If old judges are so wise, why can’t they clean up Pennsylvania courts?
This is Part 1 in our three-part series.
A litany of appalling scandals on the Pennsylvania Supreme Court
In recent years the only thing protecting Pennsylvanians from judges who have accumulated too much power with not enough accountability has been a blessed and hard-won constitutional reform requiring all state judges to retire at age 70.
But now Pennsylvania judges have embarked on a multi-year campaign to do away with this needed reform.
State judges want to extend their terms in office to give themselves a windfall of salary and benefits worth upwards of a million dollars, despite the express wishes of the framers of the Pennsylvania constitution and state voters.
Whether state judges get away with their latest money and power grab remains to be seen. But they’ve already gotten away with a lot.
In recent years Pennsylvania courts have been mired in unending turmoil of disgrace, scandal, and political adventurism. Our state courts and judges today seem unable to protect even their own dignity, let alone protect the dignity and rights of everyday Pennsylvanians, as they are charged by our constitution to do.
The dismal record of the state supreme court alone speaks volumes.
In recent years three Supreme Court justices have been removed for criminal activities or other unseemly misbehavior, making it perhaps the most corrupt and out-of-control institution in the state, and that’s saying a lot.
Justice Rolf Larsen was impeached in the 1990s after he suggested case fixing and politics were rampant on the high court; rather than investigating Larsen’s allegations, two special prosecutors and a grand jury were empanelled to go after Larsen, who himself was found to have illegally obtained prescription drugs while he sat around his chambers in a jock strap and ate chilled fruit salad, and fixed cases with a lawyer who also happened to head one of the court’s disciplinary boards.
Justice Joan Orie Melvin resigned in disgrace in 2013 after she was convicted of using state workers to help her get elected to the high court.
Just a few months ago, Justice Seamus McCaffery was forced out after an investigation by state Attorney General Kathleen Kane revealed he’d sent more than four hundred pornographic emails to an unknown number of state prosecutors, criminal investigators and others.
The most recent and ongoing state court scandal concerns whether old-boy judges and their porno-sharing lawyers are playing politics by retaliating in secretive star-chamber proceedings against AG Kane for her discovery of those same porno emails, in a political effort to force her to resign and drive her from office.
Other misbehaving state judges in recent years have been protected by a non-existent, self-policing, and highly politicized disciplinary system.
Even before this latest litany of appalling scandals, Pennsylvanians for Modern Courts points out, a ” blue-ribbon panel of civic leaders, public officials, legal professionals and members of the judiciary commissioned by Governor Casey and chaired by then-Superior Court Judge Phyllis W. Beck, found that confidence in the judiciary was appallingly low.”
With a record, and public condemnation, like this, one would imagine our judges would understand they better get their act together and behave themselves in and out of the courtroom, and stop grabbing for even more power, political Machiavellianism, and perks.
But no such luck.
This generation of Pennsylvania judges seem hell bent not on looking out for the little guy and every day Pennsylvanians, but looking out for the big guys, and themselves.
The requirement that judges retire at 70 was a critical and hard-fought reform dating back to the state’s constitutional convention of the 1960s.
But now the judges and their proxies are back in the state legislature asking that even this protective constitutional requirement be thrown out.
A bill sponsored by state Rep. Kate Harper (R-Montgomery) to raise the mandatory retirement age of state judges to 75 has made it out of committee and will soon be voted on by the full house, and passed on to the senate.
Identical legislation was passed in October 2013 in both the state house and senate. To make it on to the ballot to change the constitution, both houses must pass a proposed amendment in two consecutive legislative sessions. The governor is not required to sign.
If the current bill makes it through the general assembly and the senate this session, voters could be greeted with a question at the polls as early as this November to raise the mandatory retirement age of judges to 75.
And that prospect gives rise to a variety of issues that should be of concern to all Pennsylvanians.
Raising the retirement age to 75 by way of a constitutional amendment amounts to a power and money grab, and deserves stern public disapproval and condemnation, and denial of the initiative.
First, there’s the money.
State judges currently draw a salary of up to $195,000 a year. So five more years means some of these judges — many who are retired politicians and aren’t even competent lawyers who could cut it in private practice — will be taking in almost a cool million feeding at the public trough.
But the money is the least of what we should be worried about.
Next week: Part 2: Constitutional convention intent: retiring judges at 70 was a modern court reform.
Great job and very informative..
PA judges are bought and sold like stolen merchandise at an outdoor flea market. Get them out asap.
Why aren’t Federal officials paying attention to the discriminative, lack of due process and theft of Constitutional and protections and property, in some Pennsylvania court rooms? The on goings have been despicable, illegal, immoral, unethical and unconscionable to say the least! An excellent and informative article by Bill Kiesling. Thank you Mr. Keisling.