The
Governance of Trial Judges:
The Internal Politics of a Judges' Sponsoring Organization
Herbert Jacob
Abstract
The organization of trial courts is usually considered
in terms of its impact on the efficiency of case disposition. This
paper focuses on how the organization of a court is a by-product
of the relationships that develop among judges and how the resulting
organization affects the allocation of resources to different sets
of litigants and clients of a court. As a consequence of the manner
in which the court is organized, some litigants receive very little
court time and less qualified judges while others receive much court
time and the services of the court's most experienced judges. Clientele
groups such as specialized bars, central city commercial interests,
and suburban interests receive services in proportion to their ability
to penetrate the judge's sponsoring organization. These conclusions
are founded on research about one very large urban trial court (the
Circuit Court of Cook County, Illinois) which has 400 judges and
exercises exclusive jurisdiction over all cases in the county arising
under state law. The analysis is based on extended interviews with
all judges possessing supervisory authority and additional ordinary
judges (total n=54), official documents, and media reports. The
research puts flesh on the concept of a judge's sponsoring organization
and invites comparison with the sponsoring organizations of prosecutors,
plaintiff's attorneys, and defense attorneys.
Herbert Jacob, Department of Political
Science, Northwestern University
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