the state included at least half a dozen examples of writing cribbed – without attribution – from two books by conservative legal stalwarts, the Republican's opponent said Wednesday.California. Meanwhile, here is an article from The Recorder that begins:Justice Willett, appointed by Gov. Rick Perry to a vacant spot on Texas' highest civil court in August, confirmed having used the thoughts of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia and former U.S. Circuit Judge Robert Bork.
But Justice Willett said there was nothing sinister in his borrowing the anecdotes, some of which he said "are so commonly repeated as to be part of the conservative lexicon, like the expression, 'legislate from the bench.' "
"There was no need for attribution," he said. "This wasn't an intensely footnoted law review article, judicial opinion or doctoral dissertation. It was a conversational, earnest discussion of what I believe about the nature of judging and the limited role of the judiciary." * * *
Some examples:
• Justice Willett, in his application, repeated nearly word-for-word an anecdote about Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes and Judge Learned Hand from Mr. Bork's 1990 book, The Tempting of America: The Political Seduction of the Law. In his book, Mr. Bork footnoted and attributed that story to two sources, while Justice Willett did not describe any source.
• In writing about a passage from a legal brief that he said showed over-reliance on legislative history, Justice Willett concluded, "Reality has surpassed parody." In his book, Justice Scalia scorned the same passage, with the opening line, "Reality has overtaken parody."
• Both Justice Willett and Mr. Bork disparaged less-than-rigorous legal reasoning. Justice Willett called it "free verse as defined by Robert Frost: 'tennis with the net down.' " Mr. Bork referred to "what Robert Frost called free verse, 'tennis with the net down.'"
Less than a week after California's Commission on Judicial Performance launched formal proceedings against a Sonoma County judge who allegedly tried to use her position to avoid a DUI arrest, another jurist is facing a similar predicament in Riverside County.Judge Bernard Schwartz pleaded no contest to misdemeanor charges of driving with a blood alcohol level of more than twice the legal limit while in Pismo Beach last summer.
The commission announced Monday that it had begun formal proceedings into allegations that Schwartz repeatedly tried to avoid arrest and receive preferential treatment because he is a judge. * * *
Proceedings against Schwartz are getting under way just a week after the CJP announced it would be scrutinizing similar charges against Sonoma County Superior Court Judge Elaine Rushing, who tried to use her position and that of her husband, 6th District Court of Appeal Justice Conrad Rushing, to avoid being arrested for drunken driving in June.
Posted by Marcia Oddi on March 2, 2006 02:34 PM
Posted to Courts in general