Impersonating a Judge in Illinois. Seriously.

As reported by Law360, “An Illinois state judge for the Cook County Circuit Court was removed from the bench Wednesday after she allegedly allowed a law clerk to wear her judicial robes and rule on two cases.”

This news breaks as my paper, Open for Business: Illinois Courts and Party Politics, wraps up.

News Release from UIUC Press Bureau here (for more information, contact 
m-leroy@illinois.edu):

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — The state of Illinois may be synonymous in popular culture with political corruption, but a new paper from a University of Illinois legal expert adds another layer: With popularly elected judges, Illinois courts are similarly mired in legalized influence peddling and partisanship.

By engaging in the type of political campaigning that other states prohibit while turning a blind eye to the millions of dollars that fuel those elections, Illinois’ judicial branch mirrors the state’s corruption-prone legislative and executive branches, said Michael LeRoy, a professor of labor and employment relations at Illinois and author of the paper.

“Since Illinois doesn’t use merit selection for judges, structural influences taint the independence of Illinois courts,” said LeRoy, who also holds a courtesy appointment with the College of Law. “Illinois simply labels judges by their political party. So the courts are then shaped by the Democratic and Republican parties and General Assembly, which sets judicial salaries at near-record levels.”

According to the paper, only eight states have partisan elections for their court of last resort. In addition, Illinois is among only thirteen states with no merit commission for judges, and among only eleven states with partisan election of general jurisdiction judges.

“The nation’s constitutional founders envisioned independence for our court system, framed in a theory of separation of powers,” LeRoy said. “While they saw the judiciary as the weakest branch, they conferred special legitimacy to courts by conceiving them as an intermediate body to protect citizens from the stronger legislative and executive branches. The state of Illinois’ partisan election system works against this core principle by encouraging judges to campaign like everyday politicians. As a result, judicial independence is compromised.”

LeRoy cautions that Illinois judges are not corrupt “so far as the evidence shows,” he said, but by aligning themselves with political parties and other powerful interests, it certainly gives off “the whiff of corruption, even if there is none.”

“It’s just unbecoming,” LeRoy said. “If nothing else, it strategically labels them for wealthy donors who like to influence public policies. And that should without question raise some eyebrows.”

When donors and voters see a political label next to a judge’s name, “this signals that the candidate shares the party’s values,” LeRoy said. “Thus, a judge is forever identified as Republican or Democratic even when these labels are not used in a retention election. Campaign donors – especially business groups, labor unions, trial lawyers and political parties – are able to make calculated decisions about investing in certain judicial candidates. The fact that these donors give millions of dollars to high-level candidates signifies their confidence that party affiliation reliably predicts a judge’s key votes in future cases.

“The end result is that this highly partisan process hinders the judiciary’s fulfillment of its role as an independent, apolitical arbiter of justice.”

The paper identifies several problems with Illinois’ flawed method for selecting judges and offers several recommendations to fix the problem, including the abolishment of partisan elections for judges.

“The state should select and retain judges with a commission of citizens, lawyers and judges who use merit criteria. This change is needed because political influence pervades and taints Illinois courts,” LeRoy said. “Political influence in the Illinois judicial system will not subside as long as the state’s judicial code aids and abets record levels of campaign spending on judicial elections.”

The paper also recommends updating the state’s judicial code to include the current provisions of the American Bar Association’s “Model Code.”

“Judges are currently bound to an ethics code that is a relic from the 1970s through early 1990s – a period when little money was spent on judicial elections,” LeRoy said. “While I find no evidence that judges are corrupt like some of our recent governors, I find substantial evidence of influence peddling in judicial elections. Illinois judges should be held to the stringent campaign standards that are common in other states.”

LeRoy also argues for a board to enforce judicial ethics, with judges disciplined for donating to candidates who run for prosecutor, engaging in “retire-to-run” shams, and double-dipping at the expense of taxpayers.

“Illinois should be more like states that discipline judicial candidates for campaign messages that degrade the impartiality of the judiciary,” he said. “But these reforms cannot be accomplished until Illinois endows its judicial ethics board with more teeth through enhanced powers, provides more funding for a proactive enforcement staff, and creates transparent methods to audit and disclose the financial interests of judges to the taxpaying public.”

For now, Illinois courts remain open for business – “open for labor unions, trial lawyers and other special interest groups that dole out money from deep campaign war chests like candy corn on Halloween,” LeRoy said.