More Texas Supreme Court endorsements for Jordan, Houston, Yanez

The Nacogdoches Daily Sentinel endorses Sam Houston and Linda Yanez for Texas Supreme Court:

Texas Supreme Court: ... Houston and Yañez get nods

It's time for change on all-Republican court

Three of the nine seats on the Texas Supreme Court are up for election this year, and all three have Republican incumbents facing competent Democratic challengers. Most voters probably have little idea about just who the court's justices are, and that's not only because of the usual obscurity of the court. It's also because these nine, all Republicans, think pretty much alike. It's time for a change.

The principal criticism of the court, which handles only civil cases, has been its uniformity in ruling for business in cases where it is pitted against consumers or workers.

By one measure, a study by University of Texas law professor David Anderson of the court's 2004 and 2005 tort cases in which the court issued an opinion, the defendant — usually a business — won 87 percent of the time. While the court should not be expected to rule 50-50 in such cases, 87 percent suggests that justice isn't blind at the Texas Supreme Court.

A good example of the court's tilt toward business was its 9-0 ruling in the Entergy case, which for the first time protected plant owners from negligence lawsuits when contracts workers were injured on the job. To reach that ruling the court had to ignore years of settled practice on that very point in Texas, as well as legislative intent. Facing a storm of criticism, the court has agreed to reconsider the ruling.

In another case, the court ruled 6-3 in a case that a Colleyville church could not be held liable for harm to a young woman held down for two hours against her will to free her of a demon. Constitutional protection for religious liberty, the majority said, protected the church.

There have been other embarrassments as well, with questions raised about some justices using their political accounts for personal travel expenses, one justice and his wife caught up in a suspicious fire that destroyed their home and yet another who tried to get the Legislature to pay his legal bills for defending himself in an ethics case...

Place 7 – Texans are so used to candidates of dubious qualification but well-known name running for public office that they might automatically dismiss someone named Sam Houston, 45, a Democrat who is challenging the Republican incumbent for this seat, Dale Wainwright, 47.

But voters should take this Houston — no relation to the original — seriously enough to vote for him. From Houston, Houston is a trial lawyer with broad litigation experience and a critic of the Supreme Court, which he says needs more balance.

Wainwright has a terrific résumé and is personally impressive, but his output has been light compared to the other justices.

...

Place 8 — Linda Yañez, 60, a Democrat on the state's 13th Court of Appeals, based in Corpus Christi, is challenging the incumbent, Phil Johnson, 63, a former chief justice of the 7th Court of Appeals at Amarillo.

Yañez, too, says the court needs to go more to the middle, and her up-from-the-bootstraps personal story would bring a useful perspective to a court dominated by the products of big law firms.

The Daily Texan endorses Jim Jordan and Linda Yanez for Texas Supreme Court (and Susan Strawn for the Court of Crininal Appeals):

Supreme Court Chief Justice: Jim Jordan

Democratic candidate Jim Jordan, who is running for chief justice against incumbent Wallace Jefferson, is a highly experienced, competent candidate that would provide the court the diversity of perspective it currently lacks. Jordan, a practicing attorney with more than 20 years of experience, has actively served the community as a member of the American Board of Trial Advocates and the Texas Association of Defense Counsel. Though Jordan is running as a Democrat, he believes that partisan politics should not interfere with the stance justices take on court cases. In a court that has been criticized for exceeding its Constitutional authority and ignoring the role of juries, we believe Jordan will use his legal knowledge and experience to bring the court back on track.

Supreme Court Justice, Place 8: Linda Yanez

While her opponent Phil Johnson is a respectable candidate, Linda Yanez is well-qualified to be part of the dissenting voice the court lacks. Yanez is a former Harvard Law School instructor and has been serving on the 13th Court of Appeals in Texas since Gov. Ann Richards appointed her in 1993. In her time on the court, she has authored more than 800 opinions and served on panel for more than 3,500. Yanez has the potential to bring a new perspective to the Supreme Court while moving quickly to help the court work through its backlog of cases.

Here's the Daily Texan endorsement in the race for Court of Criminal Appeals, Place 3: Susan Strawn

The experience of working with the United States Department of Justice for 14 years, as well as two additional years’ service with the United States Department of Treasury, has given Susan Strawn a modern, well-rounded knowledge of the inner workings of the nation’s court systems. A native Texan, Strawn has spent much of her public service career traveling to places like the Balkans and West Africa on behalf of the federal government. Her work in West Africa focused on the enforcement of anti-money laundering, anti-corruption and counter-terrorist financing laws. Strawn’s impressive resume leads us to conclude that she will work to provide necessary improvements to Texas’ Court of Criminal Appeals. Recently, the court has been criticized by others in the legal community for a history of absent and irresponsible judges. Thankfully, Strawn seeks to offer fresh and innovative solutions for the court’s future.

Here's a running tally of Texas Supreme Court newspaper endorsements for Sam Houston and Linda Yanez so far:

Sam Houston endorsements -

The Dallas Morning News
The Austin American Statesman
The Corpus Christi Caller Times
The Waco Tribune
The Nacogdoches Daily Sentinel

Linda Yanez endorsements -

The Houston Chronicle
The San Antonio Express News
The Austin American Statesman
The Corpus Christi Caller Times
The Waco Tribune
The Nacogdoches Daily Sentinel
The Bryan-College Station Eagle
The Daily Texan

The Bryan-College Station Eagle endorses Linda Yanez for Supreme Court

Recommendations in state judicial elections by Eagle Editorial Board

The two high courts have nine members each. Currently, all 18 places are filled by Republicans....

Supreme Court of Texas -- Place 8

Justice Phil Johnson, Republican, vs. Justice Linda Yañez, Democrat ...

Yañez was the first woman on the 13th Court of Appeals in Corpus Christi when she was appointed by Gov. Ann Richards in 1993. She has been elected several times since.

She says the Supreme Court has been too eager to overturn jury verdicts, which, she said, Johnson has done six times.

She also criticizes his productivity, noting he has authored only 13 opinions in his three years on the court.

Yañez notes that 50 percent of the civil cases filed in Texas involve family law, but the high court takes no such cases on appeal. She said the court has a hostility to plaintiffs and is result-oriented.

Justice Johnson has done a good job, but we are convinced that Justice Yañez would add a vibrant, intelligent voice to the court, one that it badly needs. Candidates don't come much better.

The Eagle recommends a vote for Justice Linda Yañez to Place 8 on the Supreme Court of Texas.

San Antonio Express News Endorses Justice Linda Yanez for Texas Supreme Court

In Place 8, we highly recommend Democratic challengerLinda Yañez.

Yañez, who is seeking the post now held by Justice Phil Johnson, is unusually well prepared to serve on the state's highest civil court.

Yañez was appointed to the 13th Court of Appeals in 1993 and has since been elected three times. She is making her second bid for the Texas Supreme Court.

During her 15 years on the appellate bench, the Edinburg resident has written 850 opinions. She is a serious, studious judge and a former Harvard Law School instructor. Along with her stellar credentials, Yañez is committed to fair application of the law for all sides. She would be a valuable asset to the high court.

Waco Tribune: "...Linda Yanez and Sam Houston rate your vote on the Texas Supreme Court"

Texas Supreme Court: ... Linda Yanez (D) and Sam Houston (D)

Even as we still find voters amongst us who have absolutely no idea what the Texas Supreme Court does, the high court continues to handle important business in the matter of civil and juvenile cases on appeal. ...

Texans couldn’t ask for a more seasoned and reasoned judicial candidate than Democrat Linda Yanez. She’s our recommendation for Place 8 on the court. Yanez has been on the 13th Court of Appeals in South Texas since her appointment
by Gov. Ann Richards in 1993. She has run once before for the state Supreme Court. Yanez would bring needed philosophical diversity to an all-Republican court that largely is cut of the same cloth.

Her opponent, Justice Phil Johnson, was appointed by Perry in 2005. He is impressive and scholarly. It’s tough to recommend against an incumbent. But if the two were side-by-side without the benefit of incumbency, Yanez would be an easy choice.

In the contest for Place 7, the Trib recommends another non-incumbent, Democrat Sam Houston, a highly regarded Houston attorney. His opponent, Justice Dale Wainwright, was appointed to the Supreme Court in 2003.

Wainwright has drawn fire for contributing to a court backlog. A WFAA-TV report tagged him as the slowest member of a court that doesn’t always deliver on the promise of swift justice. Houston, one of Texas Monthly’s “super lawyers,” would bring needed philosophical diversity to the court.

We also encourage lawmakers to seriously review our current system of electing judges, especially in the sometimes fiercely partisan way we do. In particular, we salute some of the ideas of 160th District Judge Jim Jordan, the impressive Dallas Democrat running against Chief Justice Jefferson this year. He has made it his platform to take party politics out of the judicial process.

One method he proposes would have judicial elections in the spring, when non-partisan school board and city council elections are held. He encourages the Texas Supreme Court to push — and push hard — for these badly needed reforms. “I think the bench and the bar need to be in the lead on this,” he told the Trib editorial board. We agree. It’s high time we took party politics out of Texas’ high courts.

From migrant worker to appellate judge, Yañez takes on next big challenge

From migrant worker to appellate judge, Yañez takes on next big challenge

By Jeremy Roebuck for The Monitor

EDINBURG -- Sitting under shade trees in the vegetable fields of Illinois, a teenage Linda Yañez devoured the classics. Books took her to cultures oceans away from her hometown of Rio Hondo and introduced her to ideas foreign to many of her fellow migrant farmworkers. Four decades later, the 59-year-old appellate judge and candidate for the Texas Supreme Court compares her work now to those summer afternoons spent reading and interpreting tales of lives so different from her own. "Every case is a life conflict," she said. "We can all read the same thing and read something different into it."

The path that led Yañez from life in rural Cameron County to her current position as the senior justice on the 13th Court of Appeals in Edinburg is as unlikely as it is circuitous.

Before she became a lawyer, she worked as a farmworker, a teacher, a community activist and a political campaigner.

Her resume reads like a list of firsts. In 1993, she became the first Hispanic woman to hold an appellate judgeship in Texas. Before that, she was the first female lawyer at her law firm.

And in a story often recited on the campaign trail, her status as a pregnant woman taking the bar exam in Chicago was so foreign to many of herfellow students that they requested she take the test in a separate room for fear that she might go into labor and cause a distraction.

Should she win her race for the Supreme Court's Place 8 come November, she would become the first Latina to serve on the state's highest bench and the first Democratic candidate elected to statewide office in 14 years. ...

"The reason that we have multi-member appellate courts is that there is supposed to be a debate among justices," she said. "We don't have that currently because all nine members are from the same political party."

CONFIDENT INCUMBENT

Yañez and her Republican opponent Johnson agree that commitment to principals and legal precedent should play a role in judicial decisions. But that's where their similarities end. Johnson bridles at the suggestion that he's part of a consistently pro-business court suffering from a backlog of cases ...

That perception is bolstered by a 2007 law review study that has been cited frequently in all three Supreme Court races this year. University of Texas Law School professor David Anderson found that corporate defendants won 87 percent of the cases the court handled in 2004 and 2005. ...

The genesis of Yañez's legal career came more improbably.

She began what she thought would be a lifelong career in teaching after graduating in 1970 from Pan American College, a predecessor to the University of Texas-Pan American. Working with migrant students in Weslaco, she saw many of the same injustices she experienced as a teen playing out in the lives of her students. At the time, school districts routinely barred children of illegal immigrants who were not citizens themselves from attending school and receiving an education.

But while working for Democrat George McGovern's 1972 presidential campaign, a mentor presented an unusual proposal. David Hall, now the head of Texas Rio Grande Legal Aid, suggested she consider changing careers. It took some convincing, but within four years Yañez had earned her law degree and was doing legal advocacy work for migrants in Chicago and back in the Rio Grande Valley. "It sounds really corny," she said. "But I really did have a purpose. I wanted to come back and represent the people that I came from." As legal aid attorney, she took on the state's practice of denying education to illegal immigrant students and won.

Then, after several more years of private practice work, her life took another unpredictable turn. Democratic Gov. Ann Richards appointed her to fill a vacancy on the 13th Court of Appeals. "It literally came out of nowhere," Yañez said. "While it was going on, I never even realized we had never had a Latina at the appellate level."

RETURN TO ROOTS

..."To watch her and see her as the first Hispanic female was critical," Justice Gina Benavides told The Monitor last year. "You have to know it can be done and that the opportunity is there."

Endorsements!

The Houston Chronicle

Texas Supreme Court
The Chronicle recommends voters choose Linda Yañez ...

Texas voters should require also that their high court justices thoroughly know the law, apply it with integrity and win the respect of their colleagues and the public by making decisions that are sound, fair and impartial. ...

• Linda Yañez, Texas Supreme Court, Place 8: Yañez is the Democratic challenger in this race. She has served 15 years as a justice on the 13th Court of Appeals. Active and well-respected in state and national legal circles, Yañez has an impressive grasp of the law and of the workings of the Supreme Court.
Noting that the high court justices ruled unanimously in almost all their decisions last term, Yañez promises to bring a fresh perspective to their proceedings.

"The challenge I will bring will be intellectual, not antagonistic," Yañez pledges.

The Dallas Morning News

The nine-member Texas Supreme Court is the state's highest civil court. It has been plagued by a backlog in recent years, taking more than four years after oral arguments in some cases to issue an opinion. And what used to be regarded as a lopsidedly "plaintiff's court" has now become regarded as an unbalanced "pro-business" court, a perception fueled by a legal study conducted by University of Texas School of Law professor David Anderson. It found that the court sided with defendants 87 percent of the time in 2004-05....

Sam Houston for Place 7 seat

Democratic challenger Sam Houston has built solid reputation defending clients against lawsuits and would bring some new ideas to the court. He argues that no one likes lawsuits, but sometimes they are necessary to ensure justice, and that justice is good for business. Mr. Houston, 45, would bring some welcome – and not token – philosophical diversity to the court.

The incumbent in this race says all the right things about being fair and balanced, but Republican Dale Wainwright does not adequately answer criticism about his work ethic. In the last full year statistics were available, for example, he wrote just four signed opinions – the second fewest of any justice on the court and the lowest among the three justices seeking re-election this year. Two of his most recent opinions date to cases heard in 2004.

Justice Wainwright, 47, says there are complex reasons for this, but lives are often on hold waiting for these opinions, and such delays are unacceptable. Justice Wainwright, previously a district judge in Harris County, has a sharp résumé, but voters should send a message to the court that long backlogs will not be tolerated by electing the respected and fresh-thinking Mr. Houston.

The Austin American Statesman

Texas Supreme Court ... Houston and Yanez get nods
It's time for change on all-Republican court

Three of the nine seats on the Texas Supreme Court are up for election this year, and all three have Republican incumbents facing competent Democratic challengers. Most voters probably have little idea about just who the court's justices are, and that's not only because of the usual obscurity of the court. It's also because these nine, all Republicans, think pretty much alike. It's time for a change.

The principal criticism of the court, which handles only civil cases, has been its uniformity in ruling for business in cases where it is pitted against consumers or workers.

By one measure, a study by University of Texas law professor David Anderson of the court's 2004 and 2005 tort cases in which the court issued an opinion, the defendant — usually a business — won 87 percent of the time. While the court should not be expected to rule 50-50 in such cases, 87 percent suggests that justice isn't blind at the Texas Supreme Court.

A good example of the court's tilt toward business was its 9-0 ruling in the Entergy case, which for the first time protected plant owners from negligence lawsuits when contracts workers were injured on the job. To reach that ruling the court had to ignore years of settled practice on that very point in Texas, as well as legislative intent. Facing a storm of criticism, the court has agreed to reconsider the ruling.

In another case, the court ruled 6-3 in a case that a Colleyville church could not be held liable for harm to a young woman held down for two hours against her will to free her of a demon. Constitutional protection for religious liberty, the majority said, protected the church.

There have been other embarrassments as well, with questions raised about some justices using their political accounts for personal travel expenses, one justice and his wife caught up in a suspicious fire that destroyed their home and yet another who tried to get the Legislature to pay his legal bills for defending himself in an ethics case.

However, the justices up for election this year, while criticized for some of their rulings, have not been caught up in out-of-court problems....

Place 7 – Texans are so used to candidates of dubious qualification but well-known name running for public office that they might automatically dismiss someone named Sam Houston, 45, a Democrat who is challenging the Republican incumbent for this seat, Dale Wainwright, 47.

But voters should take this Houston — no relation to the original — seriously enough to vote for him. From Houston, Houston is a trial lawyer with broad litigation experience and a critic of the Supreme Court, which he says needs more balance....

Place 8 — Linda Yañez, 60, a Democrat on the state's 13th Court of Appeals, based in Corpus Christi, is challenging the incumbent, Phil Johnson, 63, a former chief justice of the 7th Court of Appeals at Amarillo.

Yañez, too, says the court needs to go more to the middle, and her up-from-the-bootstraps personal story would bring a useful perspective to a court dominated by the products of big law firms.

The Corpus Christi Caller Times

Changes needed on state's highest appellate courts
Supreme Court, Court of Criminal Appeals need more political, philosophic balance

If given an opportunity, voters in Texas should try to bring more ideological balance to the Texas Supreme Court. Well, voters do have that opportunity in the Nov. 4 general election to make changes on the state's highest civil court by electing two new jurists.

There are three races for the Texas Supreme Court. The Caller-Times Editorial Board recommendations are:...

Place 7, Supreme Court

The Editorial Board recommends the election of Sam Houston, Democrat, a respected lawyer in Houston. He is an experienced lawyer and Baylor law school graduate who would bring greater political, legal and philosophic balance to the state's highest civil court.

"It has been my impression and many others (including noted professors of the law schools in the state)," said Houston, "that our Supreme Court frequently disregards jury verdicts and too often sides with defendants and corporations. I believe it is time to balance our court, which will best happen by electing a trial lawyer who is also a Democrat."

Houston's opponents on the ballot include the incumbent, Dale Wainwright, Republican. Wainwright has been on the court five years; it has been pointed out that he wrote only four signed opinions in the last year for which statistics were available. The other opponent in the race is David Smith, Libertarian, a lawyer in Henderson.

Place 8, Supreme Court

For Place 8, the Caller-Times recommends voters elect Linda Yanez, Democrat from Edinburg, who is the senior justice on the 13th Court of Appeals in Corpus Christi. Yanez is widely respected in the legal community and would also help bring greater political and judicial diversity to the court.

"All nine members of the Supreme Court are from the same political party," Yanez said, "which has translated into a 'groupthink' mentality . . . They are actually of one mindset."

The other candidates in the Place 8 race include incumbent Phil Johnson, Republican, who was appointed to the court in 2005 by Gov. Rick Perry. He was chief justice on the 7th Court of Appeals in Amarillo. While Johnson has been a dependable, solid member on the high court, Yanez would help to restore some needed balance. Drew Shirley, Libertarian, is a lawyer in Round Rock.

Like the state's Supreme Court, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals -- the state's highest court for criminal matters -- also needs greater balance. This court was once notorious for leaning toward the rights of defendants, but for the past decade or so, it has become notorious for being a prosecutors' court. Voters in this election have an opportunity to make one significant change.

Place 3, Criminal Appeals

The Caller-Times Editorial Board recommends the election of Susan Strawn, Democrat, a Houston lawyer who served 12 years with the U.S. Department of Justice, from 1990 to 2002. She served as a judicial reform adviser in Kosovo and in West Africa. Recently, she has been an adjunct professor at the University of Houston Law Center.

The incumbent in this race is Tom Price, Republican. He has been on the Court of Criminal Appeals for 11 years and over that period of time he has earned a reputation for his frequent absences and low productivity. The third candidate on the ballot is Matthew Eilers, Libertarian, a lawyer in Universal City.

Place 4, Criminal Appeals

Paul Womack, the incumbent in this race, has been on the court since 1996. He has been fined by the Texas Ethics Commission for failing to file campaign finance reports; his excuse, he said, was that he suffers from attention deficit disorder. The last time he ran for the position, in 2003, he said he would not run again, if elected, but he is back on the ballot seeking another six-year term. He has been criticized for teaching a law-school class which has taken away from his energy and time on the Court of Criminal Appeals....

Texas needs to get politics out of its top appellate courts -- the Texas Supreme Court and the Court of Criminal Appeals -- by adopting an appointive system for the state's highest courts with a non-partisan judicial screening committee. Meantime, voters have an opportunity in this election to achieve a little more balance on the courts by electing two Democratic challengers to the Supreme Court -- Sam Houston in Place 7 and Linda Yanez in Place 8 -- and by electing Susan Strawn, a Democrat, to the Court of Criminal Appeals.

Of course, two out of nine on the Supreme Court and one out of nine on the Court of Criminal Appeals would be a far cry from achieving the balance that is needed. But at least voices from the other side of the political, legal, and philosophic spectrum would be heard on the state's two highest appellate courts.

Some Excellent Democratic Primary Analysis

Charles Kuffner at Off the Kuff has some excellent number crunching and Democratic primary analysis of the Texas Supreme Court races:

Sam Houston beat Baltasar Cruz everywhere except in the four districts that will have Hispanic representatives - HDs 140, 143, 145, and 148, where Houston got a respectable 46%. Linda Yanez, on the other hand, beat Susan Criss everywhere except HD 134, where she got 48%. I confess, I'm amazed at how thoroughly Yanez dominated Criss.