Judicial Compensation in New York: A National Perspective, Report

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22 JUDICIAL COMPENSATION IN NEW YORK: A NATIONAL PERSPECTIVE There are important economic implications from a Judiciary that is underpaid and demoralized through eight and a half years of unchanged compensation levels. Many of the State’s corporate executives and business associations, like the Partnership for New York City and the New York State Business Council, will be meeting with Chief Judge Kaye on June 12, 2007 in an effort to galvanize support for the Judiciary’s pay reform efforts. C. JUDICIAL INDEPENDENCE Inadequate judicial salaries suggest potential harm to judicial independence and to the public’s perception of our justice system. The average citizen should have confidence that judges will decide cases with complete independence — free of any hint that decisions are influenced by judicial interest in accommodating governors and legislators who hold judges’ financial wherewithal in their hands. But this confidence is hard to preserve: • Where judges are forced, in a very public manner, to plead with elected officials for cost-of-living adjustments. • Where, despite wide agreement that judges need and deserve an increase, judicial salary issues are entangled in disputes over entirely unrelated issues. • Where legislators frequently are very vocal in publicly criticizing judges for their decisions. 50 The situation in New York clearly has the potential to adversely affect the public’s confidence in the independence of the Judiciary. D. COMPARATIVE WORTH We note additionally that compensation should bear some reasonable relationship to the value of a particular occupation. As one commentator has put it, “judges are worth much more, by any measure of social utility, than most law partners, but they are paid far less.” 51 Judges’ decisions not only determine the outcomes of particular disputes affecting the lives of individuals but also influence life in our communities, our economic well-being and the nature of society for years to come. Given the high social value of dispensing justice, providing New Yorkers with the best possible justice system is at the very heart of the Federal and State Constitutions — ensuring justice for all. 50 As was recently reported in the popular press, a member of the Legislature accused the State’s highest court of deciding a case (unrelated to judicial compensation), in a manner calculated not to “alienate legislative leaders” and jeopardize a potential salary increase. Lovett, “Pol Slaps Top Court on Ethics,” New York Post, May 11, 2007, at 12. 51 Steven Lubet, Judging Pay, The American Lawyer, March 3, 2003.
REPORT TO THE CHIEF JUDGE OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK 23 VI. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS NEW YORK REPRESENTS ONE OF THE MOST EXTREME EXAMPLES of judicial pay erosion that NCSC has observed over the past 33 years of studying state judicial compensation trends. The State’s legislative process for setting judicial compensation has failed to produce any salary adjustments since 1999 due to unrelated policy differences between the political branches of government. NCSC recommends that New York’s judicial salary levels be adjusted to address the significant erosion in New York’s judicial pay over the last eight years. Furthermore, NCSC recommends enactment of Chief Judge Kaye’s legislative proposal to establish a permanent commission-based system for the regular adjustment of judicial salaries. Such a measure is needed to ensure that judges receive regular cost-of-living adjustments and to insulate judicial salary issues from the State’s politicized legislative process.
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Judicial Compensation in New York: A National Perspective, Report

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