While federal judges across the nation are going on more and more "questionable" subsidized trips, the number taken by their New Jersey colleagues is dropping a tad, according to a watchdog group.
In a report released April 28, the Community Rights Counsel notes a 60 percent increase in judges' trips funded by three "anti-regulatory" organizations between 1992-1994 and 2002-2004, the latest federal judge financial disclosure data available.
* * *
In any event, the negative attention on the issue has spurred the federal judiciary to take a fresh look at it.
The Judicial Conference's executive committee recently asked a seven-member subcommittee of the Committee on the Judicial Branch, chaired by Judge D. Brock Hornby of the Eastern District of Maine, to re-examine the issue.
The subcommittee will look at private educational programs for judges, financial disclosure requirements related to the programs and how to better identify possible conflicts of interest that require recusal, says Dick Carelli, a spokesman for the Administrative Office of the United States Courts.
LEC's Buckley has written to some alumni of its programs, including Ackerman, asking them to talk to members of the subcommittee about the program.
Buckley's five-page letter is apparently aimed at refuting critics, describing LEC's programs as "theoretical, not tendentious . . . philosophical, not political." The letter rejects as "perjorative" the label of "private" as applied to a program by a public law school, such as George Mason. It asserts the value of its programs and boasts of LEC's 30-year history and the Nobel and Pulitzer Prize winners who have served as faculty.
Buckley denies that the letter is meant to provide recipients with talking points and says it went only to some alumni like Ackerman, who he knows and considers a friend.
The current authority for judges on attending "independent" educational seminars is Advisory Opinion 67 from the judiciary's Committee on Codes of Conduct. The emphasis of a particular viewpoint or school of thought "does not necessarily preclude a judge from attending," but it could be improper based on such factors as whether the subject matter of a seminar is likely to come before the judge, says the opinion.
|
