The Overlooked 3rd Branch

With all of Sen. Chuck Grassley's (R-IA) recent bloviating about the D.C. Circuit Court, it's enough to bring crocodile tears to your eyes.

Chuck is vewy, vewy upset that Obama might tip the D.C. Court into a more liberal-leaning court and now wants to shrink the court by eliminating the 3 vacancies.  Grassley was just fine with the court as is until this year.  What changed?  The retirement of Republican appointed judges. 

Until February of this year, the court had a Republican majority since 1986* (except for a brief period in 2002 when it was tied 4-4-4).  The last time it had 4 Democratic appointees was 2005.  1985/86 was the last time Democratic appointees were a majority of the court.  In 1985, Johnson appointee Edward Tamm died and Reagan appointed his replacement changing the court from 7 Ds - 4 Rs to 6-5-1.  Reagan filled a vacancy in 1986 and created a tie at 6-6.  Then Kennedy appointee James Wright took senior status in 1986 and created another vacancy.  Reagan filled the vacancy that year and Republicans got a majority.

The court expanded to 11 seats in 1979, 12 seats in 1984, and then back to to 11 seats in 2008.

Below is a chart of the D.C. Circuit Court and it's composition.  Democratic appointees in blue, Republicans in red, and vacancies in green.

Bottom line, Grassley is upset because Obama has a chance to take the court in a more leftward direction.

New Bexar County Judges

The Express-News has coverage from the swearing-in ceremonies that took place today for our new judges.

The Bexar County website as already been updated.  And who says government isn't efficient?

Even the 4th Court of Appeals website has been updated to reflect the electoral changes.

Federal Circuit Courts

In November of 2011, the Baltimore Sun published an interesting article about the federal judiciary.  So often, the judiciary is one of those places that is overlooked unless 1) a nominee is high profile or 2) the nomination is for the Supreme Court.

The Judiciary is a branch of the government, but since you don't campaign for the office, most people don't pay attention.  This despite the fact that the decisions from judges have such an impact on everyone (Citizens United anyone).

Needless to say we like to think of the judges as impartial, but let's face it, there is a difference between Democratic-appointed judges and Republican-appointed judges.