Don’t Forget the Judges

Radio Commentary, WMVV 90.7 New Life FM, July 30, 2010
By Sue Ella Deadwyler

Good morning, Jim. For the last several weeks I’ve reported on political parties and candidates leading up to the July 20th Primary, because that’s when voters choose candidates who’ll be on the November General Election ballot. But, you might have noticed. Judges are not on the Primary ballot. They don’t run as Republicans or Democrats or Libertarians or Independents. They run as non partisan candidates. That means, voters can’t use party platforms to help decide how to vote.

And another thing: judges won’t tell you where they stand on issues. They’ll explain that they might have to judge a case about that subject and answering the question would be unethical. So, where does that leave us? The first thing we have to do is find out who qualified to run for judge in our districts. That information is on the Secretary of State’s web site, where I got my list. 68 judges will be elected in November and one will be on the Georgia Supreme Court. The three candidates running for the Supreme Court are Tammy Adkins, David Nahmias and Matt Wilson.

But how do we know which of those three would be the best Justice for the Georgia Supreme Court? We know that the current Justice is David Nahmias who’s a native of Atlanta, was named to the Supreme Court of Georgia by Governor Perdue and took office less than a year ago on August 13, 2009. There’s a lot about him on the Internet, but information about the two candidates running against him might not be so public. That means a little research is in order.

For those 68 judges who’ll be elected in November, we have three months to find out which have high moral standards, which have proven they’ll uphold the law and constitution and which have the character to retain those standards if they are elected to a high public office. So, find out who’s running for the Appeals Court or Superior Court in your area and don’t forget to investigate the candidates for District Attorney. They all run non partisan, too, so party platforms won’t help in any of their races. Let’s do our homework and elect judges who’ll uphold the constitution and won’t try to create laws, themselves. For Georgia Insight I’m Sue Ella Deadwyler, your Capitol correspondent.