Parties in a lawsuit challenging how high-ranking Tennessee judges are selected are presently more wrapped up in who will rule on the case than the merits of the case itself, observes Andrea Zelinski.
Gov. Bill Haslam last week appointed three new members to a Special Supreme Court to hear a lawsuit against him challenging the constitutionality of how the state has picked judges over the past four decades. Haslam’s earlier appointees stepped down after John Hay Hooker, a longtime political gadfly behind the lawsuit, pressured them to recuse themselves for having ties to an organization that lobbies against popularly electing judges.
Now, another special justice, W. Morris Kizer, has revealed that he donated to Haslam’s campaigns for Knoxville mayor in 2003 and governor in 2010. Kizer’s household gave $3,000 to Haslam’s gubernatorial campaign, according to campaign records.
Kizer insists his political donations don’t “constitute a basis for disqualification,” but Hooker contends every link is suspect.
“It’s like a football game between the University of Tennessee and Vanderbilt,” said Hooker, an 82-year-old former Democratic Party gubernatorial candidate who today is asking the Special Supreme Court to take up his case. “Do you want the referee to be a graduate from the University of Tennessee or Vanderbilt? That’s a no-no.”
…”If you ask anybody if they’re alive and human, they have an opinion about things,” Haslam said last week before naming the three new members to the panel. “That’s different than having a conflict. I think anybody that we will appoint will understand that difference and will make sure there’s no conflicts.”
Appeals judge Alan Glenn, chairman of the Judicial Ethics Committee, said the governor’s interpretation is correct. The tricky part, he said, is defining what conflicts can “reasonably” be questioned.
“Like defining what’s fairness and what’s beauty, everyone has their own ideas,” he said. “What is reasonably questioned impartiality? Everyone has their own views on it.”