the Supreme Court of Texas blog

In the past few days, the Wall Street Journal has run two separate opinion pieces about judicial elections — one from the left and one from the right.

Last weekend, the paper ran an op-ed titled “Justice for Sale” by James Sample, who directs the Brennan Center at NYU and has recently written a book highly [...]

[Read more →]

There were other contested judicial primaries (although none in Travis County, where this blog is based). In the First Court, the incumbent Sam Nuchia lost in his party primary 57% to 43%. The Associated Press gives a little background on the race:1

Republican voters also ousted the appellate judge who famously helped [...]

[Read more →]

Some of you may have noticed that there were other election contests yesterday, including some down-ballot elections in Texas.

There were two contested primaries for slots on the Texas Supreme Court, both on the Democratic side. According to the latest numbers from the Secretary of State’s website, the two winners appear to be Sam Houston [...]

[Read more →]

As the March 4, 2008 primary approaches, Texas newspapers are starting to weigh in on the Texas Supreme Court races.

This year, there are two contested primaries: the Democratic primary between Baltasar Cruz and Sam Houston (for Place 7) and the Democratic primary between Susan Criss and Linda Yañez (for Place 8).

Houston Chronicle endorses Sam Houston [...]

[Read more →]

The Houston Chronicle has conducted audio interviews with Justice Linda Yanez of the Thirteenth Court and Judge Susan Criss of Galveston. Both are running for the Democratic nomination for Place 8 to challenge Justice Phil Johnson this November.

“Linda Yanez discusses Supreme Court race” (2/4/2008). She discusses her background, how she came to run [...]

[Read more →]

The Dallas Morning News has posted a voters guide covering Texas contests, including the Texas Supreme Court races. The questions cover some aspects of judicial philosophy, campaign finance, the Court’s docket, and other matters. The newspaper received answers from the three sitting members of the Court, as well as four of the challengers.

You [...]

[Read more →]

In today’s decision in New York State Board of Elections v. Lopez Torres, available here, the United States Supreme Court reversed a Second Circuit decision that had invalidated the way New York selected judicial candidates for its trial court (known, in New York, as the “Supreme Court” because of its general jurisdiction).

The plaintiff was a [...]

[Read more →]

There is an interesting interview with Judge Susan Criss, candidate for Place 8 on the Texas Supreme Court, over at the political blog Off the Kuff.

As speculated earlier, Judge Criss is emphasizing her trial-court experience as a distinguishing feature from her opponent in the Democratic primary, Justice Linda Yanez. She also suggests that she [...]

[Read more →]

An article in Monday’s Fort Worth Star-Telegram highlights some of the political groups organized to support women running for office and, along the way, mentions the Susan Criss – Linda Yanez primary battle for a Texas Supreme Court seat.

I decided to write a post about it because the article piqued my curiosity about the history [...]

[Read more →]

Yesterday was the deadline for potential candidates to file for the three seats up for election on the Texas Supreme Court. None of the incumbents (all of whom are Republicans) have primary challengers.

Quite unlike 2000 — when none of the incumbent Justices running for reelection even had a Democratic challenger — five Democratic challengers [...]

[Read more →]