Sunday, August 22, 1999
One vote, one judge, no choice
BY HOWARD WILKINSON
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Perhaps you have wondered why it is that, in Ohio, we elect judges based on who has the most yard signs and passes out the most kitchen magnets at church festivals.
If so, you may find this year's Hamilton County Municipal Court election an interesting case study.
Mainly because there isn't one.
Well, there is one, technically speaking, but a fat lot of good it will do you, Mr. and Ms. Hamilton County Voter, because you will go to the polls Nov. 2 and your choice will boil down to this:
(A) The incumbent. Or, if you prefer, (B) The incumbent.
Seven municipal court judges up for election, one in each of the county's judicial districts. Seven incumbent judges — four Republicans, three Democrats — are guaranteed to be winners on election night, because no breathing lawyer in Hamilton County filed petitions to take one of them on.
Democracy in action.
Appointments to federal judgeships are good for life; they never have to stand for election. That's why every self-respecting trial lawyer in America dreams of landing one.
But not every lawyer can be a federal judge; some must set their sights on a branch considerably lower on the judicial tree — like Hamilton County Municipal Court. The next best thing to a lifetime appointment.
And why, you ask, are there no choices in this year"s municipal court elections?
Because the political parties, Republican and Democrat, want it that way.
For years now, there has been a tacit understanding between leaders of the two parties that they would not lay a finger on each other's incumbent African-Americans and women on the bench in order to achieve the worthy goal of a diverse court.
It has worked for the most part, although one wonders that there are judges who would find it more than a little patronizing that the political parties don't believe they could win on their own merits.
There are two such judges up for election this year — William Mallory Jr. and Cheryl Grant, both Democrats and both African-American.
But the Democratic and Republican parties have another side agreement on two other judgeships — Democrat Timothy Black and Republican David Stockdale, both of whom are white males. And both of whom are in what are considered difficult districts where either party could win. So the parties agreed not to take a chance and gave both a free pass.
In the case of the other three judges — Republicans Guy Guckenberger, Robert Taylor and Ralph E. “Ted” Winkler — their districts are so overwhelmingly Republican that the Democratic Party didn't even bother to try to find lawyers willing to run. But even when there are contested judicial races in Hamilton County, they generally boil down to name games.
You may find this hard to believe, but there are, at this very moment, judges in the Hamilton County who believe in their hearts that the best way to convince voters of their worthiness to don the black robes is to plaster their names on the back end of as many Metro buses as possible. Honest, they do.
Many, inside and outside the legal profession, would like to see “merit selection” of judges, where a panel of lawyers and lay people chooses judges to be appointed by the governor; and those judges, instead of getting involved an election battle over which candidate has the most emery boards to pass out, stands before the voters every four or six years, and the voters decide whether to keep him or her in office. If the answer is “no,” that judge is gone and the process starts over again.
Critics of merit selection say it takes away choice, that there is something wrong with the idea of voters walking into a polling place and finding only one name on the ballot.
Sort of like a Hamilton County Municipal Court election, we suppose.
Howard Wilkinson's column runs Sundays. Call him at 768-8388 or e-mail at hwilkinson@enquirer.com.
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