Texas Supreme Court Endorsements!

Jefferson, Wallace B. (R)

Jordan, Jim (D)

Oxford, Tom (L)

Cruz, Baltasar D. (D)

Houston, Sam (D)

Smith, David G. (L)

Wainwright, Dale (R)

Criss, Susan (D)

Johnson, Phil (R)

Shirley, Drew (L)

Yanez, Linda (D)

Eilers, Matthew E. (L)

Price, Tom (R)

Strawn, Susan (D)

Francis, Robert (R)

Howard, Dave (L)

Molina, J.R. (D)

Womack, Paul (R)

Cochran, Cathy (R)

Strange, William Bryan III (L)

Judges should be prohibited from soliciting or accepting political contributions from parties or attorneys who have cases pending in their courts. (Incredibly, some judges actively solicit campaign contributions from attorneys who have cases pending in their courts!)...

Mediation should not be automatically ordered in cases in which the pleadings indicate that the amount in controversy is equal to or less than $5,000.00. (Mediation should not be compulsory in such cases because the mediation fees and attorneys' fees imposed by such orders constitute a burden which is disproportionate to the relief sought for litigants in such cases and parties should not be faced with the choice they are currently given in many courts of incurring the cost of preparing an objection to a mediation order and attending a hearing on their objection -- which might be overruled anyway -- or just going ahead and paying a mediator and their attorneys for conducting a mediation. Although mediation orders in such cases do coerce litigants to enter into settlements merely out of a desire to avoid escalating litigation costs, I do not believe it is the role of the Courts to impose litigation costs on parties that are so disproportionate to the relief sought as to coerce settlements. I think it is more important for a judge to reduce the costs of access to the courts than to impose expenses upon litigants which coerce them into settlements.)

When mediation orders are entered in other cases (i.e., cases in which the amount in controversy exceeds $5,000.00) the orders should not designate a mediator nor a mediation deadline, unless the parties have agreed to same. Rather, all parties should be given an opportunity to agree upon a mediator and a mediation deadline in a rule 11 agreement to be filed with the Court or inform the Court if no agreement can be reached. Only then should trial courts be able to appoint a mediator and order a mediation deadline. (Since most experienced attorneys have mediators they prefer to use and file motions for substitution of the mediator when one is appointed by a trial court, this should also save judicial resources since a rule 11 agreement does not have to be reviewed or signed by a judge and the mediation deadline can then be extended by a subsequent rule 11 agreement between the parties without requiring another court order.)....

Judges should appoint guardians ad litem who will not automatically approve all proposed settlements on behalf of children and incompetent persons but who will do meaningful investigations and reviews of proposed settlements on behalf of children and incompetent persons (i.e., their wards) and who will reject settlements if they are not in the best interests of their wards....

Trial judges should automatically conduct Batson hearings (to determine whether jurors have been excluded for an improper reason, such as the juror's race or ethnicity) whenever it appears to the trial judge that one or more jurors may have been excluded for an improper reason.

When Batson hearings (to determine whether jurors have been improperly excluded because of their race or ethnicity) are conducted, special procedural rules should be adopted so that all persons who participated in jury selection for the party whose motivations are in question, other than the lead attorney for that party, should not be given the opportunity to overhear the testimony of their lead attorney and of witnesses who have not yet testified as to the reasons why a juror was excluded. In other words, the rule should equally apply to all witnesses in the context of Batson hearings.

Parties should be permitted to submit jury questionnaires (previously submitted to the Court and to which opposing counsel has had an opportunity to object) to jury panels for use in voir dire (in addition to oral voir dire) in cases in which the amount in controversy exceeds $50,000.00....

Jurors should not be permitted to ask questions of witnesses (which at least one current judge in Dallas County permits) because jurors should be listening attentively to the evidence and not thinking about what questions they may want to ask or wondering why they have not been permitted to ask certain questions.

Internet video and audio links should be installed in all courtrooms (including the Texas Supreme Court) so that the public has meaningful access to the courts. Only bench conferences, voir dires (i.e., jury selections), witnesses whose identities would normally be protected, and jurors themselves should generally not be shown.

Judges should be required to disclose on their court websites all political contributions they have received in excess of $50.00. (These donations must already be reported on judges' public Campaign Finance Reports which are filed with the Texas Ethics Commission and/or their local county clerks' offices, but this information cannot easily be accessed by persons who are unfamiliar with the judicial campaign finance filing system and requirements.)....

The search engines on the Texas appellate court websites should make all cases they have reviewed searchable by reference to the trial courts and judges whose decisions they have reviewed, as this information is not readily available to the public, all state court judges in Texas are elected, and some judges actively misrepresent the number of decisions they have had reversed.

Based partly on hopes for a larger-than-typical turnout among Democratic voters, the party is running a stronger and fuller slate of candidates in primaries for judicial races in this election cycle than in many previous years. In the race to unseat justices on the Texas Supreme Court, that slate of strong Democratic challengers, along with questions about judicial ethics and a huge backlog of cases on the court, means Democratic primary voters should pay special attention before they cast their ballots on March 4.