Find a cheaper ‘hobby’
Posted on Friday, October 10, 2008
This outrageous behavior has gone on long enough and it’s time that someone put a stop to it. There being no other volunteers, here goes. I have but one message for any political bullies in the audience, so they’d better listen and listen good: Stop twisting arms and putting guns to heads to compel people to do something they can ill afford to do. In short, stop forcing people to run for public office. Bullies are a pretty self-absorbed breed, when you get right down to it, so maybe those with a political bent don’t appreciate the sacrifices and hardships that go along with public service in Arkansas. Take, for example, judgeships. I have it on good authority that Arkansas judges are so underpaid that the bench is in danger of—if you aren’t sitting down, please do so at this time lest the shock of this potentially devastating revelation send you into a swoon that leaves you on the floor—in danger of attracting inferior legal minds. But wait, it gets worse. Arkansas judges are so underpaid that they can’t even afford to send their children to college. Others have to do it for them.
I guess judges’ kids never heard of working one’s way through college or applying for a student loan.
Ah, now that really takes me back. It was the 1970 s and I was working two part-time jobs to pay my tuition at a state-run college. Being a commuter—64 miles round trip five times a week—I thought a student loan might take some of the pressure off of me. As luck would have it, the lenders weren’t interested in only what I brought home each week, they also wanted to know how much my parents brought home. That year our household’s combined income was just a few bucks over the limit for a student loan, so I didn’t apply. Given inflation, maybe that’s why more judges’ kids don’t apply, either. When Mom or Dad knocks down six figures a year, like Arkansas judges, it would be a real exercise in futility.
Oh, did I forget to mention the specifics of judicial salaries in this state, where in 2006 the per-capita income was $ 19, 758 ?
Circuit judges—the people wearing black robes and presiding over cases at your local courthouse—make $ 137, 669 a year. State Appeals Court judges make $ 135, 515, except for the chief judge, who makes $ 137, 669, and state Supreme Court justices make $ 139, 821, except for the chief justice, who makes $ 151, 049.
And if anyone tries to tell you that Arkansas judges haven’t had a raise since Hector was a pup, don’t believe it. Cost-of-living increases have been as regular as clockwork for many years now, and if the judiciary’s COLAs haven’t kept pace with the actual cost of living, well, whose has ?
I’ve been acquainted with Justices Annabelle Clinton Imber and Donald L. Corbin of the Arkansas Supreme Court for many years, and they’re both nice enough people, but my heart didn’t exactly bleed when I read of their grousing about having to rely on relatives (Imber ) or use their inheritance (Corbin ) to get their children through college. Most Arkansans would feel blessed to get their children through high school.
But I’ll tell ya what did happen when I read our reporter Charlie Frago’s recent news story, “Low pay for judges poses risk to judiciary, justices say.” I almost choked. It was Corbin’s characterization of the illustrious seat he holds on the Arkansas Supreme Court as “an expensive hobby” that did it.
That’s a pretty blasé attitude coming from a fellow who hasn’t done much of anything since 1970 except run for elective office or hold one. Or has the former five-term state representative forgotten that bad case of tennis elbow—gladhand elbow, actually—he got in that first campaign for the Arkansas Court of Appeals, which he later served as chief judge before asking voters to put him on the Supreme Court ?
Testifying before a special committee on judicial salaries, Corbin said he was afraid that unless those salaries are raised and raised significantly, the only people interested in running for a seat on the high court will be young lawyers who see the salary as a step up.
As if he was never one of those. Of course, some of us have always operated under the assumption that a certain amount of prestige attaches to a judgeship, any judgeship. Addendum I’ll bet I’m not the only one who had a little trouble swallowing the morning coffee over Corbin’s “plight,” particularly that bit about how his “expensive hobby” has forced him to pay for his children’s education out of his inheritance. If memory serves, his wife is a successful lawyer in her own right, and all of their children have reached their majority. Surely he can afford to retire now and take up a cheaper hobby. Polo, anyone ?
—–––––•–––––—Associate Editor Meredith Oakley is editor of the Voices page.
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