« Firearm advice for potential adoptive parents | Main | I love stories with happy endings »
Effect of the presidency on US Court of Appeals composition
An interesting graph. When the Obama Admin began in 2009, of the eleven numbered circuits, only the Ninth had a majority of Demo appointees, with the Second and Third being split 50-50.
In 2016, only four circuits (in the middle of the country) have a majority of Repub appointees; the other seven are all majority Demo appointees. (The same is true of the DC and Federal Circuits). What's also interesting in both Repub dominated and Demo dominated circuits, the proportions tend to be overwhelming, 66-33% or more.
2 Comments
It would also have been nice if GWB had bothered to perform his duty by filling the vacancies that came up during his term, instead of leaving them empty because he didn't want to argue with Chuck Schumer.
Once more, if our judges were honorable and truthfully followed the law and especially the Constitution, there would be no battle over democrat/republican on the bench. But we have dishonorable people who are self-serving or are bought and paid for by their party. A judge should not be partial to either side but every one I've studied is. They do not decide by law but by their own predilections. So we do battle over and over when no judge should occupy a position who cannot separate his/her opinions from his/her decision. The ability to properly distance oneself from one's predilections is a hallmark of a real science PhD or any true PhD for that matter. Too bad legal education falls so far short of the requirements necessary to reach logical reasoned valid decisions. When one allows one's predilections to get involved we get things like the so-called consensus on AGW, of which there is no such consensus.
Thus, IMO, if the system and the people being appointed truly were honorable, there would be no problem with choosing from either side.