Thursday, December 18, 2008
The New York Law Journal reports that John F. O'Mara, the chair of the Commission on Judicial Nomination has released a statement (pdf file) explaining how it is that the candidates it submitted to the governor were all men.Don't get me wrong-- I respect and like Judge Pigott, and I hope he gets the nod. From what I can tell about the others they all deserve the sobriquet of "well qualified" also. I believe in merit selection, and I think that the Commission on Judicial Nomination has traditionally done a fine job. The results speak for themselves-- our appellate bench, and particularly our Court of Appeals are everything New York's courts should be. Even so, it seems peculiar that Judge Ciparick, a sitting Court of Appeals Judge, isn't on the list.
I don't think I know any of the people on the Commission, although a couple of the names are familiar. This disappoints me-- I like to think that I've been around long enough to be acquainted with some of these sorts of behind the scenes power players. It really wouldn't be appropriate to ask any of them about it. ("Yo, Gerald B. Lefcourt, WTF? E. Leo Milonas, how come no chicks?") I guess the best we can say about the situation is that there has been some consciousness raising, which is a good thing.
// posted by Bill @ 8:19 AM 
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