City and State Bar rate chief judge picks
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The New York City and State Bar Associations released their ratings for chief judge of the Court of Appeals candidates this week. Photo via NYS Courts
By Jacob Kaye
They’re all well qualified – well, almost.
That’s what the New York City and State Bar Associations said of the seven chief judge candidates recommended by the New York State Commission on Judicial Nomination to Governor Kathy Hochul several weeks ago.
The city bar, which, like most other bar associations, rates judicial candidates including chief judge candidates, gave its highest rating to each of the seven legal professionals recommended to the governor to fill the vacancy at the top of the Court of Appeals.
Sitting Court of Appeals Judges Anthony Cannataro, Shirley Troutman and Rowan Wilson, Appellate Division Presiding Justices Gerald Whalen and Elizabeth Garry, and attorneys Caitlin Halligan and Corey Stoughton were all given the bar association’s well qualified rating.
The state bar gave the candidates the same ranking, with the exception of one candidate.
The only candidate not to meet the top criteria was Cannataro, the only member of the list to have already spent time running the state’s top court and its entire court system.
Cannataro, who has been serving as the acting chief judge since former Chief Judge Janet DiFiore abruptly resigned from the post in August, was found to be “qualified” by the state bar association.
Though the bar associations do not share the details of their reviews of each candidate, their review process includes interviews with each candidate, a review of the candidates written decisions, an investigation into each of their backgrounds and interviews with judges and attorneys familiar with each of the candidates.
After the review process is completed, each respective bar associations’ various committees confer and decide what rating to bestow on each candidate.
In order to be given the NYCBA’s well qualified rating, the candidate must prove to have the “character temperament, professional aptitude and experience” to match the judicial position they are applying for.
The bar association’s only other rating is “not well qualified.”
Cannataro was given the same “qualified” rating by the NYSBA in December, when it issued ratings on the original list of candidates that included Appellate Division, Second Department Presiding Justice Hector LaSalle.
The current list of candidates was put together by the commission after the State Senate rejected LaSalle, marking the first time lawmakers have ever rejected a chief judge nominee.
The large number of well qualified candidates will likely bode well for Governor Kathy Hochul, who could potentially select two candidates to serve on the state’s top court after a new bill swiftly making its way through the legislative process could change the selection process.
Currently, if the governor were to select a sitting Court of Appeals judge to serve as chief judge, the vacancy that selection would create would be filled the same way it has been since 1974 – the commission would collect applications, conduct interviews and recommend seven candidates to the governor, who would pick a nominee and send them to the Senate.
Under the legislation, if a vacancy is created by a gubernatorial nomination, that vacancy can be filled by using the current list of candidates.
The legislation, which was passed by the Senate and Assembly less than a week after being introduced last week, has yet to be sent to the governor but is expected to get her signature when it is.
The bill is what is known as a “program bill,” or a piece of legislation that is agreed upon by the legislature and governor before it’s introduced.
The legislation’s proponents say it will prevent prolonged periods of a short-staffed Court of Appeals – the current chief judge vacancy is the longest since the current appointment-based nomination process began around 50 years ago.
“Amending this law will prevent the Court of Appeals from unnecessarily operating for an extended period of time without a full bench, which results in split decisions and delays in the important work of the court,” the bill’s text reads.
“Permitting the Governor to make an additional selection from the already approved list of qualified, recommended candidates for Chief Judge expedites the lengthy process currently required and promotes judicial efficiency,” it adds.
The bill was introduced by State Senator Brad Hoylman-Sigal, who clashed with Hochul over her nomination of LaSalle. It’s co-sponsored by Senator Luis Sepulveda, one of LaSalle’s only Democratic supporters in the Senate. All but two Democratic senators voted in favor of the bill last week.
Opponents of the legislation, including a number of legal associations who represent ethnic and racial legal communities that have typically been underrepresented in the state’s court system, say the bill will impede efforts to diversify the bench.
Though the list currently contains two Black jurists, both, Troutman and Wilson, are current members of the court.
“Were the Governor to select a sitting Associate Judge from the Court of Appeals as the next Chief Judge, and then select from this same list of nominees to fill that vacancy, there will be no opportunity for the Governor to consider an Asian American for the Associate Judge position,” the executive board of the Asian American Judges Association of New York said in a statement last week. “In fact, there will be no opportunity for the Governor to consider any candidate of color. Diversity of candidates is paramount in the selection process of an Associate Judge to our highest court, and so we call for that process to be complete, fair, and inclusive of all.”
The bill’s constitutionality has also been called into question.
“You can't change a constitutional process without a constitutional amendment,” Ali Najmi, an election and criminal defense attorney, told the Eagle last week.
Speaking to reporters last week, Hochul defended the bill.
“I read the constitution as well, it's constitutional,” she said. “We would only put it forward if we believed it was constitutional – it is.”
The governor is widely believed to be leaning toward selecting Troutman, or one of the other current justices, as her nominee for chief judge. Hochul nominated Troutman to the court last year, marking Hochul’s first nomination to the Court of Appeals since she assumed the governor’s office in 2021.
Should the bill pass, it’s believed that Hochul will select Halligan to fill the Court of Appeals vacancy. Hochul sought to retain Halligan when the battle between the governor and the Senate over LaSalle first began.
The governor will select her nominee between April 8 and April 23.
