Retired Senator Lynwood Lewis’s appointment as the next Eastern Shore Circuit Court Judge has been approved by the Virginia General Assembly. In unanimous votes on Thursday morning, both the Senate and the House approved several joint resolutions for a group of new judges to serve the Commonwealth, including Lewis’s nomination for the Shore’s seat as part of the Circuit Court resolutions.
Lewis was the only candidate called to testify before the Senate’s Committee for Courts of Justice and the House Committee for Courts of Justice this past Friday in Richmond.
Why was he the only one called to testify when there was another candidate who was highly recommended by the Bar Association, Attorneys, etc. ?
Political Favoritism Perhaps !
What a shame! He is a Liberal Democrat.
Well, the better candidate, District Court Judge Gordon Vincent, lost his bid for the Circuit Court Judgeship to a mediocrity, a part-time lawyer. Though overwhelmingly favored by members of the local bar association, the recipient of unanimous accolade from readers of the Eastern Shore Post, and though highly endorsed by the Post itself, Judge Vincent didn’t have a chance–the political hacks in the General Assembly had already fixed the game. Bottom line: Judicial excellence accounts for little on the Lower Shore, at least in the eyes of Virginia legislators, including our own Bob Bloxom. Judge Vincent will continue to maintain the high standards he has established at the District Court; meanwhile, Mr. Lewis will take the Circuit Court bench knowing that the majority of the lawyers facing him, as well as their clients, rate him a distant second-best.
Machine politics a la Tammany Hall and the O’Connell/Corning machine here in Virginia?
My goodness gracious, who’d a thought it:
HISTORY OF ALBANY COUNTY
by W. DENNIS DUGGAN
Published 2021
However, no story of Albany County’s legal history can be told without mentioning Dan O’Connell, a saloon keeper’s son and Erastus Corning, great grandson of Amasa Parker, a founder of Albany Law School who would become a Judge of the Court of Appeals.
O’Connell and Corning made and unmade judges from Justice Court to the Court of Appeals.
They had legions of powerful lawyers ready to do battle.
The Board of Elections was within their domain.
The City Common Council and County Legislature did not act unless with their approval.
Their District Attorneys were hand-picked.
Police Departments were the enforcement arm of their party.
They controlled the jury pools.
Fire Departments were a repository of their patronage.
Democratic Presidential candidates paid homage to their voter turnout abilities.
Their base was built on their ability to produce votes and supply jobs, the universal currency of politics at all levels.
Indeed, from 1920 to 1983 their political and thus legal control of Albany County was total.
For the greater part of the Twentieth Century, Dan O’Connell and Erastus Corning were the most influential figures in Legal Albany.
WELL PAST TIME FOR BLOXOM TO BE VOTED OUT, BY A REPUBLICAN, DEMOCRAT, OR OTHERWISE.
A Judge should not be a Republican or a Democrat, not conservative nor liberal. Both bring their agendas to the bench, and that is an absolute fact.
Justice is supposed to be blind.
Yeah, right.
Tell that to the politicians who hand pick the judges they want to judge them.
HOPEFULLY VOTERS WILL REMEMBER MR BLOXOM’S EGREGIOUS ACTION NEXT ELECTION.
An axiom of politics is that in the end, people have short memories, or so the politicians believe, and in my experience of politics over the years, I believe the axiom is quite true.
That’s assuming anyone outside of a handful even knows what just happened, or in this era of the jaded consumer, even cares.
“Democracy is a pathetic belief in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance.”
“No one in this world, so far as I know—and I have researched the records for years, and employed agents to help me—has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people.”
“Nor has anyone ever lost public office thereby.”
― H.L. Mencken, Notes on Democracy
An “old saw:”
Q: What do you call a lawyer with an IQ of 38?
A: Your Honor