POLITICS: Conventional wisdom

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The Red Hook Star-Revue is published every month.

Founded June 2010 by George Fiala and Frank Galeano interest to so few, that its workings are a puzzle to most, including some who are most involved with making some of the choices.

In NYC, we “elect” Civil, Supreme and Surrogate Judges. Other judgeships are appointed by the Governor (subject to confirmation) or the Mayor (not so subject) using recommendation by screening panels.

Civil and Surrogate Court nominees of each party are selected in primaries (if they are not unopposed), while Supreme Court nominees are selected at nominating conventions by delegates selected at primaries (if they are not, as is usually the case, unopposed). At least, that’s how it works on paper.

In actuality, before its convention meets, the Brooklyn Democratic Party’s Executive Committee, consisting of the elected party State Committee members from each Assembly District (who, in Brooklyn, are the Party’s de facto “District Leaders“) decide among themselves which names will be put before the convention, and those folks are then nominated by the convention, which operates using a script, with the speaking roles pre-assigned.

Yes, the delegates can nominate someone from the floor. This happened in who did so would be insuring they would never be nominated for Supreme Court. Since 2004, no one who wants to go to Supreme has been willing to put this belief to an actual test, so there are no contests.

This leaves the power of the district leaders virtually unchecked, except for the Party’s Independent Judicial Screening Panel, created in the wake of scandals at the beginning of this century.

The panel, like all efforts to reform a political process to select the person who will receive a prestigious position, is undeniably imperfect (the “independent” screening panels used by the Mayor and the Governor are also undeniably imperfect). Some have complained that the Brooklyn panel’s rules differ in significant ways fromtan; ironically, most of the difference - dures, which have lately sparked their el has real teeth; under the Brooklyn Party’s rules one cannot be put before the Executive Committee unless one was approved by the Screening Panel -

Are the panels perfect? No, they tend - ty’s legal establishment. Those wings include legal aid and public interest lawyers, and various ethnic associations. The panels are by no means lily-white; but they do tend to reflect the concerns of those who appear in Court for a living, perhaps sometimes to the detriment of other considerations. And sometimes there appears to be a bit of logrolling amongst the various factions.

Sometimes, in my humble opinion, the panel has done injustices. However, no one has ever posited any alternative method of performing such a function in an elective system. And, in fact, the equivalent panels which stand guard over appointed judgeships usually have the same establishment biases, except that they are less likely to have the diversity of the Kings County Panel.

In addition to the Screening Panel, the Party, as a sop to certain of the more outsider district leaders, created its own Ad Hoc Committee on the Judiciary, which issued its own report, complete with courtroom observations, and opinions solicited from attorneys who’ve observed the candidates in court.

The report was distributed to the Party

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